Health Services: Cross-border Co-operation

Jamie Stone Excerpts

Tuesday 16th April 2024 Westminster Hall

[Virginia Crosbie]

I thank the hon. Member for his intervention, and in particular for that feedback on how cross-border co-operation actually works. Of course I am focusing on Wales, but he quite rightly highlights that this is the United Kingdom. By working together, we can solve these issues and provide a collaborative approach to healthcare for people across the UK.

I also wanted to add to my list of failures the near-collapse of local NHS dental services. I could honestly stand here and reel off story after story of lives drastically and sometimes irreversibly impacted by the failures of BCUHB. In Holyhead, the largest town in my constituency, two GP practices were merged during the pandemic into Hwb Iechyd Cybi, or Cybi Health Hub. That practice has suffered a series of problems, including twice facing the threat of having no GPs—and that is in Holyhead, the largest town in my constituency.

One of the main things that would make a difference to Hwb Iechyd Cybi and the people it serves would be to co-locate the two original practices. Proposals have been made for that and, in the longer term, for a state-of-the-art healthcare centre for Holyhead. The co-location project would deliver economies of scale that would vastly improve the service that the practices can deliver and, therefore, patient outcomes. The project was allegedly given the go-ahead two years ago, but it has stalled and stalled in BCUHB’s hands, and now it has completely stagnated. Likewise, the integrated health centre has been under discussion for years, but it remains under discussion, with no progress likely. Lack of funding is the problem that is generally cited.

Hwb Iechyd Cybi serves 9,000 patients, and there are around 15,000 people in its catchment area. Holyhead is not a minor backwater in north Wales; it is a large town, yet it has no integrated healthcare. It has an A&E that is 25 miles away across a bridge that closes in high winds, and it has a massive shortage of doctors. I have launched my own petition to raise awareness of this issue and to call on BCUHB to proceed with the co-location project, as well as starting work on the new health centre with urgency. I recognise that the NHS faces significant pressures across the UK, but people are actually moving out of my constituency to live in other parts of Britain because they are scared of becoming ill in north Wales.

There are too many stories of avoidable death and harm. Unfortunately, it is almost impossible to compare the situation across the devolved nations in order to see just how bad it really is, because the Welsh Government produce different data from that produced by the UK Government. That makes it almost impossible to compare patient outcomes across borders.

What we do know are facts like these. In 2023, over 22,000 paramedic hours were lost in Wales just waiting outside A&E. In January 2024, more than 3,000 people in north Wales waited for more than 12 hours to be discharged from A&E, and nearly 60,000 BCUHB patients had been waiting for more than 36 weeks to start treatment; six years earlier, that number was just under 10,000. Over 57,000 people across Wales have been waiting for more than a year to start treatment, with 24,000 patient pathways waiting more than two years. Since 2010-11, the Welsh Government have increased health spending by 30.6%, well short of the UK Government’s increase in England of 38.9%.

We have asked the UK Government for help on behalf of our constituents. Last year, the then Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, my right hon. Friend the Member for North East Cambridgeshire (Steve Barclay), wrote to the Welsh Government to offer a right of access to NHS services in England for people in Wales. Unfortunately, the Welsh Health Minister claims not to have the additional budget to facilitate that proposal, despite the clear benefits it could offer our constituents. The Welsh Government can, however, find an estimated £100 million to increase the number of Senedd Members from 60 to 96; £4.25 million to buy a farm that it now cannot develop; and over £30 million to implement the much-derided default 20 mph speed limit.

The Welsh Government approach is also highly inconsistent. Take the covid pandemic. The Welsh Government seemed to be unaware that they would have to provide their own response to the threat, despite having been in charge of healthcare in Wales for years. They prevaricated and created different measures and responses, but they want to be part of the UK covid inquiry rather than holding their own. They seem to think they can pick and choose when they are accountable. It would be fantastic to see the Welsh Government prioritising health as the UK Government are doing, for example by enabling pharmacies in England to prescribe medication for common conditions such as earache and impetigo. It is challenging to be a UK MP in Wales when a matter such as health is devolved. Many people do not realise that it is devolved and blame Westminster for failings.

[Jamie Stone (Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross) (LD)]

The hon. Member is making an splendid speech, and my goodness, it rings a bell with me. I have a GP friend in Caithness who developed an aggressive cataract; within a very short space of time she was unable to drive and had to give up her practice. She put her name down with NHS Scotland. Shortly afterwards, she went private and got it dealt with. Fourteen months later, she got a message from the NHS to say she could have a consultation —not a treatment, but a consultation. She would have grabbed it with both hands if she could have got treatment across the border in England. There is a lot wrong with the NHS in Scotland. It is too bad that none of the nationalists are here. They should be pressing for cross-border co-operation as well. Let us hope we get it.

[Virginia Crosbie]

I thank the hon. Member for sharing some background information on the situation in Scotland and his friend’s story of waiting 14 months for a cataract consultation. He makes a very important point: there should be many more Members of Parliament here for the debate. We have the Minister here, and it is an important opportunity to share some of the some of the terrible stories that we hear.

Despite health in Wales not being our gig, it makes up a third of my postbag, and my colleagues and I cannot turn our backs on our constituents. We cannot ignore their problems and blame Wales, because these are life and death situations. We desperately need the UK Government to step in and up the ante on cross-border co-operation. We desperately need the UK Government to take this matter in hand and do something now to protect the wellbeing of British citizens. Will my right hon. Friend the Minister commit to visiting Ynys Môn and meeting my constituents who have suffered as a result of the BCUHB failures and those who desperately need an integrated medical centre in Holyhead?