Defending Public Services

Jake Berry Excerpts

Monday 23rd May 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

I absolutely agree with the hon. Gentleman. In fact, I wanted to come on to talk about that perceived tension between money and the quality of care. Until three years ago, we did not have an independent inspection regime to go around ambulance services and tell the service, the public, constituents and Members of Parliament how good the quality of care is in each area. The first step is to have that inspection regime so that we know the truth, and then things start to happen, as is beginning to be the case in ambulance services across the country.

The big point—this is precisely what I wanted to move on to—is the worry, which is shared by many people, that an efficiency ask of this scale might impact on patient care. They should listen to the chief inspector of hospitals, Professor Sir Mike Richards, who points out that financial rigour is one of the routes to excellent quality, and that there is a positive correlation between hospitals offering the best care and those with the lowest deficits. In other words, it is not a choice between good care and good finances; we need both.

[Jake Berry (Rossendale and Darwen) (Con)]

Before my right hon. Friend moves on, I want to draw him back to the question of charging international visitors for the use of the NHS. The Government now charges non-EU citizens £200 per person as part of their visa application. Will he tell the House why he has chosen the figure of £200, which seems extremely low? An equivalent private healthcare policy for a year would be £800, £900 or £1,000, and an equivalent level of travel insurance for the same period would be £400 or £500. Is there not an opportunity to tier this and perhaps charge people more as they get older and become more likely to rely on the NHS?

[Mr Hunt]

I recognise why my hon. Friend has asked that question. We do think very hard about the level at which we set that charge, which was introduced for the first time only a couple of years ago. The reason that it is set that low—I recognise that it is quite a low charge—is that a large number of people paying it are students who tend to have low health needs and be low users of the NHS. We want to ensure that we do not create an inadvertent disincentive for people coming to the UK when they can, at the same time, choose to do their studies in Australia and America. However, it is something that we keep constantly under review.

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[Jake Berry]

My right hon. Friend will of course be aware that there is a differential charge for students—some £150 a year rather than £200. Will he go away and consider whether there is a possibility of charging high earners who come to this country more than a couple of hundred pounds a year, because the charge does seem so low? Will he also specifically look at whether there is a possibility of charging people who are older more, as they are much more likely to rely on the NHS?

[Mr Hunt]

Let me repeat that we do keep this matter constantly under review. The important thing is that, for the first time, we are charging people who come to the UK on a long-term basis for their use of NHS resources. That is something that did not happen before.

Let me return to the crucial issue of this link between the quality of care and good finances. Why is it that it is so important not to see this as an artificial choice between good care and good finances? Very simply, it is because poor care is about the most expensive thing that a hospital can do. A fall in a hospital will cost the NHS about £1,200, as the patient typically stays for three days longer. A bed sore adds about £2,500 to NHS costs, with a patient staying, on average, 12 days longer. Avoidable mistakes and poor care cost the NHS more than £2 billion a year. We should listen to inspiring leaders such as Dr Gary Kaplan of Virginia Mason hospital in Seattle, which is one of the safest and most efficient hospitals in the world. He said:

“The path to safer care is the same one as the path to lower costs.”

That brings me on to the second way that this Government are fiercely defending our public services, which is our restless determination to raise standards so that people on lower incomes can be confident of the same high quality provision as the wealthiest. To their credit, the last Labour Government succeeded in bringing down NHS waiting times. I hope that that decade is remembered as one when access to NHS services improved. However, because of poor care identified in many hospitals post Mid Staffs, we should surely resolve that this decade must become the one in which we transform the safety and quality of care. Mid Staffs was the lowest point in the history of the NHS, so we must make it a turning point, or a moment that we resolve to offer not just good access to care, but care itself that is the safest and the highest quality available. The record of the past three years shows that we can do just that.

The King’s Fund has given credit to the Government for their focus on safety and quality of care. Patient campaigners have said that the NHS is getting safer and the main indicators of hospital mortality and harm are going in the right direction. However, there is much more to do, so what are our plans? First, we must deliver a seven-day NHS. It should never be the case that mortality rates are higher for people admitted at weekends than for people admitted in the week. Last week’s junior doctor contract agreement was a big step forward, but we also need to reform the consultants’ contracts, improve the availability of weekend diagnostic services and increase the number of weekend consultant-led procedures.

Secondly, a seven-day NHS also means a transformation of out-of-hospital services, especially access to an integrated health and social care system that needs to operate over busy weekends as well as during the week. It also means more GP appointments at convenient times, which is why we want everyone to be able to see a GP in the evening or at weekends. We are backing general practice with a £2.4 billion increase in its budget.

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[Ian Blackford (Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (SNP)]

It is a pleasure to follow the right hon. Member for Basingstoke (Mrs Miller).

I hope the House will forgive me if I reflect on an historic event that took place in Scotland this weekend. For the first time in 114 years, the Scottish cup returned to Leith, in Edinburgh, when Hibernian won the cup final. For many years those of us who are fans of Hibernian have been used to taunts that the last time the cup came back to Easter Road, Buffalo Bill was in town and Queen Victoria was on the throne. At least those taunts are over. The hurt of losing 10 cup finals—of traipsing to Hampden to face defeat after defeat—is over. A fine game, between two teams entertaining the fans, took place in Scotland on Saturday, and I am delighted that the people of Edinburgh and Leith can celebrate a cup victory at long last.

There is little to be welcomed in the Queen’s Speech. It was a missed opportunity for progressive action on pensions, social security and the economy. The UK Government are caught in a civil war over Europe and have delivered a Queen’s Speech with a poverty of ambition. The Tory party is at war with itself and failing miserably in its war on poverty, which the Prime Minister talked about at the conference last year. We are seeing not a war on poverty but a war in the Conservative party.

[Jake Berry]

One could perhaps compare the Conservative party’s disagreement over Europe to two men fighting over one woman. Is it possible that after such a catastrophe everyone can come back together as friends?

[Ian Blackford]

I am saddened at the depths to which the hon. Gentleman stoops. I am delighted to have friends and colleagues representing my party here and in government in Edinburgh, and they will continue to have our full support.

The Queen’s Speech demonstrates that the Tories are a threat to high-quality, well-funded public services. Having listened to the Leader of the Opposition last week on the Queen’s Speech, we are none the wiser as to what the Labour party is offering. We could have asked him, of course, had he been taking interventions, rather than forcing us to sit and listen to a monologue that lost the attention of his own party, never mind that of the House.

Some measures are to be welcomed, such as the likely delivery of the universal service obligation on broadband, as mentioned by the right hon. Member for Basingstoke, but the Queen’s Speech delivers nothing on pension reform for the WASPI women, on tax simplification or on social security, and no major action on the economy to boost exports and productivity.

The Conservatives have orchestrated some truly devastating cuts that have destroyed the safety net that social security should provide. We see through their rhetoric on life chances. The scrapping of legal commitments to tackle child poverty, the four-year freeze on working-age benefits, including child tax credit, working tax credit and jobseeker’s allowance, will see families losing up to 12% of the real value of their benefits and tax credits by 2020. We have seen the butchering of the very aspect of universal credit that might have created work incentives and the hammering of low-paid workers, to name just a few of the regressive cuts that will decrease the life chances of children across these islands.

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[Ian Blackford]

No, I will not, because that is not true. Full-time places at Scottish colleges have increased, and I will return to that point.

Ruth Davidson would want to introduce tuition fees in Scotland by the back door. Down here, the Tories are all for front-door fees. In Scotland, the Tories are all about back-door fees. The doors are locked to many who want to participate in education unless they can pay the price. Front door or back door, with the Tories there is always a price to pay. Young people from the most deprived areas in Scotland are now more likely to participate in higher education by the age of 30 since the SNP came to power—up from 35% of young people in 2007-08 to 41% in 2014-15—which is the result of the SNP’s successful education programme. The number of qualifiers from the most deprived areas increased by over 2,300 from 8,035 in 2007-08 to 10,395 in 2014-15.

Overall, since the SNP came to power in Scotland, the number of Scottish-domiciled, first-degree students going to university has risen by 11%. Last year saw a record number of Scots accepted to universities across the UK. That is a record to be proud of. Rather than carping from the sidelines, the Labour party should perhaps get behind what the SNP has delivered in Scotland for the people of our country.

The Scottish Funding Council has invested more than £76 million in additional widening access and articulation places over the past three years and continues to fund a wide range of other initiatives to support access. We will ensure that those who have a care experience and who meet minimum entry requirements will be guaranteed the offer of a university place and a non-repayable bursary of £7,625. In Scotland, we recognise that access based on ability, investing in our human capital, is the right thing to do. That is a non-negotiable principle. It is price worth paying for our children and our future. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Gordon (Alex Salmond) said some time ago:

“The rocks will melt with the sun before”

the SNP imposes tuition fees on Scotland’s students.

There is little good news for young people. Whether someone is young and looking to start a journey towards eventual retirement or is nearing retirement, there is much to fear from this Government. Given the injustices for many women, the UK residents living in many overseas countries suffering from frozen pensions, or the constant tinkering with pensions that undermines saving, there is little for which to commend this Government. The Government are playing a risky game on pensions; the new lifetime ISA muddies the waters in an already complex area. ISA savings from taxed income undercut the pension saving from pre-tax income—in other words, the Chancellor has found a convenient tool to increase tax receipts today, but that is not necessarily good news for individual savers. According to the Association of British Insurers, presented with a choice, no employee will be better off saving into a lifetime ISA than a workplace pension because of the loss of employer contributions. ABI calculations indicate that the long-term cost of forgoing employer contributions would be substantial—for a basic-rate taxpayer, the impact would be savings of roughly one third less by the age of 60.

[Jake Berry]

The hon. Gentleman is making an important point, but does he not accept that one benefit of people saving for their retirement through an ISA is that it gives considerably more flexibility? As we go on our life journey, there are often times when we may want to draw down some of that money—for example, for a deposit to buy a house. Does he not see this as being about consumer choice? There is probably room for both of these things, although it is extremely important that we protect the existing pensions system as well.

[Ian Blackford]

This is a vastly important issue, and I genuinely want to work with the Government on it. All of us in this place have a collective responsibility to get pensions right. I will accept that there is a shared concern across the House, with a recognition that pension saving is not at a sustainable level in this country. My problem with the lifetime ISA proposal is that it undermines what should be the best route for all, which should be saving through the new auto-enrolment, with the incentives that are there. Of course, that will be discussed when the plans are presented to Parliament, but I say to the Government that they should be very careful with what they are doing, because we all share the ambition to get this right. I make the offer to the Government that we are prepared to work together to make sure that we get the best mechanisms to increase pension savings in this country.

Pension saving is at a crisis point, and no amount of regulation will right that problem—[Interruption.] I can hear some guffawing; I will try to wrap up my remarks, but I have been very generous in taking interventions from across the Floor. We need a fundamental overhaul of the pensions system. The Tories need to be more ambitious on pension reform and find real solutions that incentivise pension saving. The SNP has long called for the establishment of an independent pension commission to look holistically at pension reform, focusing on existing inequalities and paving the way forward for a fair, universal pensions system.

We must also prioritise fraud and scam prevention. Kate Smith, head of pensions at Aegon UK, commented that fraud and scams that pensioners are vulnerable to should really have been tackled in the pensions Bill. She said:

“I’m extremely disappointed that the government has failed to use the Queens Speech as an opportunity to tackle the ever-growing threat of pensions fraud via legalisation.

We still need to look at ways for the industry, regulators and pension industry to work together to raise the profile of pensions fraud to stamp it out and protect savers.”

I am going to wrap up my remarks, Madam Deputy Speaker, but let me just say that nearly 1 million people aged over 75 live in poverty and need more help from the Government, according to a report by City University London and Independent Age. It also suggests that the income of those aged over 75 is, on average, £3,000 a year less than that of younger pensioners. Those figures suggest the vital need for a sustainable income in retirement to be available for our older generation, and the Government must do more now to address that. There is so much that needs to be addressed to give confidence to savers and pensioners.

Our alternative Queen’s Speech proposed a universal pensions Bill to support a more progressive pensions system. Such a Bill would establish an independent pensions commission to investigate the inequalities in current and future proposed pension policies; fund transitional arrangements for WASPI women affected by the rapid pace of increases in the state pension age; and allow for further development of access to automatic enrolment and further options to incentivise pension saving. The complexity of the pension system is a real turn-off for savers, preventing them from shopping around or making sound savings choices. Just last week, the Bank of England’s chief economist, Andy Haldane, said that the British pension system was so complicated that even he failed to understand it, and he warned of the damaging consequences that that presents for consumers as they approach retirement. Conversations with countless experts and independent financial advisers have confirmed for me only one thing: they have no clue either.

That comment about having no clue could equally be made about the Government in the Queen’s Speech. We have outlined an SNP alternative, delivering a message of hope and vision for the people of Scotland. It is not too late for the Tories to open their ears and, indeed, their minds to a different direction. If the Government seriously want to increase the life chances of our children, they must return to the drawing board on social security cuts and admit that they have got it wrong, as they have done on the economy. Instead of the promised assault on poverty, we have been left with a Government plan that has a poverty of ambition. There is a different way, and I appeal to the Government to make the right political choice and abandon austerity.

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[Jake Berry (Rossendale and Darwen) (Con)]

Like me, Mr Deputy Speaker, you will know that Lancashire has some of the finest public services in our country. I represent the police force and the health service in my constituency with the greatest pride here in Parliament, and rely on them when I am at home in Lancashire.

However, proud as I am of our public services in the north-west and Lancashire in particular, we need to show that our businesses and our economy will improve in order to support them. This Queen’s Speech—a one nation speech—did not give preference to the private sector over the public sector, but set out a programme in which both could succeed, and in which, specifically, the northern powerhouse, which was mentioned by the hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr Sheerman), could play a central role.

Many years ago, my home city of Liverpool contributed more to the Exchequer than the City of London. In 1889, when our great county council—Lancashire county council—was formed, our first civic leaders, some of whom had been Cabinet Ministers, resigned as Members of Parliament to lead it. Was that because, at the time, it was said that the empire’s bread hung by Lancashire’s thread? Well, it may have been, but I believe that the real reason was that those MPs—including former Cabinet Ministers—knew that more power resided in our great northern cities, and in our town halls, than at Westminster and in Whitehall.

Of course, all that changed during the first and second world wars. As we waged total war in this country, it became necessary to concentrate power in London. We saw the nationalisation of our industries, and we saw many decisions taken away from our great regional local authorities. Just as the power came to London, wealth and skills moved away from the north of England to the south. The Queen’s Speech, and its commitment to the northern powerhouse, means that some of that money and power will be removed from London and returned to the north. London has had it for far too long, and we want it back.

This scheme did not drop out of thin air. My right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer first advocated the idea of a northern powerhouse in June 2014, at the Museum of Science and Industry. It could not have happened in a better place than Manchester, close to our Free Trade Hall. With your indulgence, Mr Deputy Speaker, I want to reflect a little on the progress that we have made in the last 23 months.

During debates in the House, Members often ask why so much money is spent on London’s infrastructure. Why has London been given Crossrail 1, and why is it to be given Crossrail 2? Well, one reason is that Transport for London unifies all the London boroughs so that they can work on infrastructure projects throughout this great capital. For far too long, our local authorities in the north of England have been in competition with each other when it comes to rail and road infrastructure projects, rather than working together to ensure that we have a plan in the north to enable our cities to grow. That is why I am so pleased that we now have Transport for the North fighting for our cities and towns throughout the region.

It is so important for the north of England to become super-connected. What do I mean by “the north of England”? Well, within 40 miles of Manchester we have Leeds, Liverpool, Lancashire, Cheshire, Yorkshire, and the city of Sheffield. That belt of counties, towns and cities encompasses 10 million people. One powerful urban conglomeration could become one powerful, super-connected economic unit, which would not compete with London, and would certainly not pull London down, but would create growth and wealth throughout the north of England so that we could compete not just with the south, but with other cities across the globe. If the north were an independent economy, it would be the ninth largest economy in the European Union, and—much as it pains me, as a Lancastrian, to say this—if Yorkshire were its own country, it would have created more jobs in the last five years than the whole of France.

Of course the northern powerhouse is hugely important, but we are also very excited about the digital economy Bill. The commitment to super-connect every house with a universal broadband connection is important to our rural communities throughout the north-west of England. It is a glue that can bind towns and villages into the northern powerhouse project, and Lancashire can play its part.

We have three world-class universities; Uclan—the University of Central Lancashire—Lancaster, and, of course, Edge Hill. However, I must make an appeal to Lancashire county council. If we are to have a powerful, knowledge-based economy in which we all become wealthier and more successful, the council must not cut our library services. If we want young people throughout Lancashire to be able to study in peace, and to look things up on the internet in, for instance, Bacup, Whitworth and Crawshawbooth libraries, we must be far-sighted. We cannot focus on short-term cost savings. I accept that budgets are under great pressure, but we must have a long-term plan, and that will not be served by robbing our young people of their libraries.

In the last 23 months, we have also seen development to help the northern powerhouse to grow throughout Lancashire. The Heysham link road is nearing completion, and a close partnership with Peel Ports in both Liverpool and Heysham is enabling us to create a global gateway through the sea for the north-west’s industry. That, of course, includes the aerospace industry. We are very lucky in Lancashire—our aerospace industry is globally pre-eminent—but we must ensure that, through the northern powerhouse project, we can build on the success of that existing industry. In my own constituency, companies such as J. and J. Ormerod plc, Linemark, WEC Engineering and of course the world-famous Crown Paints are already making the northern powerhouse a reality.

I have a simple ambition, and I hope that it will be reflected in the Queen’s Speech. It is to drive the northern economy ahead and to narrow the north-south divide. In a one nation speech, we in the north of England must show that we do not want to drag down London or the south; rather, we want to create a more prosperous north of England to rival and succeed the south as we build our economy. Those who talk the northern powerhouse down—as the Leader of the Opposition did in his response to the Queen’s Speech—are making a mistake. Perhaps the ambition of Members from across the House who represent the north of England is not understood in Islington or other parts of London. People who say that the northern powerhouse is dead just because one infrastructure project has been delayed or because one business has closed do not understand the scale of our ambition. I caution those Labour Members who are hanging on in the south of England— one of whom we have just heard from—against talking down the north, because to do so would be a terrible mistake. I know that the hon. Member for Southampton, Test (Dr Whitehead) did not do that; it was the Leader of the Opposition who talked it down in his response to the Queen’s Speech.

I have some small suggestions for the Government. First, we have handed over an unprecedented amount of power to our cities through city deals in Preston, Leeds, Liverpool and Manchester. There was some criticism when civil servants from the northern powerhouse were brought to London. Let us reverse that by creating a northern powerhouse board made up of civic leaders based in the north of England. Secondly, people in the business world want clear guidance about how they can be involved in this project. It excites businesses across the north of England like no other Government initiative, and we have to get the information out there. Finally, I hope that the Government will keep in mind our creative industries in the north-west. Those industries are supremely successful at competing on a global scale, and the northern powerhouse must drive that forward and celebrate those industries.

[Mrs Sharon Hodgson (Washington and Sunderland West) (Lab)]

I was hoping for a lot more from this Queen’s Speech. I hoped that there would be something to address the ever-growing housing crisis in this country. I also hoped that there would be something on the environment or on the long-awaited and much promised Bill on wild animals in circuses. But mainly, I hoped that there would be some hope for my region and my constituency. Yet again, however, we heard only scant warm words with the brief mention of the northern powerhouse—the Chancellor’s pet project—which does not even seem to reach the north-east.

I do not think the Chancellor heeded my words on the lack of measures for the north-east in his ultra-shambolic Budget back in April, when I warned him that, despite his ambition to be king of the north, he needed to recognise that there was a lot more of the north beyond Manchester before he got to the wall. Mercifully, his time as Chancellor is almost up. Who knows where he will be when winter comes, post-referendum: in No. 10 or in the wilderness on the Back Benches? His legacy for the north-east is, sadly, only more pain and hurt.

Today’s debate is all about our public services, and I want to highlight the damage that is being inflicted on them by this Conservative Government, who are continuing to starve them of proper investment while forcing through damaging and unnecessary legislation. The Tories are now trying to dismantle and ruin two of our country’s greatest and most precious institutions: the NHS and the BBC. These are two public services that we probably all use almost every day and both are central to our national way of life. This Government are hellbent on completely changing the culture and ethos of the two institutions. They have already started the process, but we must not let them complete it.

Since the Conservatives came into office in 2010, the NHS has faced crisis after crisis, all of which could have been avoided if it had been given proper investment and support. Instead, we saw an unnecessary top-down reorganisation of the NHS that disjointed funding streams and placed unnecessary burdens on services through cuts that have been detrimental to our constituents’ experiences of using the NHS. This abysmal mismanagement of the NHS by the Health Secretary and his equally appalling predecessor is compounded by the fact that 3.7 million people are currently on waiting lists, by the understaffing of our hospitals and by patients’ struggles to see their GP. The mismanagement has been acutely felt in the north-east, with the prime example being the underperformance of the North East Ambulance Service NHS Trust. That was the subject of a Westminster Hall debate about two weeks ago in which I and a dozen other north-east colleagues raised our numerous concerns. I hope that the Government have listened to those concerns and will act as soon as possible.

Instead of addressing the issues that the NHS is facing on a day-to-day basis, the Health Secretary took it upon himself to enter into a protracted fight with our junior doctors. They do an amazing job of treating patients in difficult circumstances, yet he has battled with them remorselessly over their pay and conditions. It is welcome that a deal has now been struck between the Department of Health and the junior doctors after everyone was at last brought back around the negotiating table. However, this all could have been avoided, including the recent strike action, if only the Health Secretary had meaningfully listened to the junior doctors’ concerns about the impact the proposed changes to their contracts would have on the NHS.

The Health Secretary must rethink his entire strategy for the national health service and ensure that it does what it was created to do. I want to quote from the leaflet that every home received when the NHS was launched in 1948:

“It will provide you with all medical, dental and nursing care. Everyone—rich or poor, man, woman or child—can use it or any part of it.”

It was Nye Bevan who said:

“Illness is neither an indulgence for which people have to pay, nor an offence for which they should be penalised, but a misfortune, the cost of which should be shared by the community”.

We should have seen something like that in this Queen’s Speech. But wait—no, that only happens in a Labour Queen’s Speech. That is how we got our NHS in the first place.

The BBC is another of our treasured public services that the Government are trying to undermine. The Culture Secretary is using tactics that can only be described as bullying and intimidation to make the BBC accept a new charter—which is in no one’s interests other than those of commercial media moguls—and he has shown his true colours by going on record as saying that the disappearance of the BBC is a “tempting prospect”. Those are the words of the man who is supposed to be in charge of nurturing and championing British culture and talent.

The Government’s proposals aim to hobble the BBC, and they will put its position as an independent public broadcaster in jeopardy by introducing Government appointees to oversee the organisation. That is a clear attack on the BBC’s independence and its ability to hold the Government to account. Putting Government-approved people on the board would threaten the very existence of the BBC as we know it. Peter Kosminsky, the director of “Wolf Hall” and winner of the BAFTA Best Drama award, has said that

“the BBC’s main job is to speak truth to power—to report to the British public without fear or favour, no matter how unpalatable that might be to those in government.”

Those words remind us of exactly why the Government must maintain the integrity that the BBC has come to be respected for, not just in the UK but right across the world.

The BBC is not only one of our main sources of news and information; it also acts as a beacon for British culture and talent and is a true cornerstone of UK plc. From giving that much needed break to up-and-coming artists on BBC radio stations to the many TV programmes that showcase the greatest aspects of British life—commercially successful shows such as “Strictly Come Dancing” and “The Great British Bake-Off”, informative and incredible documentaries such as “South Pacific”, “Frozen Planet” and the many other David Attenborough documentaries that have taken us into some of the most remote and exotic places in the world—the BBC is the very best of British in everything it does, and we get to enjoy all that for the remarkably good-value price of just 40p a day while sitting in the comfort of our own home. However, the Culture Secretary has persistently put the future of commercial BBC programming in jeopardy by saying that the BBC should focus on broadcasting for the public good. He clearly forgets that all shows broadcast by the BBC, whether commercial or informative, are for the public good. The two cannot be separated because commercially successful programmes help to fund world-class documentaries that are viewed across the globe. My Opposition colleagues and I will do everything in our power to ensure that one of our most treasured institutions is protected, continues to drive creativity in the 21st century, and is accessible to all.

Going back to Peter Kosminsky, he also said in his acceptance speech at the BAFTAs:

“It’s not their BBC, it’s your BBC.”

Never have truer words been said about our BBC. We need to defend it at all costs from the damage that this Government wish to inflict upon it. Our NHS and BBC make us proud to be British. When it comes to damaging those two precious public services, the Government will not get an easy ride either from Opposition Members or from the wider public watching today.

[Jake Berry]

Does the hon. Lady agree that the BBC is uniquely able to tackle difficult issues such as controlling abuse? She may have been following the recent story in “The Archers” relating to Helen Titchener, which showcases the BBC at its best. If the hon. Lady goes on to the “Free Helen Titchener” JustGiving page, she will see that the BBC has been involved in helping to raise £130,000 to support women’s refuges across the country.

[Mrs Hodgson]

I am so pleased that I allowed that intervention, because it was excellent. I thank the hon. Gentleman for that, and I do agree with him.

The NHS and the BBC are cherished institutions, providing an essential public good. They are the very best of British. The proposals are a damning indictment of this Government’s attitude towards our country and those two great institutions, of which I believe the whole country is immensely proud. That is why we cannot allow them to be dismantled or diminished in stature or performance. On the day that the NHS was founded, Nye Bevan said:

“The NHS will last as long as there are folk left with the faith to fight for it.”

His words apply equally to the BBC in this context, as much as he intended them for the NHS. We need to have faith now, and we need to fight for both of them before it is too late. Otherwise, the NHS and the BBC, which our grandparents’ generation so proudly created, will no longer be there for our grandchildren, who will never forgive us.