Patient Safety

Henry Smith Excerpts

Tuesday 24th June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

We have ongoing discussions with the Ministry of Defence about the care and support that we offer to our combat troops, but I can assure the hon. Gentleman that we give them the highest priority.

[Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con)]

I welcome the action taken by my right hon. Friend to extend transparency for the purpose of safety in the NHS, but could it be extended to the social care sector, especially in the light of the January 2010 Care Quality Commission report on Orchid View care home in Copthorne, near my constituency? The report rated the home as good, but 19 patients subsequently died.

[Mr Hunt]

I thank my hon. Friend for raising that very harrowing issue. I hope I can reassure him by saying that we are progressively extending the changes we introduced to hospital inspections to inspections of general practice and adult social care settings. The new inspection regime is designed to be much tougher when it comes to identifying problems. It is never possible to identify all abuse in an inspection, which is why what I have announced today is so important: it is about the creation of a culture that tries to prevent such problems from arising in the first place.

Oral Answers to Questions

Henry Smith Excerpts

Tuesday 10th June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Jane Ellison]

Before I respond to the substantive point, it is worth saying that there is a spectrum of disorders and some of the diagnoses on certain parts of the spectrum are quite difficult. We have statistics on foetal alcohol syndrome and there is no evidence that that is increasing, although we seem to be diagnosing more in younger children. Also, the women to whom this tends to happen are extremely difficult to reach through public education campaigns as many are subject to additional, complex factors.

On bottling, through the responsibility deal, there was a commitment to get 80% of alcoholic drinks on the market labelled. That is being independently audited and is something we champion, not just with messages about drinking in pregnancy, but through guidance from the chief medical officer on drinking generally.

[Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con)]

Prevention is of course better than cure. What is my hon. Friend’s Department doing on better guidance and support for midwives and other groups such as the National Childbirth Trust to discourage expectant mothers from drinking alcohol?

[Jane Ellison]

One of the slight challenges in this area is that quite a lot of pregnancies are unplanned and people have sometimes been drinking alcohol before they know they are pregnant. However, a lot of advice is available. Along with health visitors and midwives—we are putting more resource into those areas—Public Health England’s “start for life” campaign provides advice to pregnant women. There are National Institute for Health and Care Excellence guidelines, including for those women to whom I referred earlier with complex social factors. A lot of information is available, and the chief medical officers are reviewing the guidance to people generally. The simple message to women who are hoping to conceive or who are pregnant is that it is best to avoid alcohol.

Oral Answers to Questions

Henry Smith Excerpts

Tuesday 1st April 2014 Commons Chamber

[Stephen McPartland (Stevenage) (Con)]

9. What recent steps he has taken to improve maternity care.

[Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con)]

11. What recent steps he has taken to improve maternity care.

[John Howell (Henley) (Con)]

14. What recent steps he has taken to improve maternity care.

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[Dr Poulter]

I would be happy to do so. I am aware of the positive difference that the Diamond Jubilee unit has made to local maternity services. My hon. Friend will be aware that the East and North Hertfordshire NHS Trust and the unit have received £314,000 of this Government’s capital funding to support the hard-working staff on that unit delivering high-quality care to women.

[Henry Smith]

In 2001 the then Labour Government closed the maternity unit at Crawley hospital, despite a growing birth rate since then in my constituency. The local clinical commissioning group proposes to reintroduce a midwife-led maternity unit. Will my hon. Friend meet me and the CCG to discuss those plans further?

[Dr Poulter]

I would be delighted to do so. As my hon. Friend knows, I have a particular knowledge of his local hospital trust. It was a very short-sighted decision by the previous Government to downgrade and effectively close Crawley hospital, given the demographic pressures there. There is a good case for a midwifery-led maternity unit. Under this Government we are seeing the numbers of those increase. I would be happy to meet him to discuss these matters further.

Oral Answers to Questions

Henry Smith Excerpts

Tuesday 26th November 2013 Commons Chamber

[Dr Poulter]

As I outlined, there are not any official figures, because the data are now held locally. Monitor carried out a survey of some trusts, but that is not a measure of all trusts. The hon. Gentleman wants to look at the reasons why there have been changes to walk-in centres. There was a reduction in central funding of over 90% under the previous Government. I believe that the right hon. Member for Leigh (Andy Burnham) was a Minister at the time; if the hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull East (Karl Turner) wants to look at the reasons for that, he should perhaps ask his right hon. Friend why he reduced central funding for walk-in centres by 90%.

[Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con)]

In 2005, under the Labour Government, Crawley hospital had its accident and emergency department closed. Now we have an urgent treatment centre that has increased its operating hours and the services that it provides. What advice can the Department give to clinical commissioners about how we can expand urgent treatment centres?

[Dr Poulter]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right to highlight that these are local decisions that need to be made by local commissioners, because what looks good in Crawley will be very different from the needs in Bradford. That was the very reason that underpinned the previous Government’s decision to transfer responsibility for these services to local commissioners, but we often need more co-located services, because the Monitor survey picked up the fact that in the past, far too often, walk-in centres were isolated in the community; people did not know how to access them, or when they could do so. Monitor also recognised that there was duplication of effort, and sometimes patients who needed to be seen in accident and emergency were treated, inappropriately, in walk-in centres.

Accident and Emergency Departments

Henry Smith Excerpts

Tuesday 10th September 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

I can absolutely reassure the hon. Lady on that point. We are extremely careful—I have had good discussions with her about this—before making any structural changes, to ensure that the impact on neighbouring A and E departments is properly thought through. Since the statement to the House about Trafford hospital, we have approved a capital funding programme for one of the neighbouring hospitals that will be affected. That is extremely important and we will continue to monitor it closely.

[Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con)]

The A and E unit that my constituents have to access is at East Surrey hospital, and I welcome last year’s investment of £4 million to refurbish it, but does my right hon. Friend agree that Labour’s closure of Crawley A and E in 2005 certainly did not help with the pressure on local A and E departments?

[Mr Hunt]

A number of things have contributed to these changes, one of which is that we have not succeeded, as an NHS or as a Parliament, in getting the way in which we do reconfigurations right: they do not command the confidence of the public and people are not satisfied that there are alternatives that they can trust or that good alternatives will be put in place when a change is proposed. We need to learn the lessons from what happened in my hon. Friend’s constituency.

Oral Answers to Questions

Henry Smith Excerpts

Tuesday 16th July 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

No, and I am as concerned as the hon. Lady that it is difficult to push through the mergers that local commissioners want to happen. We have to operate within the framework of European law, but we are looking at what we can do to make it easier for these things to happen.

[Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con)]

14. What steps he is taking to tackle health tourism and ensure a fair system of contribution to the costs of the NHS.

[The Secretary of State for Health (Mr Jeremy Hunt)]

On 3 July, my Department and the Home Office launched co-ordinated consultations on a range of proposals on a new charging system for visitors and migrants in which everyone makes a fair contribution to health care. Those include making temporary migrants from outside the European economic area contribute to the cost of their health care, and introducing easier and more practical ways for the NHS to identify and charge those not entitled to free health care.

[Henry Smith]

I very much welcome the statement by my right hon. Friend and support the new visa fee proposal for non-EU foreign nationals who come here and receive NHS treatment. May we also have an assurance that the treatment of EU nationals will be properly audited in the NHS, so that those costs can be recovered through the European health insurance card scheme?

[Mr Hunt]

My hon. Friend is right to point to the fact that we estimate that we collect less than half the money for which we invoice for “overseas operations” and we identify fewer than half the people who should be invoiced in the first place—that applies in respect of those from inside the EU as well as from outside the EU. We can get refunded for the care we give EU nationals if we are sensible about collecting this money and we put those systems in place. Given the pressures in the NHS, we are absolutely determined to make sure we do so.

Accident and Emergency Waiting Times

Henry Smith Excerpts

Wednesday 5th June 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker.

I repeat: it was one of the poorest speeches ever given by an Opposition on the NHS, and I predict that the right hon. Member for Leigh (Andy Burnham) will bitterly regret choosing to make an issue of A and E pressures, because the root causes of the problem have Labour’s fingerprints all over them.

The right hon. Gentleman was right on one thing, however: there is complacency on this issue—not from the Government, who have been gripping it right from the start, but rather from Labour, which still does not understand why things went so badly wrong in the NHS on its watch.

Labour’s narrative has, I am afraid, a single political purpose at its heart: to undermine public confidence in one of our greatest institutions—an institution which, in challenging circumstances, is performing extremely well for the millions of vulnerable people who depend on it day in, day out.

Labour’s story today is a totally irresponsible misrepresentation of reality. One million more people are now going through A and Es every year than in 2010, which creates a lot of pressure, so how are A and E departments actually performing? The latest figures show performance, against the 95% target, of 96.7%. The week before it was 96.5%, then before that 96.3%, 96.6% and 95.6%. Yes, we had a difficult winter and a cold Easter, and I will come to the causes of the problems we had then, but, thanks to the hard work of NHS doctors and nurses, our A and E departments are performing extremely well.

[Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con)]

The Secretary of State is absolutely right to say that we should point to the record of the previous Government, who closed the A and E department in Crawley.

[Mr Hunt]

Indeed. We were having a discussion about walk-in centres. It is true that Labour opened a lot of those, just as it closed or downgraded 12 A and E departments during its time in office. That is one of the reasons we face the problems we have today.

A and E Departments

Henry Smith Excerpts

Tuesday 21st May 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

As the hon. Gentleman knows, the decision has been taken, but the A and E department has not been closed and will not be closed until it is clinically safe to do so.

[Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con)]

The last Labour Government closed accident and emergency at Crawley hospital, but in the last few years the urgent treatment centre has been able to see more and more patients. Does my right hon. Friend agree that upskilling urgent treatment centres is part of the answer to the problem?

[Mr Hunt]

I do, and my hon. Friend is right to point out that the last Labour Government closed or downgraded 12 A and E departments. The Opposition have criticised us in the press—indeed, the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Copeland (Mr Reed), who is sitting on the Front Bench, has criticised me for not getting on and closing more A and E departments, which is what he seems to want to happen. Every time there has been a controversial reconfiguration, Labour has opposed it all the way. I think we could expect a bit more consistency from a shadow Secretary of State who was once a Health Secretary.

Immigrants (NHS Treatment)

Henry Smith Excerpts

Monday 25th March 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

If the hon. Lady is worried about that, perhaps she might like to complain to her own party leadership, which, during Labour’s last five years in office, had an average underspend in the NHS of £2 billion.

[Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con)]

I, too, congratulate the right hon. Member for Birkenhead (Mr Field) on his urgent question, and my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Health on following my private Member’s Bill, the NHS Audit Requirements (Foreign Nationals) Bill. When will that primary legislation receive Government time to start its passage through this place?

[Mr Hunt]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on his excellent private Member’s Bill, which looked forward to many of the problems we are trying to address. Our first step is to identify the scale of the problem. We will then identify the right legislative response, but the response will not all be legislative. That is when we will consider including it in the parliamentary timetable.

Oral Answers to Questions

Henry Smith Excerpts

Tuesday 26th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

If the hon. Member for Crawley (Henry Smith) wishes to come in on this question, he may, but he is not obliged to do so.

[Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con)]

On Question 13, sir.

[Mr Speaker]

We will get to No. 13 in due course. Never mind.

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[Norman Lamb]

There are plans to increase the number of training places for GPs, with the aim of providing more than 3,000 extra places by 2015. That will fully meet the needs to which the hon. Lady has referred.

[Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con)]

13. What steps he has taken to support research on the most common causes of premature mortality.

[The Secretary of State for Health (Mr Jeremy Hunt)]

We are still far too low in the European league tables for premature mortality, particularly in respect of cancer, liver disease and respiratory diseases. I have therefore made improving our performance a key priority.

[Henry Smith]

Can the Minister say a little more about what is being done to prevent early mortality as a result of heart disease?

[Mr Hunt]

We are investing £34 million in cardiovascular research. Much excellent work is being done at, in particular, the Oxford Biomedical Research Centre, which will help us to make great strides.