National Health Service (Amended Duties and Powers) Bill

Christopher Chope Excerpts

Friday 21st November 2014 Commons Chamber

[Sir Tony Baldry]

Every Government have invested money in the NHS, and quite rightly so. This Government have invested real-terms increases in the NHS, as evidenced by the Commonwealth Fund, which compares health systems internationally. It found this year that, although the United States health care system is the most expensive in the world, it underperforms relative to other countries on most dimensions of performance. The fund studied 11 nations: Australia, Canada, France, Germany, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and the United States. The United States ranks last, but who ranks first as the best health care system in the world? The United Kingdom. We should all, wherever we sit in this House, be proud that we have the best health care system in the world.

[Mr Christopher Chope (Christchurch) (Con)]

The picture is not quite as rosy as my right hon. Friend paints it, is it? Even The Guardian newspaper reported that the Commonwealth Fund survey showed that the

“only serious black mark against the NHS was its poor record on keeping people alive.”

[Sir Tony Baldry]

I am not entirely sure what point my hon. Friend is trying to make. The fact is that the Commonwealth Fund found that the NHS is the best health care system in the world. I hope that he and everyone in the House takes pride in that. The NHS has many challenges—we are all conscious that with an ageing demography and advances in medical technology, every health care system faces challenges—but we should take pride in being the best.

We also need to be honest about what has gone before. There was an enormous amount of rewriting of history and revisionism in the speech of the hon. Member for Eltham. For those of us who have been in the House for some time, it may be worth looking back and reminding ourselves about what happened in the not-too-distant past.

In the introduction to the NHS plan of July 2000, the then Secretary of State for Health, Alan Milburn, wrote:

“This NHS Plan sets out the steps we now need to take to transform the health service so that it is redesigned around the needs of patients. It means tackling the toughest issues that have been ducked for too long.”

I do not think anyone would ever disagree with that as a statement of intent. He went on:

“For the first time the NHS and the private sector will work more closely together not just to build new hospitals but to provide NHS patients with the operations they need.”