Hospital Beds: Availability

Debate between Lord Dubs and Lord O'Shaughnessy

Thursday 9th February 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Dubs]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what is their estimate of the number of hospital beds currently occupied by persons who could be discharged.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health (Lord O'Shaughnessy) (Con)]

My Lords, the most recently published figures—for the last Thursday of December 2016—reported that 6,191 people who were occupying hospital beds were ready to return home or transfer to another form of care.

[Lord Dubs (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for that reply. I am extremely puzzled because the official NHS figures I have been looking at suggest that, in November, there were 200,000 people blocking beds. What is more significant, all the experts say that the actual number of bed-blockers is three times the size of the official figure. Bed-blocking means that people are not given the best possible care and beds are blocked for others who could be admitted. Surely we have to solve this problem quickly.

[Lord O'Shaughnessy]

My Lords, the figures that the noble Lord is referring to are across the whole month. He may be aware that new figures have been published today, which show that an increasing proportion of delayed transfers is due to the availability of social care packages. He will also know that this reflects the changing nature of the patient demographic, which is becoming older and frailer. I agree with him that this needs addressing urgently, which is why the Government took action in the Autumn Statement to increase social care funding. We need to address the wide variation in the rate of delayed discharge from local authority to local authority. As the Prime Minister has said, in the long run we need a more sustainable solution.