Oral Answers to Questions

Barry Sheerman Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd June 2015 Commons Chamber

[Alistair Burt]

I thank my hon. Friend for raising this subject. He is absolutely right: Willen hospice in his constituency, next door to mine, has an excellent reputation, as does St John’s hospice in Moggerhanger in my constituency. We are all indebted to hospices for the invaluable work they do. I am sure that he and the House will be interested to hear that, from April, there will be pilot projects working on a new funding formula for palliative care, with the aim of providing a fair and transparent process and improvements. I expect that there will be a report to the House in due course.

[Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)]

Does the Minister agree that there is a deeper ongoing problem in the financing of hospices? Kirkwood hospice in my constituency faces it all the time. Is it not about time we tackled long term the roots of the problem of funding hospices?

[Alistair Burt]

That is probably tied into the whole issue of end-of-life care. A review of that is going on, as the hon. Gentleman may be aware. End-of-life care is important. Choices for people about where they wish to end their days is very important, and the Choice review which reported recently, whose recommendations the Government are considering, will make further progress. Hospice funding is part of that, but we expect local commissioners to take notice of what hospices can provide for those in their area.