Urgent and Emergency Care

Justin Madders Excerpts

Monday 5th September 2022 Commons Chamber

[Steve Barclay]

Far from there being a lack of planning, the very essence of integration between social care and the NHS through the ICSs is that we recognise the importance of both aspects working much more closely together. That is why we are bringing forward initiatives such as the federated data platform.

Monkeypox is outside the scope of today’s statement, but I know the issue is of particular interest to the hon. Gentleman. He will know that, fortunately, we have not yet had any fatal cases in the UK and the rate of infection has been falling. We purchased the maximum number of vaccines that we could; I wrote to the relevant charities with the details. Although smaller doses are being delivered compared with the initial 50,000, we still have doses in the system. We expect a further 20,000 very shortly and a further 80,000 later this month. We have procured doses, we are getting them out and it is fortuitous that cases are falling, but we are obviously keeping the situation under close watch.

[Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)]

This summer I have heard some horror stories from constituents with life-threatening conditions about the dangerous delays they have faced. When one constituent raised the issue with the NHS, she was told by the senior consultant at the A&E department that the NHS has collapsed. If senior frontline clinicians are saying that in the summer, God help us when we get to winter. I really fear where we are going to be, because there is no doubt that my constituent is very lucky to be alive. We have heard a lot of figures today about the number of excess deaths this year. Will the Secretary of State give us his estimate of the number of people who have died unnecessarily because they have been stuck in an ambulance waiting to get into A&E, or because an ambulance has not turned up at all?

[Steve Barclay]

Again, despite that colourful language, we have more doctors, more nurses and more paramedics. We are training more and meeting more demand, and significant additional funding has been applied to ambulance trusts, call handling and other parts of the system, including primary care. Part of reducing the demand on the ambulance system is related to GP capacity, which is why—to take that as an example—an additional £1.5 billion of funding has gone in.