Oral Answers to Questions

Chris Skidmore Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd October 2013 Commons Chamber

[The Minister of State, Department of Health (Norman Lamb)]

I pay tribute absolutely to that local initiative, which is exactly the sort of direction we are going in. I have made the point several times that we cannot get great care on the back of exploiting workers. The idea that people should not be paid while they are travelling from one house to another is, in my view, unacceptable. When employers and care providers breach the minimum wage legislation, we should be absolutely clear that that is completely unacceptable. To ensure great care, the Government are introducing in 2015-16 the £3.8 billion integrated transformation fund, which will pool resources between the NHS and social care to ensure that we shift the focus to preventing ill-health and deterioration, and I think that that can make a real difference.

[Chris Skidmore (Kingswood) (Con)]

T7. I and my hon. Friend the Member for Filton and Bradley Stoke (Jack Lopresti) have long campaigned for the maximum hospital facilities at Frenchay hospital, including a community hospital with an outpatients clinic—as was agreed as part of the Bristol health services plan in both 2005 and 2010. Now it seems that NHS managers are attempting to revisit these plans, something to which I am opposed, as is my hon. Friend the Member for Filton and Bradley Stoke, who has recently written to the Secretary of State to ask for a meeting to look into the situation. Will the Secretary of State agree to meet us both and investigate the situation?

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health (Jane Ellison)]

I am always happy to meet colleagues for discussions, particularly when they are championing important health care facilities in their local area. I can confirm that the Secretary of State has received a formal referral from South Gloucestershire council in relation to these proposals, and has referred them to the Independent Reconfiguration Panel. He will of course consider the panel’s recommendations before making a final decision, and I am sure that my hon. Friend would agree that it would be inappropriate to pre-empt those deliberations.