Health and Social Care Leadership Review

Jeremy Hunt Excerpts

Wednesday 8th June 2022 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the Chair of the Select Committee, Jeremy Hunt.

[Jeremy Hunt (South West Surrey) (Con)]

I thank the Health Secretary for this excellent report and commend Sir Gordon Messenger and Dame Linda Pollard for all their work in putting it together. It has some very important recommendations. People who run hospitals are doing one of the most difficult jobs in Britain today, and anything we can do to give them better support in their careers will help all of us.

Does my right hon. Friend agree that the elephant in the room is that one thing that makes their job most difficult: we have more national targets in the NHS than any other health system anywhere in the world? That means not only that there is a risk of patients turning into numbers, but that we remove the autonomy from managers to show the leadership that Sir Gordon is advocating in this report. So as my right hon. Friend implements the recommendations, will he look at the role of national targets in the NHS and whether we need to simplify and reduce them?

[Sajid Javid]

I thank my right hon. Friend for his support of the report. Of course he speaks with incredible experience. He is right to raise the issue of the importance of targets, and sometimes targets can have unintended consequences. The report does talk a bit about the importance of that issue. I can assure him that as we make changes and work with our colleagues in the NHS to make reforms, we will certainly be taking that into account.