Health and Social Care (Re-committed) Bill

Chris Skidmore Excerpts

Tuesday 6th September 2011 Commons Chamber

[Chris Skidmore (Kingswood) (Con)]

Is the hon. Lady placing on the record her party’s opposition to any form of competition in the NHS?

[Debbie Abrahams]

As we have shown, we are not opposed to private sector involvement in the UK’s health system. What is important is that it should add value and capacity. The Government’s proposals are a completely different ball game.

--- Later in debate ---

[Frank Dobson]

I entirely agree. Nobody could possibly claim that redundancy payments constitute money being spent on improving services for our constituents. That is just money down the drain as far as patient care is concerned.

The fundamental problem behind the proposals is that the Government are, in effect, proposing a further major fragmentation of the national health service. In the past, up to the point at which the previous Tory Government introduced an internal market, the spending on administration in the NHS amounted to 4% of the total. That was largely because great big slugs of money were transferred round the system, and I am prepared to accept that there might be some disadvantages in that arrangement. Since then, however, under that Government and the Labour Government, the system has changed to one in which the money follows the patient. That has led to the creation of all sorts of exceptionally expensive systems to bring about individualised transactions, which has resulted in the cost of administering the national health service rising to 12% of the total—an increase of 8%. The NHS is spending about £100 billion a year at the moment, so an extra £8 billion that should have been spent on patient services is now being spent on the administration of the semi-fragmented system. What is now being proposed will involve yet further fragmentation, and I shall explain why I believe we will end up spending yet more money, but not on patients.

[Chris Skidmore]

The right hon. Gentleman has mentioned the £8 billion being spent on administration in the NHS. I assume that he therefore welcomes the coalition Government’s decision to cut the administration budget by £5 billion by 2015. In his speech so far, however, he seems to be suggesting that the status quo is acceptable. I believe that it is unacceptable. Does he welcome the fact that we will be putting an extra £12.5 billion into the NHS?

[Frank Dobson]

If the hon. Gentleman—and, for that matter, the Secretary of State and the Chair of the Health Select Committee—had ever listened to what I say, they would know that I think that we need change. We need organic change, however, rather than structural change, because structural change generally costs more than it provides. If the hon. Gentleman thinks that introducing a system in which virtually every transaction will be a legally binding document, with herds of lawyers grasping their share of proceedings, will reduce the amount spent on administration, he obviously believes in Father Christmas and various other mythical figures.