Oral Answers to Questions

Dan Poulter Excerpts

Tuesday 21st February 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Burns]

It is a bit rich for the former Secretary of State to bleat about that. What I want is the finest health care for patients so that they are treated more effectively and quickly and their long-term conditions are managed in a way that enhances the patient experience.

[Dr Daniel Poulter (Central Suffolk and North Ipswich) (Con)]

4. What steps he is taking to address underperforming hospital management teams.

[The Secretary of State for Health (Mr Andrew Lansley)]

The performance of hospital management teams is the responsibility of their boards. Those are accountable to strategic health authorities for NHS trusts, and foundation trusts are accountable to their governors to ensure that they comply with Monitor’s framework. As part of our work to strengthen NHS trusts so that they can reach foundation trust status, we have published guidance on strengthening trust boards, their clinical leadership and management. We are further strengthening accountability through quality accounts and open reporting so that the public can see the absolute and relative performance of all NHS service providers.

[Dr Poulter]

I thank my right hon. Friend for that answer. It is absolutely right that managers take responsibility for the decisions that they take at a local level on behalf of patients and are held accountable for them. A doctor or nurse who fails in their duty can be struck off, so there is clear accountability, but there appears to be no clear accountability or traceability for the decisions of hospital managers. Who will hold those people properly to account when they have failed?

[Mr Lansley]

My hon. Friend knows that the management of trusts should be accountable directly to their boards. As I said, the management of foundation trusts are accountable, through their boards, to their governors. An important point that arose in relation to Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust is that we should ensure—we are looking at how to fulfil this—that there is also a code of practice to which managers are held accountable. He knows, as I do, that management must be accountable through their boards.