NHS Funding

Debate between Andy Sawford and Joan Ruddock

Wednesday 12th December 2012 Commons Chamber

[Andy Sawford (Corby) (Lab/Co-op)]

My right hon. Friend will be aware that my constituents have similar concerns about the future of their local hospital in Kettering, despite assurances that changes are being driven by the best clinical advice and guidance and by clinical outcomes. Contrary to the unrecognisable picture described by those on the Government Benches, we know that the cuts in Kettering hospital’s services, which will affect my constituents in Corby and east Northamptonshire, are a result of a £48 million deficit that is a direct result of the Government’s policies. Does my right hon. Friend share my concern that this is about those cuts in funding rather than the clinical outcomes?

[Dame Joan Ruddock]

I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention. If all hon. Members are honest in providing a record of what is happening on the ground, we will see that the reality is, indeed, cuts and reductions in services.

It is a case of not only how much money we spend on the NHS, but how wisely we can spend it, and there may be agreement throughout the House on that. [Interruption.] I say to the hon. Member for Beverley and Holderness (Mr Stuart) that just four years ago, Lewisham hospital gained a new wing through a successful and affordable private finance initiative contract. Just two years ago, a state of the art new birthing centre was opened, and only in April of this year the £12 million refurbishment of the A and E department was completed.

Now, however, the trust special administrator proposes to close both the full A and E service and the full maternity service at Lewisham hospital. The consequence of closing the A and E department and replacing it with an urgent care centre means the closure of the intensive care unit, the coronary care unit and the acute medical and elderly medical services. Every year, more than 13,000 people benefit from those acute services, 4,500 babies are born in the maternity unit, and more than 120,000 people use the A and E department.

The proposals are, to be frank, catastrophic—they will remove vital services from a growing population of more than 270,000 people. This is an accountant’s solution to a problem that does not even exist in Lewisham itself. Not a single constituent, patient, GP or hospital specialist has come to me in support of the plans.

My colleagues, Lewisham hospital trust and I are not opposed to change aimed at greater efficiencies and higher standards. Indeed, that was the Labour Government’s policy and philosophy for the NHS all along. We know that closures of small hospitals have led to safer services. We know that paramedic services and blue-light ambulances taking people to highly specialised centres save lives every day. We also know that the NHS could be more efficient, but there is no evidence that the needs of Lewisham people for A and E or maternity services can be safely met elsewhere in south-east London. All other existing provision is full to capacity, and travel from most of Lewisham to Woolwich is highly problematic.

The TSA report is full of assertions and aspirations that are completely divorced from the realities of people’s lives in a borough that contains some of the most deprived wards in the UK. If the proposals were to go ahead, the 750,000 residents in the boroughs of Lewisham, Greenwich and Bromley would be dependent on a single A and E department. As the report says, hospitals are part of a bigger NHS family, which is why the Secretary of State must look at London as a whole. It cannot be just or sensible to try to find enormous financial savings to rescue one health trust by destroying another.

The public have had just 30 days to respond to the extraordinary proposals in what is a deeply flawed consultation process, but such is the anger that more than 32,000 people, including more than 100 local GPs, had added their names to a petition started by my hon. Friend the Member for Lewisham East (Heidi Alexander) by the time we presented it to No. 10 last Friday.

Last week the trust board of Lewisham hospital issued its response. It supports in principle the merger of Lewisham with Queen Elizabeth hospital in Woolwich, and I must say that that is worth considering, but the trust says:

“We are concerned that the financial modelling completed by the TSA team at pace will include errors that will work against financial viability of the proposed Lewisham Healthcare NHS Trust and Queen Elizabeth hospital reorganisation.”

That would simply repeat the history of the hospitals in the South London Healthcare NHS Trust that have had continuing financial problems.

The trust board goes on to say:

“The TSA process has made it impossible to have the engagement and involvement that proposals such as these would normally warrant, and our clinicians do not feel they have been listened to in this process.”

The rest of its submission to the TSA is entirely damning. It says:

“We do not believe there is a convincing case for the major change of services proposed in Lewisham. The TSA has overlooked the significant role that LHT provides in the broader provision of services to local people. The TSA recommendations will result in worse, rather than better, care for the people of Lewisham. We believe a health and equalities impact assessment would show this but has not yet been completed—a significant weakness of the TSA Report.”

When the Secretary of State comes to view the TSA’s report, whatever form it takes, I urge him also to review all of the evidence that has been presented by local people, local experts, local consultants, GPs and the hospital trust itself. As the local Save Lewisham Hospital campaign says, this is not a difficult decision for the Government—it is potentially a deadly one. I urge him to give the most careful consideration to what is being said. The criticisms are damning and we have absolutely no faith in the proposals that the TSA will put before him.