Heart Surgery (Leeds)

Debate between Jeremy Hunt and David Ward

Monday 15th April 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

Let me be clear: I do not want anyone in the NHS who has concerns about mortality to sit on those concerns, so if Sir Roger had concerns, he was right to raise them with Professor Sir Bruce Keogh. Sir Roger also made comments that suggested that he might have prejudged the outcome of Safe and Sustainable, so I think it is right that he does not take any further role in that, and we will be getting independent advice on whether Safe and Sustainable made the right recommendations, which I shall consider before making any decision. I have to say to the hon. Gentleman that there is no fancy footwork. I am absolutely clear that if anyone, anywhere in the NHS, has concerns about safety and if the view of the NHS medical director is that we need to investigate those concerns and, in the meantime, suspend surgery at that institution, I will support the NHS medical director. That is the right thing to do and I think the hon. Gentleman would do exactly the same if he were in my shoes.

[Mr David Ward (Bradford East) (LD)]

This whole thing stinks; it really does. We now know that the unit is perfectly safe, which means that, for a period of time, children’s health was put at risk while it was closed. That is the seriousness of the situation. The decision was not made after careful, thoughtful consideration of authoritative, verified data; it was a kneejerk reaction to what must, in all probability, have been malicious allegations made against the unit. We have been told over and over again to ask ourselves what Sir Roger could have done, other than close the unit, but what did he actually do? That is what we need to find out, and the matter needs to be investigated. We know what the context was, following the court case, and we need to find out what follow-up work he did in that context to verify the allegations before he took that risk with the health of young children.

[Mr Hunt]

There are some risks, of course, in suspending surgery, but when we have mortality data such as those that Professor Sir Bruce Keogh was faced with, there are also considerable risks involved in doing nothing in response. The decision was taken not to close the children’s heart unit but to suspend surgery until he could get to the bottom of whether there was any truth in the data. He had a very difficult decision to make, given that situation, but I think he made the right decision.