Queen’s Speech

Baroness Masham of Ilton Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd June 2015 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Masham of Ilton (CB)]

My Lords, I would first like to pay tribute to the noble Earl, Lord Howe, who worked so hard for the NHS and took a great deal of trouble answering many of your Lordships’ questions, including my own. I hope that the incoming Minister will pick up the many challenges surrounding the NHS.

I will quote what was said in the Queen’s Speech about,

“ensuring the National Health Service works on a seven-day basis. Measures will be introduced to improve access to general practitioners and to mental health care”.

I hope that the Minister, when summing up the debate, may tell your Lordships what these measures will be. Can this really happen or is it a pipe dream?

I live in a rural area where the surgery is open only four and a half days a week. My GP does not work on a Friday and my previous GP went to Canada. A lady who had a stroke some time ago recently telephoned the surgery when it was open as her medication was of a different brand from the one that she was used to. The surgery never rang back. When her carer telephoned 111, an ambulance was sent and she was taken to A&E. I feel that the Government’s idea of the NHS working on a seven-day basis would be of great benefit to patients but, if communication was better now, it would be at least a start towards better care. Communication and quick answers are so important between all medical services and patients, between NHS England and hospital trusts, and between Public Health England and social services.

There is no doubt that, in the rural area of North Yorkshire where I live, the veterinary out-of-hours service is far superior to that of the medical service. A vet rings back far quicker. Usually, it is a local vet who knows the area and is on an out-of-hours rota who attends.

How can England retain the doctors that we have? Are there going to be more medical schools to train more doctors? Should there not be a system so that they would have to stay in England for a said period after training?

Physiotherapists and occupational therapists are very important for rehabilitation. I know that some of those posts have been cut in hospital trusts that are in debt. This is a dilemma. Specialist nurses are vital for supporting such conditions as stroke, Parkinson’s disease, tuberculosis, spinal injuries, HIV, diabetes and so many others. Without enough specialist staff, the standards of the NHS will fall.

I ask the Government whether they agree with me that patient safety should be the top priority. We must stop tragedies happening where there is neglect and fear, as happened in the Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust; in Morecambe Bay, where babies and mothers died through inadequate care; and in Stepping Hill Hospital near Manchester, where patients were murdered by a rogue nurse injecting insulin into saline bags.

One drain on the National Health Service is the employment of agency nurses and doctors. I am glad that this is being addressed. We need well-trained, honest staff. Without doubt, this is one of the challenges facing the NHS.

As president of the Spinal Injuries Association, I am concerned about the very specialised treatments covering spinal injuries—neurology, orthopaedics, urology and sociology—being classed as rehabilitation only. It should be a specialist subject in its own right, which might help in getting good-quality medics, who are so badly needed, and would be an investment for the future.

It is of great concern that so many patients are misdiagnosed and that GPs do not send them on to the appropriate specialists quickly enough. This has been found to be the case so often; for example, by patients with multiple sclerosis who have to go three, four or five times to their GP before being sent for the appropriate tests and to a neurologist. This problem was highlighted last week by a young cancer patient who was diagnosed as having dietary anaemia because she was young, even though she had symptoms of cancer. She had aggressive cancer and died soon after finally being diagnosed. The Teenage Cancer Trust said:

“Sadly this story is not uncommon and is something we see time and time again in this age group … one in four young people with cancer have to visit their GP four times or more before being referred to a specialist”.

Surely something should, could and must be done to improve this unacceptable situation.

I cannot go without mentioning the wheelchair service, which is so important to so many seriously disabled people. Its slowness to achieve its objects needs looking at urgently.

It is estimated that 3.5 million people will be affected by a rare disease at some point in their lives. There are many examples of excellent practice for those with rare diseases throughout the UK, but unfortunately they are more often the exception than the rule. I ask the Government what progress is being made on the UK strategy for rare diseases. To meet the needs of people with rare diseases there needs to be collaboration between industry, healthcare professionals, universities and patient organisations.

I shall mention briefly mental health—it is such an important subject, but time restricts me. What are Her Majesty’s Government doing to help prison staff deal with the many people with the combination of having committed a crime and suffering a mental health condition? I do not think that prison staff are trained to cope in an unsatisfactory environment with mental health conditions.

Finally and by no means least, I feel that infection control should come high on the list of priorities. We should not be complacent because matters have improved in some situations. The global rate of drug resistance to antibiotics is increasing. Recently, I attended the showing of a film on resistance produced in the USA which illustrates what a vital aspect of living antibiotics are. We desperately need new ones as resistance increases worldwide.

One of the new Members of Parliament lost her father in a Yorkshire hospital to MRSA. She will campaign on these matters. They are of the utmost importance in safeguarding society.