NHS and Social Care Funding

Jo Churchill Excerpts

Wednesday 11th January 2017 Commons Chamber

[Dr Whitford]

Public consultation is important, and not just in the way it has often been done in the past—“We’ve made a decision, it’s a fait accompli, and we’re coming and telling you about it.” Unfortunately, that is very much what we have heard about the STP process, partly because it has been so short and partly, I am afraid, because it is about budget-centred care, not patient-centred care. Areas have been given a number and told, “If you’re not reaching this number, don’t bother submitting your plan,” and they are working back from that. That will not achieve an efficient, integrated service, so the public must be involved.

Frontline clinicians must also be involved. They work in a service and know exactly what the bottlenecks are and exactly what horseshoe nail is missing and holding a service back. If we have clinician-led redesign, such as I was involved in for breast cancer in my health board 17 years ago, we can track a patient’s path. We can quickly imagine ourselves as a patient, see the bottlenecks and focus investment on them.

I read an article yesterday stating that three hospitals in Manchester have spent £6 million on management consultants to say, “Shut a ward, sack hundreds of people and jack up the parking charges.” I am sorry, but that was not good value for £2 million each.

[Jo Churchill (Bury St Edmunds) (Con)]

I thank the hon. Lady for, as ever, eloquently expressing issues that face us all, no matter where we come from and who we are. Does she agree that having good healthcare data for clinicians enables patients to be put through the system seamlessly? Many individuals do not realise that their data do not go from their GP into acute care and then back into social care. If we could improve that—I make a plug for my private Member’s Bill on Friday—it would help patients.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jo Churchill (Bury St Edmunds) (Con)]

I pay tribute to all who work in our national health service and welcome this important debate. I hear the Secretary of State not blaming, but looking for solutions; that is more what we should be about. I have called for an honest debate about the NHS since I came to this place. The NHS is 70 years old next year, and if it is going to reach 100 we need to look after it.

But I want to start with the positive. My own hospital, West Suffolk, saw a 20% increase between Christmas and new year in the number of patients admitted. Those patients were poorly—very poorly; that point was made earlier. The hospital had prepared a resilience plan for a 5% uplift in patient numbers, but it has coped spectacularly well. To refer to a point made by the hon. Member for Tooting (Dr Allin-Khan), who is no longer present, people come into A&E with ingrowing toenails and dry skin, and it is important that we make sure we see the most poorly people in the most appropriate way and use resources most effectively.

My constituency has the second oldest population in the country. There is an ageing population with comorbidities, and in the next 10 years the number of those aged 85-plus will rise by 45%, so the allocation of resources as we go forward is important.

But my hospital has been one of the most resilient in the east, at 85%, and its resilience is in most part due to its fantastic staff. West Suffolk hospital has been innovative. It pays for 20 beds in Glastonbury court, a facility owned by Care UK to provide a step-down facility. In January, it will be doing a bridging care service with the councils. Improvement will come through prevention and integration, and not always by shouting for more money.

My hon. Friend the Member for Faversham and Mid Kent (Helen Whately) said that what we need is good integration. Good working in Suffolk needs to be copied. As my hon. Friend the Member for Wells (James Heappey) and the hon. Member for Central Ayrshire (Dr Whitford) said, STPs need to be looked at as a force for good, and I urge Labour not to knock them, but to work with them. They are clinician-led, which is what everybody was asking for.

We cannot have everything we want in life—we never can—and we cannot have everything we want out of the NHS. That is why we need an honest conversation. With rising expectations and an ageing population, the private sector has been in use in the NHS since 1948. If we are going to get more bang for our buck, we should perhaps look at parts of the private sector, to be able to enhance what we give patients through these critical periods.

[Simon Hoare (North Dorset) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right about the need for a grown-up debate about integration and about learning from best practice. Does she share my concern that as Labour Members fan the flames of their artificial indignation, all they are doing is proving yet again that they are either unwilling, ill-equipped or ideologically—

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Mrs Eleanor Laing)]

Thank you. Jo Churchill.

[Jo Churchill]

I agree in that since we last debated this with the Opposition on 23 November, apart from asking for £700 million to be brought forward, they have put forward very little in the way of tangible plans. We are talking about everybody here, and just slinging bows and arrows across the Chamber will not get us to the solution we need.

If this is about money, why do some areas do better than others? It is actually about the allocation of resources and good leadership. I have received three letters about good healthcare. A resident in my constituency saw the GP on 28 October, the consultant on 8 November, and had their operation on the 29th. That was at my district general hospital that used the private facility locally to enhance the patient experience.

We need a long-term solution. I am pleased that the Prime Minister has spoken about tackling the difficulties of mental health. The right hon. Member for North Norfolk (Norman Lamb) has championed that and shares a mental health trust with me. I am pleased to see that another 49,000 people are being treated for cancer—that is something that I came to this place to champion—and another 822,000 people are receiving specialist cancer treatment. We have seen huge increases in demand, and we need to admit that we cannot just carry on. There have been advances in drugs, but we need to take into account comorbidities and an ageing population.

We need to understand what is wrong, and we will do that by having better data throughout the system. The Richmond Group wrote in support of my private Member’s Bill that information held in healthcare records has a huge potential to provide better care and improve health service delivery within the service. Paramedics have asked me for better access to data so that, when they find someone on the floor, they will know what meds they are on and what the most beneficial treatment would be. GPs want their information to flow through the system to help social care and the hospital sector. Pharmacies need to be able to read and write, and those working in social care need to be able to look at someone’s pathway. Patient outcomes should be the thing that we are all talking about, but we have to make decisions. At the centre of all this, we need to support those colleagues who are working above and beyond at this time. We need to behave in a grown-up, responsible way, just as they are, in caring for our NHS.