Baroness Keeley
Main Page: Baroness Keeley (Labour - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Baroness Keeley's debates with the Cabinet Office
(2 years, 2 months ago)
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Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
Order. I was about to draw matters to a close, it being 17 minutes past 2, but I appreciate that those on the Opposition Front Bench might point out that the people for the next debate are not yet present. Therefore, I will extend the statement for a very short while, but I should note that it is not very good practice not to be here.
Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab)
As one exasperated constituent put it, having not been able to get a GP appointment,
“It seems there are too many patients and not enough doctors and this has gotten worse over the last few years.”
My constituents can grasp the workforce issue, but it seems that the Secretary of State cannot. I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Wirral South (Alison McGovern) that it is deeply worrying that the new Secretary of State did not mention the pay of care staff, when that is the crucial issue if we are to tackle the 160,000 vacancies in the care sector. Will the Secretary of State tell me why the Government are choosing not to tackle the shortage of doctors, nurses and care staff, which is leading to such long wait times for my constituents?
