Oral Answers to Questions

John Baron Excerpts

Tuesday 10th June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Norman Lamb]

I pay tribute to the right hon. Gentleman for his tireless campaigning on diabetes. He has played an essential role in ensuring that it is brought to public attention. It is critical that people who require care for diabetes get access to the care they need, whether they are living in a care home or in their own home.

[Mr John Baron (Basildon and Billericay) (Con)]

4. What assessment he has made of the role of the comprehensive delivery dashboard in holding clinical commissioning groups accountable for their one-year cancer survival rates.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health (Jane Ellison)]

NHS England uses a range of data, as my hon. Friend will know, including data from the delivery dashboard, to assess the performance of CCGs. That includes the data from the composite cancer one-year survival indicators. NHS England will take action— it has quarterly assurance meetings between area teams and CCGs—if there are concerns about CCGs’ performance.

[Mr Baron]

May I suggest to the Minister that if the Government are to meet their target of saving an additional 5,000 lives a year and to promote diagnosis, we need to hold underperforming CCGs to account. Why is it, then, that the one-year survival rates, which are designed to promote earlier diagnosis, are not in the delivery dashboard, which, unlike the outcomes indicator set, has teeth, particularly given that CCG chief executives have said that they see no reason why the one-year figures could not be included in the dashboard?

[Jane Ellison]

We will certainly look at that, but I emphasise that all those things are important as part of the conversation between area teams and CCGs. I remind the House that the CCG outcome indicators set for 2014-15 include a range of important indicators for cancer, including one-year survival for all cancers, one-year survival for breast, lung and colorectal cancers combined, cancers diagnosed via emergency routes, and cancers diagnosed at an early stage—something I know my hon. Friend has, quite rightly, championed consistently in this House.

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[Norman Lamb]

Absolutely, and we are doing it. One of the problems we are having to confront is that when the Labour Government introduced the 18-week waiting standard, unbelievably they left out mental health. When mental health is left out from a standard of that sort, that determines where the money goes, and ever since then mental health has lost out. We are committed to changing that.

[Mr John Baron (Basildon and Billericay) (Con)]

T1. If he will make a statement on his departmental responsibilities.

[The Secretary of State for Health (Mr Jeremy Hunt)]

Almost a year ago, following the Keogh report, we put 11 NHS trusts into special measures, the first time such a large number of trusts have been put into special measures. Yesterday I was pleased to report to the House that the first trust, Basildon, has come out of special measures. I am pleased to tell the House today that across all the trusts in special measures, an additional 1,202 nurses and an additional 118 doctors have been recruited. The programme is making good progress, and the whole House will want to commend the efforts of all the staff in those hospitals on the tremendous efforts they are making.

[Mr Baron]

I join the Secretary of State in commending the management and all the staff of Basildon hospital for their excellent work and a great team effort. The hospital is now no doubt on an upward trajectory. I should like to raise with him the matter of the human papilloma virus vaccination programme for young women. It has been a success, and there is mounting evidence that is should be extended to young men. Will the Government now look into the feasibility of doing that?

[Mr Hunt]

My hon. Friend is right, and I am grateful to him for mentioning how proud we are of the HPV vaccination programme for girls and women. It is one of the best in the world, and we are getting an 86% take-up rate among eligible 12 to 13-year-old girls. He is also right to say that we now need to look at whether the programme should be extended to men and boys. A decision was taken at the time that it did not need to be, but we are now reviewing that decision. We will shortly be getting advice from the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation—which, as he will know, gives us independent advice on these matters—and we will take its advice seriously.