Summer Adjournment

Clive Efford Excerpts

Thursday 21st July 2016 Commons Chamber

[Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)]

I am grateful for the opportunity to raise a number of important issues on behalf of my constituents. Next Wednesday, I shall join residents of the Horn Park estate in my constituency to lobby the clinical commissioning group to urge it not to take the decision to cease funding of The Source, which is a nurse practitioner-led health centre on the estate. We do not want to lose any form of health service provided locally. The estate has no pharmacy and no GP practice. In fact, the nearest GP practices are almost two miles away.

One of the reasons given for taking this service away is that many of the patients treated by The Source, which is funded by Greenwich CCG, are patients of Lewisham doctors. I campaigned against the closure of the GP practice on this estate 25 years ago, when it first lost its practice. As part of the single regeneration budget 5 funding, in 2007 facilities for the introduction of a nurse practitioner-led service were funded, but now, because public health has been separated off from the previous primary care trust, the service falls between two stools. Local GP practices refer people to this service, and they appreciate the quality of it. No one disputes the fact that it provides good value for money, but because of this split in the funding between public health and primary services funded by the CCG, no one is prepared to continue funding it.

Last year, this service treated 5,332 patients, and 4,489 in the previous year. The annual cost is about £142,000, which is minuscule in the scheme of things. The average cost per visit is about £26.63. This is really good value for money. Everyone recognises that it is really good value for money, and everyone recognises that this is a deprived community which needs direct access to health services, but because of the bureaucracy, people are being penalised. Although all those people are Greenwich residents, some of them were forced to join Lewisham practices because the estate was on the border, and now they are being penalised. Having lost their own general practice years ago, they are now being told, “We are not prepared to fund this service”, because a fifth of the people who use it are Lewisham patients although they are Greenwich residents.

That is completely unacceptable, and I will be there with my constituents lobbying very hard for all the health managers—general practices, the CCG and the local authority—to come together and maintain the service on the estate for my local residents. It provides vaccinations and treats people who need dressings renewed, so that they need not undertake arduous journeys to other places. It has been said that many of those services will be replaced by home visits, but at a cost of £26.63 per visit to the centre, it cannot be cost-effective to travel all the way to the far end of the borough to treat people in their own homes when those people are asking for the service to be maintained because they use it for many purposes. I hope that a health Minister will hear my appeal and intervene, bang some heads together, and ensure that we do not lose that vital service on the estate.

Another issue that I want to raise is the quality of service that is being provided by Southeastern. It is utterly appalling. We have had some truly hot weather this week, for the first time this summer, and what has it resulted in? A minor change in the weather for a short time has resulted in major disruption to the service. It seems that no matter what sort of weather we have—whether it is heavy rain, severe cold, a bit of snow, or some hot weather—Southeastern cannot run the trains. We in south-east London do not have direct access to the London underground, and we rely heavily on those rail services to travel to and from central London.

According to a recent survey conducted by Passenger Focus, passenger satisfaction is going down sharply. In autumn 2012, 83% of passengers were satisfied with the service, and punctuality stood at 91.4%; in spring this year, the satisfaction rate was down to 70%, and punctuality stood at 87%. That is just not good enough. According to a Passenger Focus survey of Southeastern passengers, only 53% were satisfied with its services. It was one of the worst performers.

One problem that confronts my constituents is overcrowding. Our platforms have been lengthened to accommodate 12-car trains, but we have yet to see those trains. We know that rolling stock will become available when the Thameslink upgrade has been completed, and that existing rolling stock will be available to Southeastern if the Government give their approval. Let me appeal to the Government again. We have lengthened the platforms, and we have told people that they will have longer trains. We have no underground, we rely heavily on those train services, and we must have that additional rolling stock to improve the quality of the service.

I have only a few moments left, but I want to raise one more issue. I have written to the Minister about a planning application for the site at the Gaelic Athletic Association. The planning inspector has recommended approval, but I urge the Minister not to set such a precedent. There is a viable plan for that sports ground, and we should not be building on it.