Children’s Cardiac Surgery (Glenfield)

Debate between Lord Garnier and David Tredinnick

Monday 22nd October 2012 Westminster Hall

[David Tredinnick (Bosworth) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone. I offer many congratulations to my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Harborough (Sir Edward Garnier), who very deservedly received a knighthood recently. I remind him that that is of course a tradition in his constituency, as his predecessor was also knighted. I served with Sir John Farr in my first Parliament, and he did so much for hosiery and knitwear in his constituency. I welcome my hon. Friend the Minister to the Front Bench. It is very nice to see her there.

It is clear from remarks that hon. Members have made that there is universal and cross-party support for retaining children’s services at Glenfield. One of the first decisions of the new Secretary of State for Health was to call the matter that we are debating in for review. That bodes well, because my right hon. Friend did so well with the Olympics that I believe he will do just as well as Secretary of State for Health. His decision shows his light touch. The fact that we now have a second chance to consider the issues, and the welcome arrival of a letter today, saying that the Independent Reconfiguration Panel will commence a full review and report not later than 28 February, is a huge relief for the county. My hon. Friend the Minister has already intervened to point out that she cannot second-guess what it will say, but the point of today’s debate is to give Leicestershire Members on both sides of the House an opportunity to show how concerned we are about the decision and to make some points about it.

I shall not repeat the points made by my hon. Friend the Member for Harborough or the hon. Member for Leicester South (Jonathan Ashworth), who engagingly described my hon. Friend as learned; I think, Mr Hollobone, that we are not allowed to do that any more. Did not the reforms of the House say that we could not call—

[Sir Edward Garnier]

You can make an exception.

[David Tredinnick]

My hon. and learned Friend says I can make an exception for him, and I am delighted to do that.

The first point I want to make is that there is real concern that we are working on faulty statistics. The data used to make the decision were based on 2006-07. We need only consider the recent publication of the census in London to see the huge increase that there has been in population. There are shifting populations, and there is concern that the analysis is fundamentally flawed. It is not only my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Health who has had to consider flawed data recently. What about the west coast main line, whereby we found we were operating with completely inaccurate information? The right hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne East (Mr Brown) nods his head. This can happen in Departments, and we must take note of it.

My hon. and learned Friend the Member for Harborough and the hon. Member for Leicester South have addressed the issue of the ECMO link. To most reasonable people, it seems absurd that the two decisions will not be linked. I am sure that there are legal arguments, but somehow we must get a sensible decision so that both issues can be considered together.

The next point concerns the site of Glenfield. Glenfield is a hugely popular hospital not just with patients, but with surgeons. From, one might say, a feng shui point of view, it is on top of a hill outside the city, and it has a good, clean, clear energy. That is why everybody likes working there: it is nicer for everybody than the Birmingham site, as is proven, I would suggest, by a survey showing that only 2% of the staff in Glenfield want to move to Birmingham. It is not just BBC current affairs programmes that are jumpy about moving out of their current locations, as there is a real problem with the decision to move from Glenfield to Birmingham, as the hon. Member for Leicester South said. The body of knowledge built up over 20 years will dissipate, because many of the people who work at Glenfield simply will not move.

My next point involves the increased pressure on Birmingham, which has been referred to. Can Birmingham deal with it? Somewhere in the briefing papers is a point about Bristol. What happens if something goes wrong at Bristol and patients are moved around? My hon. and learned Friend the Member for Harborough made the point about the terrible tragedy in Wales, during which patients have been brought to Glenfield. Is it wise to concentrate all the resources in the midlands in one centre? I wonder whether it is.