Health and Social Care

Anne Marie Morris Excerpts

Thursday 16th January 2020 Commons Chamber

[Anne Marie Morris (Newton Abbot) (Con)]

That was a very thought-provoking, emotional and personal contribution from the hon. Member for Vauxhall (Florence Eshalomi), who I very much welcome to this place. She made some very important points about the NHS and knife crime, and I look forward to her working with all of us in this House to deliver exactly what she rightly says we must. I congratulate her.

It is right that health and care are a substantial part of this Gracious Speech, but it must be about action, not just words and promises. Across the House, whichever party we represent, we must deliver on what our constituents need and want and what we have promised them. I welcome the inquiry into social care. My concern is that this has been promised by Governments for years, and it seems to be taking forever and a day. This is urgent—it cannot wait. We must talk cross-party and look at the work that has been done, rather than do it all over again. Let us look at what works and does not work, take the good and move forward. I would like to see a Bill on social care in this Parliament.

Integration is another key issue. Members across the House have pushed for integration, and we need to make it happen. NHS England has proposed legislation to unblock the things preventing this from working. I am pleased to see the Bill to implement the NHS long-term plan, but I would like it to be more ambitious. It is right to address the commissioning challenge, but the Bill does not address the overlapping regulatory system, the conflicting accountability between health and social care or any of the legal relationships. Where are we with sustainability and transformation partnerships and integrated care systems? They have no legal status, yet we look to them to deliver a solution on integration. More must be done, and we must be bold.

Across the Chamber, we agree that mental health is a priority, but again, where is the ambition? Dealing with detention is crucial, but we must also look at parity of esteem. It is not defined. We talk about mental health representing something like 23% of the burden on the NHS, but how is that measured? Is that really the totality of the issue? We need to define parity of esteem, be clear how we will measure the need and address that need as a matter of urgency. We talk about achieving parity of esteem over the next 10 years, but that seems an incredibly long time. I would like to see a proper plan, and I would like to see parity considerably sooner than 10 years from now.

There was an extremely well-made speech a little earlier about wellbeing. For so long, we have talked about the NHS and health, but actually we talk about illness, not about wellness. When we talk about Public Health England, that is not the only part of trying to ensure wellbeing. Professor Dame Sally Davies, the former chief medical officer, has said that wellness is as important as dealing with illness. I would like to see that fully addressed, and I very much hope that those on the Front Bench are listening and will take that seriously.

The assets that we have to address our problems are not infinite. We have some wonderful people, we have some wonderful infrastructure—buildings and hospitals—and we have some wonderful technology.

[Neil Parish (Tiverton and Honiton) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is making a really strong speech. Talking of assets, in my constituency we have community hospitals in Honiton, Axminster and Seaton, which could be used to much greater effect to take some of the pressures off the acute hospitals. Honiton does good work with Ottery St Mary and others in the neighbouring seat of East Devon. Can we actually get these assets working better for us? I welcome what the Secretary of State said in his speech earlier.

[Anne Marie Morris]

My hon. Friend makes a very good point, and I was very pleased to hear the Secretary of State say that community hospitals were valuable. We must have a fundamental rethink of the infrastructure and look at what we really need. In rural areas, where we cannot get to the best stroke centre, say, we must think seriously about how we use or reuse such facilities.

[Dr Whitford]

Talking about assets, do we not also need to sweat the assets that are in the community? In Scotland, we have had community pharmacies with minor ailment services since 2005, and we now have the same for optometrists, to the point that only a tiny percentage of people ever need to go to A&E if they have an eye injury, a red eye or another problem.

[Anne Marie Morris]

The hon. Lady—I almost said my hon. Friend because we share some common issues, and she is a great spokesman from the SNP Benches—is absolutely right. I think we would actually all agree that we need to look at the people who deliver these services and at the breadth we have, and involve them all appropriately.

We must also look at the new professions with the new associate levels. Physician associates take a huge part of the burden, and have a great career across the whole of primary and secondary care. Let us be innovative and creative, and provide the training, the financial support and the respect that I think many people working in our health system feel they do not necessarily receive from this place, although clearly they feel they have it from their patients. IT has always been the call of the Secretary of State, but again, let us be more imaginative. It is not just about communication; it is also about diagnosis and the delivery of care. There is much that can be done.

The Queen’s Speech refers to a medicines and medical devices Bill, which it is absolutely critical to get right. I am very keen to look at the speed of getting medicines to patients, but we need to do more than deal with clinical trials. There is much that has to be done with regard to the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency and NICE and their systems. I would like to see the approach to access to medicines be more ambitious.

Finally—I am getting the evil eye, I think, Madam Deputy Speaker—I am very pleased that in the NHS Funding Bill we are now committing to enshrine increased spending in law. My concern is: do we have the right level of spending, how will we be measuring need and is that spending matching the increase in demand? That is a good promise, but it needs considerably more work.

This Government have done a good job in setting out some of the key issues and priorities that we as a House need to address, but we must look at the detail, we must implement this and we must deliver.