Government Vision on Prevention
Debate between Lord O'Shaughnessy and Lord Framlingham(5 years, 8 months ago)
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Lord O’Shaughnessy
My noble friend is quite right. The campaigns took quite different approaches. One used tax and regulation and the other used destigmatisation and the provision of services, but they were highly successful and I reassure him that the knowledge and learning from those campaigns influence our current prevention strategy.
Lord Framlingham (Con)
Given how unhelpful much of the advertising is nowadays, how brave are the Government prepared to be in curtailing it?
Lord O’Shaughnessy
We have said that we will clamp down on junk food advertising. Clearly we have cut down on the advertising of alcohol, smoking and many other things over successive Governments. This country has led the way in dealing with this sort of issue, so I am confident that we will have the necessary approach.
NHS Winter Crisis
Debate between Lord O'Shaughnessy and Lord Framlingham(6 years, 6 months ago)
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Lord O’Shaughnessy
First, I join the noble Baroness by reiterating on a personal basis a tribute to the staff who have worked so hard over this period. I think we all know many of those people, and they do an extraordinary job. Social care is clearly a really important part of the picture because it is not just the flows into hospitals but the flows out. A lot of that is to do with delayed transfers of care. That is one reason why additional funding has been going in—I think it is £1 billion this year. It is important to point out that all local authorities have now signed up to plans to reduce what are called DToCs, in the jargon. DToCs have been falling, which means that there is the opportunity to get people out of hospital. That could be into a care home or residential care or it could be to their own home.
Lord Framlingham (Con)
My Lords, the disastrous white elephant which is HS2 will cost a minimum of £60 billion. The NHS needs £5 billion to balance the books, and a fraction of HS2’s cost would provide finance for the NHS for years to come. I urge the Minister to please urge the Government to scrap HS2 and spend the money saved on sensible projects, with the NHS at the top of the list.