Oral Answers to Questions

Andrew Selous Excerpts

Tuesday 19th October 2021 Commons Chamber

[Edward Argar]

I am grateful, I think, to the shadow Minister. We have a very clear definition of a new hospital, which I believe is shared by the public. It also leans on VAT notice 708 and its definition of what constitutes a new build or a refurbishment. To his specific question, we are committed to our manifesto commitment of 40 new hospitals by 2030—we build, the Opposition complain.

[Andrew Selous (South West Bedfordshire) (Con)]

T1. If he will make a statement on his departmental responsibilities.

[The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Sajid Javid)]

If I may, I would like to take this opportunity to remember my friend and colleague James Brokenshire, who shall be sorely missed, and I would like to dedicate this statement to my colleague Sir David Amess.

Sir David was a friend, and I had the privilege of knowing his kindness, his compassion and his selflessness at first hand. For those who did not, Sir David’s record tells them everything they need to know. His first concern was never his own rank or status, but the cause of the underdog, the vulnerable, the marginalised and the forgotten. As well as on fuel poverty and in standing up for animal welfare, Sir David left his mark on my own brief in campaigning to tackle obesity, chairing the Conservative Back-Bench health committee and launching the all-party parliamentary group on endometriosis. That disease would never affect him personally, but it was raised by one of his constituents in his surgery—exactly like the one he was taking when he was killed. His legacy is the many lives that he touched, and I know that, like me, Members across the House will miss him terribly.

[Andrew Selous]

Of course I agree with every word of that very fine tribute to our two lost colleagues.

I represent an area of high housing growth so general practice provision needs to increase as the houses go up, but my clinical commissioning group tells me that NHS capital often appears at incredibly short notice and then disappears just as quickly. Can we try to get the provision of new general practices on a planned basis as the new houses go up?

[Sajid Javid]

My hon. Friend is right to raise this. Capital is allocated by two CCGs on a regional basis that is weighted by population, and, as he says, if that population changes, the weighting also changes. Additional funding can sometimes be allocated from section 106 or community infrastructure levy funding as well, but I am more than happy, if my hon. Friend would like, to meet him to discuss this further.