Mental Health and NHS Performance

Debate between Jeremy Hunt and Karen Buck

Monday 9th January 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

I am happy, on my hon. Friend’s behalf, to ask the Minister responsible to meet him to discuss that psychiatric unit. Of course the proof of the pudding is in the eating, but this is the first time that I can remember that a Prime Minister has made her first major speech on the NHS about mental health and indeed talked, on the steps of Downing Street as she arrived, about the importance of sorting out mental health. That is a sign of the commitment coming right from the top.

[Ms Karen Buck (Westminster North) (Lab)]

The fabulous team at Imperial, St Mary’s in west London are featuring in a television programme this week, and the chief of service for emergency care is reported as saying:

“We’ve just had our worst 10 days on record. There’s nowhere in the hospital to move anybody. What’s happened in the last two years is the whole system, countrywide, has ground to a halt.”

That is partly because there is more than the equivalent of a ward of patients at any time who cannot move out of the hospital because there is nowhere for them to go. Does the Secretary of State accept that his Government have gone too far in the destruction of local government finance, including for social care, and does he accept that next year, despite all the rhetoric, local government finance will go down, not up?

[Mr Hunt]

First, I would like to thank the staff at Imperial, who, alongside other NHS staff, have done a fantastic job over a very difficult period. I would say to the hon. Lady that 50% of councils have no delayed discharges of care. It is a problem in many hospitals, but there are many areas that are managing to deal with it. I suggest that the local authorities that serve her constituency should look at the other parts of the country that are dealing with this problem.

A and E and Ambulance Services

Debate between Jeremy Hunt and Karen Buck

Thursday 18th December 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right, and I commend what is happening in his constituency. He will be pleased to know that this is beginning to happen all over the country. The heart of the long-term solution is to have people in the social care system, people in primary care and people in hospitals to see themselves as part of one system, in which people are properly flowing between different parts of the system in the way that is right for them, ignoring organisational or institutional barriers. Where that happens, we are making good progress and we are getting the right performance in A and Es.

[Ms Karen Buck (Westminster North) (Lab)]

Last week, the chief executive of Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust told me that it had a ward of patients that it was unable to discharge into the community. This week the Care Quality Commission ranked the A and E unit at St Mary’s as being inadequate owing to a lack of bed capacity and physical capacity in the ward. Yesterday the London ambulance service had to call in emergency help because it is under such pressure. What is the Secretary of State doing to turn around the crisis in central London’s health service? Will he remind us again why it made sense to close two west London A and E units in the middle of an A and E crisis?

[Mr Hunt]

It is funny how the hon. Lady talks about the closing of A and E departments without talking about the opening of A and E departments and the improvement of facilities. The plans for north-west London involve significant improvements, including weekend opening of GP surgeries, which is one of the key things that the shadow Front-Bench team has talked about as something that will help A and E departments. As for what is happening specifically, I was disappointed with the CQC report about the A and E at St Mary’s, but I gently say to her that it was this Government who set up an independent inspection regime with a chief inspector who gives the public information in a way that they did not have before. I think that is the biggest spur to making sure that the right changes are made quickly.

Changes to Health Services in London

Debate between Jeremy Hunt and Karen Buck

Wednesday 30th October 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

The right hon. Gentleman campaigns assiduously for his constituents. I recognise that there are worries about potential changes in his constituency, an issue he often raises. Yes, we must ensure, if there are transitions or changes, that proper plans are in place to ensure they can be made safely. If he reads the report, he will derive a great deal of comfort from the stress the IRP puts on the necessity of having proper alternative provision in place before any changes are made.

[Ms Karen Buck (Westminster North) (Lab)]

The Secretary of State’s statement has left us even less clear than we were on the implications for hospital services for Westminster residents. Frankly, that is quite an achievement. Planned non-emergency hospital services have already moved away from St Mary’s Paddington to pre-empt the closure programmes that he is now telling us will not happen. That was done on the basis that St Mary’s would become the premier emergency hospital for west London, so where does that leave the provision of additional emergency services? Will that leave my constituents having to travel to Hammersmith, Ealing and Central Middlesex hospitals for their treatment, something the local authority was not even consulted on? Many GPs did not even know where their patients were being treated.

[Mr Hunt]

I hope that I have provided clarity by saying that there will remain an A and E at Ealing and Charing Cross, and that I support what the report says, which is that there should be five major A and E centres, of which St Mary’s Paddington will probably become the most pre-eminent trauma centre in the country. This is a big step for the hon. Lady’s constituents who use St Mary’s, and I think that they will be pleased with what I have said today.