Oral Answers to Questions Debate
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John Stevenson
Main Page: John Stevenson (Conservative - Carlisle)Department Debates - View all John Stevenson's debates with the Department of Health and Social Care
(13 years, 6 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr Lansley
Well, I do not wish to embarrass the chief executive of the NHS, but actually, he told me he made an error—he was referring to health visitors, not midwives, when he was talking to the Public Accounts Committee. We are short of health visitors precisely because, through the life of the last Government, the number was continuously going down, and we are going to recruit more. Actually, we share the last Labour Government’s commitment to increase the number of midwives, not least because of the increase in the number of births, and to do so in pace with that. As a consequence, in conversations that the Under-Secretary of State for Health, my hon. Friend the Member for Guildford (Anne Milton), and I have had with the Royal College of Midwives, we have made it clear that we will do all we possibly can. We already have more midwives in training than at any other time in our history.
John Stevenson (Carlisle) (Con)
T4. As Ministers are aware, GPs in north Cumbria are supportive of GP commissioning and are already working hard for its success. However, given the rural nature of the area, what support will be given to the local hospitals to ensure that they can provide secondary health care within the new regime, when they have to accommodate the additional costs of providing health care in a rural environment?
Mr Lansley
Yes, I entirely endorse what my hon. Friend says about GPs in Cumbria. They are indeed very forward-looking and show that, even under the last Government, practice-based commissioning was demonstrating its benefits, and we are building on that. I mentioned earlier the duty in the Health and Social Care Bill on the NHS commissioning board to reduce inequalities in access to health care. That will be important for rural areas. The pricing arrangements, led by the commissioning board and Monitor, must also take into account varying costs associated with the delivery of care in different localities.