Health Infrastructure Plan
William Wragg Excerpts(5 years, 2 months ago)
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Edward Argar
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman both for his question and for the reasonable tone in which he pitched it. [Interruption.] Indeed, he is always reasonable. As he knows, the capital investment will allow for investment in a new hospital, providing a range of services across emergency, maternity and specific out-patient and other diagnostic services. As for consistency of care and the experience of patients, the hon. Gentleman is absolutely right to pay tribute to the fantastic work done day in, day out by the NHS workforce, and that is why we have seen that workforce grow under this Government. Equally, however, when I visit hospitals, as I have done since I was appointed, I observe that the infrastructure and the buildings in which they operate can play a huge part in delivering not only consistency of care, but speed of care and speed of access. That capital investment in the hon. Gentleman’s local hospital will play a huge part in giving its excellent staff the tools with which to do their job and the environment in which to do it, and he will see that delivering better and more consistent care to patients.
Mr William Wragg (Hazel Grove) (Con)
During the summer, we welcomed the £30.6 million investment in a new urgent care centre at Stepping Hill Hospital. Does the Minister agree, however, that support will be needed for infrastructure, particularly for adequate car parking? That is a big issue for local residents, who regularly experience problems parking.
Edward Argar
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Capital improvements in hospitals are hugely important, but it is also important for them to be set within the broader context of car parking and other facilities to ensure that those hospitals can run smoothly.
Oral Answers to Questions
William Wragg Excerpts(5 years, 11 months ago)
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Mr Speaker
I call Alistair Carmichael. Where is the fellow? I hope that he is not in Orkney and Shetland because that would be a pity. Never mind, I am sure that we will see him ere long.
Mr William Wragg (Hazel Grove) (Con)
Colin Clark (Gordon) (Con)
The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Matt Hancock)
In September, we announced £145 million to upgrade NHS facilities for winter and, last month, £1 billion as part of the NHS long-term plan. Future capital spending decisions will be for the spending review.
Mr Wragg
I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for his answer. He will know the importance of Stepping Hill Hospital to my constituents. Will he work with me and others to ensure that the hospital can secure additional capital investment to expand accident and emergency, improve outpatient facilities and provide additional car parking?
Matt Hancock
I look forward to working with my hon. Friend and his local colleagues on what we can do to support Stepping Hill Hospital further. He is an assiduous representative for Hazel Grove who makes the argument very clearly, both to me and to the NHS Minister, who has already heard from him on several occasions. We did manage to provide £1 million for upgrades to Stepping Hill Hospital ahead of this winter and we understand the case that they make.
Cyber-bullying: Young People’s Mental Health
William Wragg Excerpts(6 years, 8 months ago)
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Alex Chalk (Cheltenham) (Con)
I am delighted to be able to lead this debate, even at this comparatively late hour, about the effect of cyber-bullying on young people’s mental health. This important debate arises out of a cross-party inquiry that I set up in Parliament to look into this issue and which published its report earlier this year. It took evidence from over 1,000 young people and was supported by the excellent charities the Children’s Society and YoungMinds, which showed conspicuous dedication, skill and professionalism. Without them, this important work could not have been done. I am very grateful too to colleagues from across the House—Conservative, Labour and Scottish National party colleagues—for their valuable input, as well as to the many witnesses who gave evidence.
Just to provide a bit of context, this all really arises out of my experiences as a constituency MP. I visited schools in Cheltenham, from Bournside to All Saints’, and I spoke to parents and agencies such as Teens in Crisis, which has been commissioned by some schools to provide regular support. I became deeply struck—I fancy that other hon. Members in this House have as well—by the apparent increase in child and adolescent mental health problems. To me at any rate, it does not feel so much like a temporary spike, but more like a lasting surge. I want to say a bit about that before turning to the specific issue of cyber-bullying and what our inquiry found.
Mr William Wragg (Hazel Grove) (Con)
As a member of that panel, I want to place on record my thanks to my hon. Friend, who has shown such leadership in this area. I also pay tribute to the young people who gave evidence to the panel. That evidence was deeply moving at times and it was a real credit to them given what they have been through.
Alex Chalk
I am very grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention. He should not be modest about his contribution, which was absolutely fantastic and gratefully received.
To say a little more about the context, recent research by the Prince’s Trust suggested that young people’s wellbeing has declined over the last 12 months and is now at its lowest level since the study was first commissioned in 2009. What is interesting as well is that this is not just a British phenomenon. A recent article by NBC in the United States, citing research from Johns Hopkins University, referred to an acute mental health crisis happening among members of the youngest generation of Americans, with, as the article put it,
“critical implications for the country’s future.”
Similar data is emerging from France and Germany.
Much of the debate in this House has been about a cure—about how we go about fixing the problems after they have emerged. We have debated achieving parity of esteem, funding child and adolescent mental health service beds closer to home, and so on. All that is vitally important, of course, but equal attention must be paid to prevention. Why is the surge happening in the first place? How can we stop it taking root?
Oral Answers to Questions
William Wragg Excerpts(7 years, 5 months ago)
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Justin Tomlinson (North Swindon) (Con)
2. What steps are being taken to increase the supply of doctors and nurses in the NHS.
Mr William Wragg (Hazel Grove) (Con)
12. What steps his Department is taking to increase the number of doctors and nurses working in the NHS.
The Secretary of State for Health (Mr Jeremy Hunt)
Last year this Government announced one of the biggest expansions of medical training places in the history of the NHS, involving funding 1,500 additional medical school places every year—of which 500 start this September—and reforms that will enable universities to offer up to 10,000 additional nurse training places every year.
Mr Hunt
My hon. Friend makes a really important point. In parts of the country, GP shortages have been successfully addressed as the CCG has done in Swindon. An important part of this is persuading people who go into medicine that general practice is one of the most exciting and rapidly changing parts of medicine today. We have seen a 9% increase in the number of medical students choosing to go into general practice since 2015.
Mr Hunt
I heard a lot about Stepping Hill when I went to visit my hon. Friend; I think it was last year. I had the privilege of visiting the hospital more recently after the horrific terrorist attacks, and I commend the hospital for the brilliant work that it did in the wake of the bomb. The hospital has done a good job of recruiting; I think it has recruited 93 more doctors and nearly 300 more nurses since 2010. A national programme to help all trusts to retain their nursing staff has been launched by NHS Improvement in the last week.