Oral Answers to Questions

Alan Mak Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd October 2018 Commons Chamber

[Damien Moore (Southport) (Con)]

3. What steps he is taking to improve value for money and efficiency in the NHS.

[Alan Mak (Havant) (Con)]

7. What steps he is taking to improve value for money and efficiency in the NHS.

[The Minister for Health (Stephen Barclay)]

Having committed an additional £20 billion in real terms, the Government are asking the NHS to deliver a long-term plan that includes continued improvements in productivity and efficiency, and we are reinvesting the savings in improved patient care.

[Stephen Barclay]

I am keen to work with my hon. Friend to encourage Southport and other trusts to recycle equipment. I know from my family’s experience that it causes significant frustration when people see hospitals not collecting perfectly good medical equipment that could be recycled. I am keen to work with him and with trusts to ensure that we learn from that.

[Alan Mak]

Digitising patient records and removing outdated technologies such as fax machines can improve productivity and patient care across the NHS. What steps is my hon. Friend taking to prepare the NHS for the fourth industrial revolution?

[Stephen Barclay]

I commend my hon. Friend for his excellent report for the Centre for Policy Studies, which highlights the opportunities provided by technology. I was at a Scan4Safety event last night, looking at how barcodes are being used at six trusts, and at how that could be expanded to deliver 4:1 efficiency savings and improve patient care through the safety it offers.

Social Care Funding

Alan Mak Excerpts

Wednesday 17th October 2018 Commons Chamber

[Alan Mak (Havant) (Con)]

There are just 15,000 centenarians in the UK today, but the population aged 90 and over is growing rapidly. One in six people alive today—more than 10 million—will reach triple figures and get a letter from Her Majesty the Queen. Social care is at the heart of a system that must ensure that everyone can live a long and fulfilling life, and that is both an opportunity and a challenge. I welcome the Government’s action in this area, which is reflected by the Care Quality Commission’s conclusion in its annual state of care report that 82% of adult social care services are good or outstanding.

I commend the hard work of carers, professionals and management who work tirelessly every day to make sure that our loved ones receive the best possible care. That is certainly the case in my region. Across Hampshire, 26 of 28 care homes provided by Hampshire County Council are rated good or outstanding by the CQC. That includes, in my constituency, Malmesbury Lawn care home in Leigh Park. But we need to continue this success, and funding is an important aspect of that. I welcome the fact that the Government have given local authorities an extra £2 billion over the next three years to meet these challenges. I also welcome today’s announcement by the Secretary of State of the extra £240 million to help adult social care get through this winter. Hampshire will receive over £4.7 million, and that is extremely welcome.

However, it is clear that money is not the only issue that needs to be debated and is not the only solution to the challenge of a growing and ageing population. Only by embracing technology, as the fourth industrial revolution accelerates, can we keep more people out of care homes and in their own homes. Some local authorities are already moving forward at pace with ambitious plans to make sure that new technology plays a role in revolutionising social care. In my own region, Hampshire County Council has been at the forefront of the new wave of assistive care technology. That includes alarms worn by patients that can detect falls and epileptic fits, and even have GPS capability in case a dementia sufferer wanders from their care home. Around the county, 8,600 people benefit from supported by assistive technology.

The roll-out of such technology has saved the council about £7 million in domiciliary care and care home costs, so there is a financial benefit to it. Hampshire has also become the first authority to work with Amazon in trialling a new customised version of its Echo device to support people to live independently in their own homes, which should be one of the goals of the social care system. I commend the council’s Liz Fairhurst, the cabinet lead for this area. It is right that she has been shortlisted for the Local Government Association’s councillor achievement awards for this year. She has been a fantastic leader of adult social care services across Hampshire, and other county councils are following its lead.

The use of technology in adult social care is exciting and necessary. However, as I said in my Centre for Policy Studies paper published in May this year, we can make full use of all these technologies only if we end the culture of fax machines, pagers and paper in the NHS. Just as the NHS must go fully digital over the next 10 years, care homes, the care sector and local authorities must also be digital-first. That is the key to making sure that we can make the most of technology to help alleviate the challenges of adult social care in the years ahead. As the baby boomer generation ages, we have a new generation of tech-savvy pensioners who will be going through our care system for the first time. They will be a generation comfortable with new technology and willing to embrace digital care.

I understand that the pressures on the care system are not just financial, and that technology is not a silver bullet, but by deploying technology we can unlock savings, alleviate funding pressures, keep more residents in their homes, and deliver a better service. I hope that these aspirations will be reflected in the Secretary of State’s Green Paper when it comes out in the weeks ahead.

Oral Answers to Questions

Alan Mak Excerpts

Tuesday 24th July 2018 Commons Chamber

The Secretary of State was asked—

[Alan Mak (Havant) (Con)]

1. What recent progress has been made on providing patients with online access to NHS services.

[The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Matt Hancock)]

It is a great honour to be here, Mr Speaker.

There is good progress in patients using online services in the NHS—about a quarter of patients are now registered to access general practitioner online services, up from about a fifth a year ago—but there is much more to be done to use technology in the NHS for the benefit of patients and clinicians alike.

[Alan Mak]

I congratulate my right hon. Friend on his appointment. Healthcare delivered by app is increasingly popular with patients in Havant and across the country. Will my right hon. Friend reconfirm his Department’s commitment to the first ever NHS patient app, and update the House on the timetable for its roll-out?

[Matt Hancock]

The roll-out of technology right across the NHS and, indeed, social care is good for patients and good for clinicians. I have seen countless examples of that in just my first two weeks in this job. I pay tribute to the Centre for Policy Studies report, which was launched by my predecessor and authored by my hon. Friend, which demonstrates how apps can be useful for making healthcare easier to access for patients. Apps are popular with patients, and I cannot wait to drive that forward.

Health and Social Care (National Data Guardian) Bill

Alan Mak Excerpts

3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Friday 6th July 2018 Commons Chamber

[Alan Mak (Havant) (Con)]

It is a great pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Banbury (Victoria Prentis). I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone) on all his hard work taking the Bill through the House, and I commend him for steering it through Committee without amendment, which I think reflects the importance that the whole House places on this topic.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough has said, the National Data Guardian, Dame Fiona Caldicott, has already done much work to promote good practice in handling medical data, and I am sure that putting her role on a statutory footing will enhance that further. I join my hon. Friend the Member for Banbury and others in paying tribute to Dame Fiona, who has played an excellent role and been a strong voice for patients as our first National Data Guardian.

I am particularly pleased to speak in the debate because of my long-standing interest in the fourth industrial revolution, and because of the report I recently released, supported by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, on how we can better use technology and data to improve the NHS’s performance. This week, as we celebrate the 70th anniversary of the NHS, there is no better time not only to look back at its successes, but to look forward and consider how we can safeguard its future through the use of good data.

The NHS has been a long-standing user of good data, even since its infancy. In the 1950s it was data from 20 London hospitals that first proved the link between smoking and lung cancer, which has certainly saved many lives in the years since. Fast-forward to 2018, and the potential for using medical data to improve lives has certainly grown exponentially.

Despite the clear and unquestionable potential of the fourth industrial revolution, and the new technologies associated with it, many members of the public remain sceptical about its benefits. They, like me, have seen a number of attempts to digitise health services fail, from the national programme of IT under the previous Labour Government to the WannaCry hack last year. There is still much work to do to win over a sceptical public. That is why my argument, and my support for the Bill, is clear. I believe that shared data saves lives, and I believe that the National Data Guardian has an important role to play in spreading that message.

One of the principles of the National Data Guardian is the need to build a dialogue with the public about how we all want information about us to be used. Although the NHS is rightly introducing a wide range of digital services, I have no doubt that the service most coveted by patients and our constituents, especially those in the smartphone generation, is the long-awaited NHS smartphone app. Anyone who has used NHS digital services will know that a wide variety of options are available to patients.

One of the key recommendations of my report was that the NHS should introduce a one-stop shop, with an overarching app that would allow patients across the whole of England to book appointments, order repeat prescriptions, control access to data and seek advice on medical problems. The app would operate 24/7 so that patients could access the NHS at their fingertips, from the comfort of their sofa or their place of work.

My long-term vision is for a smart NHS that personalises medicine and treatment, and provides advice in one integrated place. That is why I was delighted that the Secretary of State recently announced that he will be taking forward plans to build this new NHS app, to ensure that the smartphone generation have access to healthcare at their fingertips. As the Secretary of State, the Minister and their colleagues at the Department of Health and Social Care begin the work of designing and implementing the app, I think that the National Data Guardian can play an important role in shaping its future. She should call for full integration of the app with paperless records to ensure that digitisation takes place across the whole NHS. Only by ensuring that the app is available to everybody can the NHS reach its full potential, delivering all the services envisioned in my report.

In conclusion, the healthcare of tomorrow will be powered by artificial intelligence, big data, automation and increasing digital connectivity. That is why the NHS must be a global leader in this field. At the same time, we must ensure that informed consent is not put at risk, and that the patient voice is kept at the heart of all treatment. Key to that is the role of the National Data Guardian, which is why I am very keen to see her role placed on a statutory footing. I am therefore delighted to support the Bill.

Gosport Independent Panel: Publication of Report

Alan Mak Excerpts

Wednesday 20th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his comments and agree with what he says. Of course, if the police decide to bring forward criminal prosecutions, that would have the support of the Government, but the police must make that decision independently. If a family feel that an injustice has been done, who can they go to if they feel that ranks are being closed? I think we have made progress on that question, but we need to reflect very carefully on whether it is enough progress.

[Alan Mak (Havant) (Con)]

The events at the hospital and the panel’s report are of significant interest to me and my constituents, and those of my hon. Friend the Member for Meon Valley (George Hollingbery), on whose behalf I am also speaking. His constituents and mine have asked whether the families can be confident that the report’s findings will be acted on and that people will be held accountable for what happened.

[Mr Hunt]

My hon. Friend is right to ask that question. The best parallel is the Hillsborough process, which was also led by Bishop Jones. A similar report was published that put documents into the public arena, essentially enabling people to understand truthfully what happened. On the basis of that, inquests were reopened, criminal prosecutions happened and so on. We are at that stage of the process. I hope that the transparency and thoroughness of the report will give families hope that they are at last being listened to.

Oral Answers to Questions

Alan Mak Excerpts

Tuesday 19th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Luke Graham (Ochil and South Perthshire) (Con)]

5. What steps his Department is taking to support UK life sciences and medical research.

[Alan Mak (Havant) (Con)]

22. What steps his Department is taking to support UK life sciences and medical research.

[The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Mr Jeremy Hunt)]

The life sciences sector is critical to the UK economy, which is why we support it with a £1 billion annual grant through the National Institute for Health Research.

[Mr Hunt]

I am happy to do that. The life sciences industry is critical to Scotland, and Scotland’s role is critical to the UK. We all remember Dolly the sheep being pioneered in Edinburgh University, and last week’s announcement of a new centre in Renfrewshire is another good example of the great things happening in Scotland.

[Alan Mak]

The use of big data and artificial intelligence in medical research has the potential to save hundreds of thousands of lives. Will my right hon. Friend consider setting up data hubs and support the full digitisation of patient records?

[Mr Hunt]

My hon. Friend is very knowledgeable about that area. We have announced the creation of a set of digital innovation hubs, and perhaps we can broaden those to turn them into the hubs that he thinks would be a good idea.

Oral Answers to Questions

Alan Mak Excerpts

Tuesday 8th May 2018 Commons Chamber

[Steve Brine]

This issue has received a lot of publicity in recent weeks. My noble Friend Lord O’Shaughnessy and I wrote to Vertex following that debate and asked it to be reasonable and continue, with vigour, its negotiations with NHS England. That letter was made public, as was the company’s actually quite positive response last week. I urge the company again to come to a reasonable conclusion.

[Alan Mak (Havant) (Con)]

Healthcare delivered by app and other new technologies is increasingly popular with patients. Will my right hon. Friend undertake to ensure that the NHS fully explores the possibilities of new technologies when delivering front-line services?

[Mr Hunt]

I will absolutely do that. I congratulate my hon. Friend on the excellent report that he published last week on that very topic. We want to be the first country in the world where all patients can access their own medical record through an app.

Oral Answers to Questions

Alan Mak Excerpts

Tuesday 20th March 2018 Commons Chamber

The Secretary of State was asked—

[Alan Mak (Havant) (Con)]

1. What progress his Department is making on implementing the Government's Life Sciences Industrial Strategy.

[The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Mr Jeremy Hunt)]

The UK has a fantastic life sciences industry. As a result of the sector deal announced in December, a further £210 million is being invested in research and £162 million in medical manufacturing.

[Alan Mak]

Patient outcomes can be improved by sharing big datasets and integrating new technologies, such as artificial intelligence, across the NHS. Will my right hon. Friend update the House on the NHS’s plans to digitise and adapt to the fourth industrial revolution?

[Mr Hunt]

I am looking forward to reading my hon. Friend’s report into this topic in May. We are a bit of a curate’s egg in this country. We have five of the world’s top 10 medical research universities and more than double the number of Nobel prizes of France, so we do incredibly well on the research side, but some of our hospitals are still running on paper, which is totally inappropriate. That is why we are determined to implement the Wachter review.

 Orkambi and Cystic Fibrosis

Alan Mak Excerpts

Monday 19th March 2018 Westminster Hall

[Alan Mak (Havant) (Con)]

My constituency, and that of my right hon. Friend the Member for Portsmouth North (Penny Mordaunt), were among the top three constituencies for people signing the petition. Will my hon. Friend join me in calling on the Minister to get Vertex, the NHS and NICE to continue their negotiations, because time is of the essence?

[Paul Scully]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. It is important, because every day counts for people who have the condition. I said that cystic fibrosis cannot be caught, but neither can it be cured. The people who have cystic fibrosis now will be the same people who have it for the rest of their lives, which basically means that the supply of Orkambi would have a fixed price. We know pretty well, within a margin, how much we would spend on this lifelong treatment.

The current evaluation process turns on an incremental cost-efficiency ratio, which is the total additional lifetime cost of a treatment divided by the additional quality-adjusted life years resulting from that treatment. For acute conditions, the additional quality-adjusted life years resulting from the shorter-term treatments moderate the efficiency ratio, even if the drug is expensive. However, because drugs for chronic and lifelong conditions have to be taken every day for life, the cost of the treatment prevents that downward moderation. Basically, it is easier, under the NICE appraisal system, for medicines for acute conditions to attain a more favourable cost-effectiveness outcome than for innovative medications for chronic conditions, like Orkambi. It is basically a one-size system.

We then have to take into account section 13G of the National Health Service Act 2006, as amended by the Health and Social Care Act 2012, which requires NHS England to have regard to the need to reduce inequalities in health outcomes. Those two imbalances in the system need to be looked at if we are to have a system that is far fairer for people with illnesses such as cystic fibrosis.

Oral Answers to Questions

Alan Mak Excerpts

Tuesday 20th December 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

We now feel considerably better informed.

[Mr Alan Mak (Havant) (Con)]

Advertising agencies and industry bodies can play a key role in ensuring that adverts are appropriate. Will the Minister continue working with the industry to tackle child obesity?

[Nicola Blackwood]

Yes.