Chris Bryant
Main Page: Chris Bryant (Labour - Rhondda and Ogmore)
Mr David Crausby (Bolton North East) (Lab)
I want to express my concern about the development of the Princess Anne maternity unit at Royal Bolton hospital. The creation of a new regional baby supercentre at the hospital was announced in August 2007. Construction work on the expansion began in September 2009, and is due to be completed by the end of 2011. Royal Bolton hospital won the bid in competition with other hospitals, and we were naturally delighted in Bolton.
The care that the NHS delivers throughout our lives and during the period that leads to our death is priceless, but nothing can be more important than the start that our children are given in life, and quality maternity services can make an important difference in that regard. The development was welcomed by the whole region because it was designed to raise maternity services to another level. The state-of-the-art supercentre was designed to provide extra delivery rooms, new high-dependency beds, new intensive-care and high-dependency cots, new beds for antenatal and post-natal wards, new on-site overnight facilities for parents, and the best equipment possible to provide care for our sickest babies. Twenty million pounds were invested to make all that happen and 400 jobs were to be created in the town, not just for the benefit of Bolton but in the interests of parents and children throughout Greater Manchester.
Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)
I am sorry to interrupt my hon. Friend, but he may not have realised that the hon. Member who spoke before him was making a maiden speech. I am sure that he would like an opportunity to congratulate her on a very fine speech.
Mr Crausby
I am sorry, Mr Speaker. It is a real privilege to follow the hon. Member for Witham (Priti Patel). I am grateful to her for inciting that intervention, because it has given me another minute in which to speak, but I also congratulate her on what was indeed an excellent maiden speech.
The decision was made after the extensive making it better review of maternity services. Doctors, nurses, midwives and specialists were consulted throughout, and 12 primary care trusts, 12 hospitals and 12 local authorities were directly involved in the process. Thousands of information leaflets were distributed across the region. Workshops were held with members of the public, and a citizens’ council, a maternity council, NHS managers, doctors and nurses were all involved. The level of public consultation was unprecedented, with more than 242,000 people sharing their views by means of formal responses, petitions and public meetings. At all stages, the focus was on making the necessary changes to provide the best possible care for patients.
It was decided to replace the 12 centres in Greater Manchester with eight centres of excellence, with three supercentres providing neonatal care. The higher standard of care provided by the new structure and concentrated resources would mean that more premature and sick babies would survive, and fewer parents would be turned away owing to staffing problems. It was estimated that between 30 and 50 lives a year would be saved. The move from 12 to eight centres was never going to be easy—it was bound to arouse strong and emotional local protest—but in this case it was the right thing to do, because it was in the interest of better-quality maternity services throughout Greater Manchester.
The problems started when the general election campaign arrived. Along came the then shadow Secretary of State for Health—the current Secretary of State, the right hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire (Mr Lansley)—campaigning in Bury, Rochdale and other Greater Manchester constituencies. He was clearly a man in pursuit of votes and popularity, and he was going to get what he wanted by promising to keep all the maternity units open. In doing so, however, he was completely undermining the making it better scheme in a naked attempt to win Conservative target seats in Greater Manchester. He must have known—if he did not, he certainly should have known—that this money was being provided to fund the supercentres and the improved facilities for the benefit of everyone only because the available resources were being sensibly concentrated. What he said in one town alongside a prospective Conservative candidate was being denied in other towns. Eventually, however, under pressure, the then shadow Secretary of State for Health was forced to claim publicly that the Conservatives would keep all the maternity units open and at the same time ensure that Bolton’s development and other supercentres would be unaffected.
Things have changed now, of course. The former shadow Secretary of State has lost the shadow part of his title and reality is setting in, but he still provides no explanation as to where the money will come from or what other services will have to be cut as a result of, effectively, his commitment to increase spending on Greater Manchester maternity services. He no doubt hopes that his general election promises will fade into the distance, and in order to try to wriggle out of them he has called for a review of Greater Manchester’s maternity facilities. He does so even though the making it better programme had already involved an enormous review and public consultation, so he is simply playing for time. The major question that the Secretary of State must answer is if the centres that were previously due to close are now set to continue, where will the extra funding come from for the centres of excellence and the supercentres?
As a result of my concerns, I raised this issue in a recent Prime Minister’s Question Time and the Prime Minister assured me that there were no plans to cancel the improvements to Bolton’s maternity unit, but just one week later health bosses were told by the Government that they would have to, again, prove that the improvements are necessary in order to secure the investment.
The Secretary of State for Health and the Prime Minister need to be clear with the people of Bolton and Greater Manchester. The consultation work has already been completed and the most efficient plan put in place with construction and recruitment in Bolton already under way. After more than six years of preparation and investment the entire process is almost complete. Will the Government support the improvement plans as they did during the general election campaign? If not, what alternative do they propose, and how will services be affected and funded?
I have fought hard throughout my political life, but I would never dream of sinking so low as to put at risk the health and well-being of mothers and children for electoral advantage. The Secretary of State for Health has no honourable alternative now but to come clean and stump up the money to deliver what he promised to the people of Bolton and Greater Manchester by fully funding Bolton’s maternity supercentre as he said he would.