NHS

Debate between Victoria Atkins and Simon Clarke

Thursday 23rd May 2024 Commons Chamber

[Victoria Atkins]

I join the hon. Lady in thanking her local NHS staff, and, indeed, NHS staff throughout the country. The NHS employs more than 1.3 million people, and every single one of them contributes in their own way, from clinicians to nurses to hospital porters to administrative staff. All those people play a really important part in keeping us well and safe.

Notwithstanding the picture that the hon. Lady has sought to paint, I hope she will have the graciousness to acknowledge that we are diagnosing more cancer cases, and diagnosing them more quickly at stages 1 and 2. I hope she will acknowledge, for example, that some nine out of 10 cancer patients are treated within 31 days of a decision to treat them, and that the average waiting time in England—not Wales—is just under 15 weeks. Of course there is more to do, but we have plans in place.

I also urge the hon. Lady to look carefully at our dental recovery plan. We have seen more practices open up to provide more NHS appointments, and as the recovery plan is rolled out, we will see up to 2.5 million more appointments, roughly three times as many as will be seen under Labour’s dental recovery plans. Compare and contrast!

[Sir Simon Clarke (Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland) (Con)]

Let me add my best wishes for your retirement, Madam Deputy Speaker. I hope it will be a long and happy one.

I thank my right hon. Friend for her statement. As waiting-list figures continue to fall, which is fantastic, it is vital that we continue to boost access to primary care, so will she join me in welcoming the news that the excellent Garth surgery in Gisborough, in my constituency, is seeking to expand by creating six new consulting rooms and more space for the recruitment of GP registrars?

[Victoria Atkins]

I thank my right hon. Friend for presenting us with what is happening on the ground, rather than the relentless doom and gloom that we hear from the Opposition. There are excellent examples in our local areas of people not just enjoying working in the NHS, but thriving in it. My right hon. Friend’s general practice will be one of those that have contributed to the 60 million more GP appointments made available in the last year—an election promise that we made in 2019, and have kept. Let me explain the maths to the Opposition: that means more than 1 million primary care appointments each working day. That is something of which we should all be proud, and for which we should thank our GPs.