Health and Social Care Bill

Baroness Whitaker Excerpts

Monday 13th February 2012 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Whitaker]

My Lords, in supporting this group of amendments to which I have put my name, perhaps I may first say how grateful I am to the Minister for his letter of 29 November in response to the Committee debate. He confirmed in that letter that speech language and communication needs are included in the remit of public health. This group of amendments simply makes that clear for the Secretary of State and for commissioning groups. I suggest that it would not otherwise be clear. Look at what has happened: 70 per cent of British Sign Language users admitted to A&E units will have no interpreter provided. Increasing numbers of people with hearing loss have problems even with making appointments and understanding the diagnosis of their GP.

Since Committee, as the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, would have said and as the noble Baroness, Lady Hollins, said, the report of the communication champion, Ms Jean Gross, has been published with further evidence of cuts by 10 local authorities to speech therapy services of more than 15 per cent. The Royal College of Speech And Language Therapists reports that 70 of 109 such services jointly funded by the National Health Service and the education authorities had lost the NHS element. More than half of newly qualified speech therapists have not found jobs. This crisis in the provision of speech and communication therapy means that for a significant proportion of children with these conditions—I remind the House that it is the most common disability of childhood, which substantially limits the chances of reaching their potential at work and even in relationships—this problem will be neglected without the kind of emphasis that these amendments provide. It needs to be clear that the health duties will include communication needs.

[Baroness Thornton]

My Lords, briefly, we support these amendments and commend the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, and my noble friend for tabling them again because they are indeed important. I got quite excited when I saw the original spelling which was out there because I was thinking, “Is this about TB or HIV? This is a new one on me”. Nevertheless, this is a very important group of amendments because, as the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, and other Members of the House have pointed out over many years, if you do not deal with the communication, speech and language problems of children at an early stage, you are storing up problems for the future. Indeed, Jean Gross’s report on front-line speech therapy for children is a cause for great concern, because it is quite clear that significant gaps are already appearing because of the cuts that have been made to provision.

I point out to the House that the allied health professionals have expressed their very grave concern about these issues by saying that they would like the Bill not to proceed. They are among the many thousands of health workers who, in this case, have been saying that for some extremely good reasons. Perhaps the noble Baroness would like to explain to the House what she is doing to persuade the allied health professionals and the speech and language therapists why the Bill will help them do their job any better, when it is quite clear that the services to children with speech and language therapies are already suffering.