GP Services

Debate between Caroline Lucas and Dan Poulter

Thursday 5th February 2015 Commons Chamber

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

I add my congratulations to the hon. Member for Halton (Derek Twigg) on securing the debate. I am very pleased to have worked with him to have this opportunity today to discuss the vital issue of building sustainable GP services.

Proper funding for our GP services is vital for good patient care, easing pressure on hospitals and ongoing sustainability. The question we need to ask is this: why have Ministers allowed a trend of consistently falling GP funding? The Royal College of General Practitioners made its own concern clear back in June 2013 with an urgent call for an increase in GPs’ share of the NHS budget, so that 10,000 more GPs could be hired. However, recent figures reveal funding to be at an all-time low of 8.3%, something which shows a worrying complacency. In response, more than 300,000 people, including many in my constituency, have signed the RCGP’s petition, “Put patients first: back general practice”. The petition calls for more money to be allocated to GP services. Alongside the campaign, the BMA has conducted clear analysis of the serious work load pressure facing GPs, an issue so many hon. Members have raised today.

As the Minister well knows, the drop in share of the NHS budget for our doctors’ surgeries comes at a time when GPs are under increasing pressure and are having to see more and more patients. A situation in which they are seeing 40 to 60 patients a day is simply unsustainable for both patients and doctors. It is horrifying that 80% of GPs say that they do not have sufficient resources to provide high-quality patient care.

GPs in my constituency are telling me that good patient care is being destroyed because of what they see as impossible demands, including as a result of privatisation and a lack of funding for primary care services. For example, in a joint letter to me, seven local GPs said:

“There is no doubt that general practice is really suffering from the lack of investment, impossible demands and never ending re-organisations. If we could stop having administrative battles and spend our precious hours on patient care we would all be much happier, and the service would be better and significantly cheaper to run.”

[Dr Poulter]

I commend the hon. Lady for making points on behalf of her local GPs. She talked about privatisation. Would she not accept that the funding model for GPs as small businesses in their own right has existed since 1948, when Nye Bevan created the NHS?

[Caroline Lucas]

I accept that, of course. When I talk about privatisation, I guess what I am referring to is constant fragmentation: the way in which NHS England, CCGs and others are still struggling to get a streamlined process, which makes it more difficult for patients to be seen when they need to be seen and by the person who needs to see them.

NHS (Government Spending)

Debate between Caroline Lucas and Dan Poulter

Wednesday 28th January 2015 Commons Chamber

[Dr Poulter]

Such drivel, frankly, is beneath the hon. Lady. We have made considerable additional investment in the NHS. Comparisons between an NHS run by a coalition Government in England and the NHS in Wales bear up very well for the NHS in England.

[Caroline Lucas]

Just before I came into this debate I met a 10-year-old constituent, Margot, and her mother, who works for the NHS. She works all hours and still struggles to put enough food on the table. Can the Minister explain why the Prime Minister does not care about NHS workers? That is what Margot wants to know and that is what the rest of the country want to know.

[Dr Poulter]

I am familiar with the hon. Lady’s constituency, having worked as a doctor at a hospital in the area. Her question is very disingenuous when we have increased the number of front-line clinical staff working in our NHS, investing in more staff to treat patients. We have also recently agreed with the unions a pay deal that will see the majority of NHS staff receiving a substantial increase in pay, thanks largely to their increments. Other staff will receive 1%.

Care Bill [Lords]

Debate between Caroline Lucas and Dan Poulter

Tuesday 11th March 2014 Commons Chamber

[Dr Poulter]

rose—

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

rose—

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Caroline Lucas and Dan Poulter

Tuesday 26th November 2013 Commons Chamber

[Dr Poulter]

My hon. Friend makes some important points about the funding formula. He will know that for the first time this year, it will be set independently by NHS England, and I am sure that it will take on board the points that he has made. He will recognise, however, that there are many other determinants of the funding formula, such as deprivation, which it will want to look at and take into account.

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

T5. The last time I asked the Secretary of State about the £30 million-worth of cuts forced on hospitals in Brighton and Sussex, he said that it was all down to local discretion. Does he admit that behind his rhetoric about protecting the NHS budget there still lies a real 4% cut to the centrally dictated national tariff? Does he acknowledge, therefore, that hard-working nurses and doctors have to do more with less money while patients suffer? Will he reverse those cuts?

Green Economy

Debate between Caroline Lucas and Dan Poulter

Thursday 28th June 2012 Commons Chamber

[Caroline Lucas]

It does not make me feel any better to know it is also closing plants in other parts of the world. It has clearly said one of the reasons why it did not go ahead in Sheerness was that it did not have enough orders for turbines on the order book. If that is a problem here in the UK, we should be addressing that, rather than worrying about what is happening in China.

One measure that would provide huge and tangible benefits both in my constituency and the rest of the UK is a massive investment in making the UK housing stock super-energy efficient. As others have said, that would not only be good in terms of getting our emissions down and creating lots of jobs; crucially, it would help tackle fuel poverty as well. This measure should be funded not through more levies on energy bills—as the Government plan, and which is inherently regressive—but from using funds such as the revenue from the carbon price floor and auctions of carbon emissions permits through the EU emissions trading scheme. That would have benefits in job creation, tackling high energy bills and achieving rapid emissions cuts. Some 118 Members have now signed the early-day motion on the Energy Bill Revolution campaign, which calls for precisely this step.

Members support that EDM because they know that, sadly, as it is currently designed, the green deal policy instrument is extraordinarily weak and the energy company obligation part of it—the bit that is supposed to be tackling fuel poverty—looks set to fail miserably both against the Government’s own objectives and in terms of doing what is needed to cut carbon emissions and end fuel poverty. The truth is that the final shape of that fuel poverty package could result in a 50% drop in the funding targeted at low-income and financially deprived households. There will be far less money in the ECO than there is in the measures that are being phased out—the carbon emissions reduction target, the community energy saving programme and Warm Front.

[Dr Daniel Poulter (Central Suffolk and North Ipswich) (Con)]

I think the hon. Lady is being disingenuous, to say the very least, in respect of this Government. It is because of the policies of this Government that we are seeing investment in increasing numbers of offshore wind farms, not only off the Kent coast, but, as I am sure my hon. Friend the Member for Waveney (Peter Aldous) will point out in his speech, off our coast in Suffolk. Will the hon. Lady at least accept that there have been many good advances in green energy—some of which are being delivered right now in Suffolk?

[Caroline Lucas]

That has probably happened in spite of Government policy, not because of Government policy. [Interruption.] I hear the muttering on the Government Benches, but what I say is true. The measures of investment figures show that under this Government investment in green technologies has decreased.

[Dr Poulter]

rose—

[Caroline Lucas]

I apologise, but I will not give way again, as I do not have much time left.

For many low-income households the green deal financial mechanism simply does not stack up. [Interruption.] The mechanism is based on loans with interest rates of between 6% and 7%. That creates the risk that these loans will be taken up by middle-class and well-off households, which might be able to afford to take them up without needing any support, rather than by less-affluent families with next-to-nothing in their pockets. Although there are limitations in respect of this market mechanism, if we are going to use it, we will at least need support to bring interest rates down to a more realistic level—as Germany has done through the development bank, KfW.

Renewable energy enjoys massive public support. That is true even of wind—although judging by the outcry from some Tory Back Benchers, we would be forgiven for assuming otherwise. In November, a YouGov survey found strong support for renewables, with 60% of people supporting wind power subsidies. The Prime Minister said in his half-speech at the clean energy ministerial meeting in April that he passionately believed that the rapid growth of renewable energy was vital to the UK’s future, but, sadly, his Government’s policies do not reflect those warm words. Instead, we hear rumours that he and his Chancellor are seeking backroom deals for a 25% cut in subsidies to onshore wind. Any reduction beyond the proposed 10% cut to wind subsidies would fly in the face of environmental and economic common sense, jeopardising the future of both onshore wind and investment in other renewables across the country, as well as the thousands of jobs they could bring.

The solar feed-in tariff fiasco provides another example of coalition Ministers creating harmful uncertainty. As one solar company in my constituency described it, the industry has had to endure a series of “unsettling knee-jerk changes” that have undermined not only investor confidence, but public confidence in the solar industry. Solar energy has huge potential in the UK and it is a tragedy that we are not supporting it more.

Marine energy also has massive potential. With the right support the UK industry could seize almost a quarter of the world’s potential market, according to the Carbon Trust. That would be worth an estimated £29 billion per annum to the UK economy by 2050 and would support more than 68,000 jobs. Sadly, that potential looks hugely unlikely to be realised, given that we have a Government Budget with a £3 billion tax break for more offshore oil and gas drilling—