Coronavirus and Care Homes

Barry Gardiner Excerpts

Tuesday 19th May 2020 Commons Chamber

[Matt Hancock]

Yes, we are doing a huge amount of work now to ensure that there is protection in the future should there be a further increase, and in particular in advance of winter in case there is strong seasonality to this disease. As a clinician himself, my hon. Friend understands the importance of these areas and we will absolutely take the idea he put forward and run with it.

[Barry Gardiner (Brent North) (Lab) [V]]

Brent Council was at the epicentre of the initial covid outbreak, with one of the highest hospital death rates in the country, but back in February it spent £1.5 million to purchase PPE, which it made available to its care homes. In March, it established a separate care facility to provide 14 days’ isolation for any patients discharged from hospital back into the care system, whether or not they had tested positive for coronavirus. Now Brent has one of the lowest number of care home deaths in London. I know the right hon. Gentleman will want to congratulate Brent, which actually did put in place a protective ring around its care homes, but what he must answer is: if Brent Council had the good sense and foresight to get this right, why didn’t he?

[Matt Hancock]

The hon. Gentleman makes a really important point and it comes to the nub of the challenge around care home policy. I do want to congratulate Brent. I think that the work it did was important, but, of course, formally and in the law responsibility for care homes is for local councils and some local councils, like Brent and others, have done a magnificent job. However, I also understand that it is a reality of political life and our constitution that I as Secretary of State for Health and Social Care am also responsible, and I take that responsibility very seriously. However, when it comes to longer-term reform, this does bring a conundrum because the policy levers that I have as Secretary of State are only through councils, which themselves have to then act.

On the funding side we have seen this challenge. We put in £1.6 billion at the start of this crisis through councils without a ring fence, and there are questions being raised about how much of that has got to the frontline, so for the £600 million we put through on Friday we have put in a very firm ring fence, so it must be paid in a timely manner through to care providers. I think this actually raises a question not just for the crisis but for the longer term. When I am held accountable at this Dispatch Box for the actions of local authorities, I can give support, but we do not have the direct levers. We have not even had the direct data flows through to the centre, and we are putting that right too.