Five Year Forward View Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateDepartment: Department of Health and Social Care
Chloe Smith
Main Page: Chloe Smith (Conservative - Norwich North)Department Debates - View all Chloe Smith's debates with the Department of Health and Social Care
(10 years ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
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Mr Hunt
The Government believe that the NHS has to live within its means, as do individual hospitals. We recognise that that is challenging, and one of the reasons it is challenging is that in the past it has been too easy for hospitals trying to balance their books to cut corners, for example on nursing numbers in elderly care and dementia wards. We have a new inspection regime that has made it much harder to do that, which I think is a good thing, because it means that older people are getting the care they need. It also means a harder road to getting those deficits under control, however.
Chloe Smith (Norwich North) (Con)
Page 26 of the document refers to
“an equal response to mental and physical health”.
Despite my right hon. Friend’s good leadership on this topic, I suspect that the document’s authors do not operate an equal funding formula for mental and physical health. Can my right hon. Friend give me any guidance on that?
Mr Hunt
We are looking at the issue very closely, and I think that we have made very good progress. We have introduced maximum waiting time targets for some mental health conditions, which has never been done before, and we have made a clear commitment to applying those targets to all mental health treatment during the next Parliament. However, my hon. Friend is right: ultimately, we need to look at funding differently. We need to look at it holistically. We need to understand that it is a false economy not to invest in proper mental health care, because it will only make the overall costs to the system greater in the long run.