Bus Services Bill [Lords]

Debate between Andy Burnham and Lilian Greenwood

3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Monday 27th March 2017 Commons Chamber

[Andy Burnham]

Well, I will call it a partnership Bill, if that makes my hon. Friend feel a bit more at ease. It is certainly a rare example of common sense breaking out on both sides of the House.

I want to pay particular tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Riverside (Mrs Ellman). As she said a moment ago, she has consistently spoken of the damaging effects of bus deregulation—the free-for-all, the decline in the quality of services and the increase in fares. She has been consistent, and she is vindicated tonight as the Bill finally goes through the House. So, too, is my hon. Friend the Member for Blackley and Broughton (Graham Stringer), who made the same argument throughout the years, including under the Labour Government, and who has waited a long time to see this Bill come to pass.

To be successful in the new role that I seek, I will seek to use the powers in the Bill for the benefit of the travelling public in Greater Manchester. For 32 years, we have had a bus service that has been run for private vested interests rather than in the public interest. Only last week, a whole new series of service alterations were announced that will decrease the quality and coverage of services across Greater Manchester, with no real ability for communities to challenge those decisions. Well, that way of running bus services is coming to an end.

[Lilian Greenwood]

I am very much enjoying my right hon. Friend’s speech. Does he agree that, contrary to what the right hon. Member for Chipping Barnet (Mrs Villiers) said, the Bill seeks to enhance competition and the role of the private sector by having really effective competition off the road? On-road competition has not delivered for passengers.

[Andy Burnham]

That is absolutely the point. If we construct a franchise process that really puts the public interest first, and we then ask the private sector to meet that public interest, that will be a much better system; indeed, it is the system the right hon. Lady’s constituents benefit from in London. The question I was going to ask her was, why, if she thinks that is okay for her constituents, is she seeking to deny it to ours? That is not an acceptable position for her to take.

NHS Services (Access)

Debate between Andy Burnham and Lilian Greenwood

Wednesday 15th October 2014 Commons Chamber

[Andy Burnham]

My hon. Friend is right. We heard the commitment that the Deputy Prime Minister gave last week, and I am sure that he means it, but people will ask why they have not done anything about it in this Parliament. It is lip service. We introduced talking therapies and many other things. The key point is that they cut it faster than they cut the rest of the NHS. Worse still, they introduced a tariff decision this year that will cut it even further and make the problems even worse. It was Labour that proposed parity of esteem between mental and physical health in law. The Government accepted it, but they have done absolutely nothing about it.

[Lilian Greenwood (Nottingham South) (Lab)]

One of the groups most affected by cuts to mental health services is children. On this Government’s watch we have seen increasing numbers of children with mental health difficulties treated on adult psychiatric wards. Is that not completely unacceptable?

[Andy Burnham]

My hon. Friend puts it very well. If mental health is the poor relation of the NHS, then child and adolescent mental health services are the poor relation of the poor relation. How can that be the case when we are talking about children who need the best possible support—the most vulnerable children—being denied the services that they need? My hon. Friend the Member for Leicester West (Liz Kendall) discussed at a shadow health team meeting a constituency case where a family were trying to find a bed for a child who was in a crisis and not one bed was available for that child in the whole country—not one bed. She is nodding. That is the reality. I wish that Government Members would focus on that rather than making complacent statements.

No amount of spin from the Government can disguise the fact that the NHS is heading for the rocks and urgently needs turning around, so the question is how we get it back on track. I have two positive proposals to put before the House on policy direction and on funding. Let me take each in turn. Instead of just admitting privately that the reorganisation was a mistake, the Government should be actively working with us to begin to put it right—and they will soon have a chance to do so. In five weeks, my hon. Friend the Member for Eltham (Clive Efford) will bring a Bill before this House to repeal the worst aspects of the Health and Social Care Act 2012. When the Government’s reorganisation was going through, their mantra was “Doctors will decide.” The Prime Minister repeated this in his “Today” programme interview during the Conservative party conference when he said:

“there’s nothing we’ve done which makes it more likely there’ll be private provision in the NHS”.