NHS Outsourcing and Privatisation

Karin Smyth Excerpts

Wednesday 23rd May 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

That is exactly the point. Sometimes the quality is high in the private sector and sometimes it is low. When it is low, we will clamp down hard just as we do with the NHS.

[Karin Smyth (Bristol South) (Lab)]

I am listening carefully to the Secretary of State’s comments on ideology and the Health and Social Care Act 2012. He will remember that I, in a CCG, was implementing the 2012 Act. Is he saying that he is proud of the Act and that it has worked out as intended?

[Mr Hunt]

As Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai said about the French revolution, it is too early to tell.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Solihull (Julian Knight) alluded to, there is one ideology that we will not compromise on: our belief that the NHS should be free at the point of use and available to all. And why will we not compromise on this? It is because, contrary to Labour’s creation myth about the NHS, it was a Conservative Health Minister, Sir Henry Willink, who first proposed it in 1944. Here are his words from 1944 announcing the setting up of the NHS:

“Whatever your income, if you want to use the service…there’ll be no charge for treatment. The National Health Service will include”—

[Interruption.] I know this is difficult for Labour Members, but let me tell them what the Conservatives said when we were setting up the NHS:

“The National Health Service will include family doctors”

and will

“cover any medicines you may need, specialist advice, and of course hospital treatment whatever the illness”.

Nye Bevan deserves great credit for delivering that Conservative dream, but let us be clear today that no party has a monopoly on compassion, and no party has a monopoly on our NHS. There are some other myths—

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[Karin Smyth (Bristol South) (Lab)]

The biggest issue facing the NHS is the money and the workforce, and going into that mix, we have these wholly owned companies. They are a wheeze to gain income, but the consequences are deeply troubling. They drive further fragmentation of the NHS and, when collaboration should be growing, we instead see each trust going its own way.

If these changes for wholly owned companies were driven by service improvement and the appetite of staff for change, the managers and boards of the trusts would be doing their jobs, which is to identify the need for improvement in these services and to speak to their staff about how to achieve it. However, in almost every case, the changes have been progressed in secret, with little or no staff engagement or consultation and with no documents being made public. It is very hard to get the documents from these trusts. Worse still, we are now in an uncontrollable hiving off of NHS assets to these new companies, with no discernible safeguards to prevent the assets, or indeed the whole company, from being sold off to anyone else. They are one step away from being taken outside the NHS to any other provider.

In response to some of my written questions, I have discerned a bit of change in the Government on the NHS. I asked how many trusts have had to change the terms of their authorisation, which was a requirement in the Health and Social Care (Community Health and Standards) Act 2003, to protect the transferred assets. On 11 May, the Government said:

“There is no requirement to change the terms of authorisation when setting up a wholly owned subsidiary and therefore, the Department does not hold the information requested. If trusts hold community interest assets then these are considered public assets and cannot be sold unless subject to a Departmental/Secretary of State approval, however this is only a limited number of assets.

For other assets trusts should consider whether transactions are ‘reportable’ under the transactions guidance and therefore would be subject to a review if above the thresholds outlined.

NHS Improvement has committed to:

The proposed creation of subsidiary companies becoming a reportable transaction to NHS Improvement under the Transactions Guidance, irrespective of size; and”

NHS Improvement will be looking at “subsequent changes”.

While a tick-box exercise and oversight by NHS Improvement is welcome, that is closing the door after the horse has bolted. In answer to another question about continued onward sale, I was told that there would be restrictions where disposal would affect commissioner-requested services. The 2003 Act does not say that. Section 16 talks about NHS foundation trusts not disposing of protected property

“without the approval of the regulator”

and says that protected property is the

“property of the trust designated as protected in its authorisation.”

I think there has been a change in that period and I would like to understand why. If the Minister cannot answer that today, I am happy to write to him.

We have essentially no assurance as to how the transfer of these wholly owned companies to any private bidder, one step on, can be stopped. How would local people ever know? How would the staff now? We cannot get any information from most of these trusts. They are not answering FOI requests and that is why this is essentially of such continued concern.

The first step to remedying this shambles would be to close the VAT loophole, which I do not have time to talk about today. Meanwhile, NHS Improvement should not be encouraging the recreation of a two-tier workforce, especially at a time of such overwhelming concern about the availability of a skilled workforce. This is ever more important with Brexit looming. NHSI is a Government body funded by the taxpayer and accountable through the Secretary of State to Parliament. That it is encouraging and permitting these deals, and doing so in secret, is a disgrace. It should not be allowed. As NHSI is subject to ministerial oversight, the Secretary of State needs to tell it to stop it.

NHS 70th Anniversary

Karin Smyth Excerpts

Wednesday 16th May 2018 Westminster Hall

[Karin Smyth (Bristol South) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hosie. As my hon. Friend the Member for Blaenau Gwent (Nick Smith) said, the antecedents of the NHS are to be found in Tredegar and in the Beveridge report, which preceded it. Disease was one of Beveridge’s five great evils. Infectious diseases such as polio, diphtheria and tuberculosis caused people to die in their early and mid-50s on average. The need for a sufficient and healthy labour force to rebuild the economy necessitated combating those diseases, which also caused a high rate of infant mortality. The need for a better, longer-living workforce drove much of what Beveridge looked at.

There was in fact a good deal of state funding provision before 1948 to cope with the devastation of disease, but what Bevan did, against tremendous opposition within the service and politically, was to centralise the system, nationalise hospital provision, create standards across the country and, crucially, give people the assurance that they would always be seen and treated, based on their need, not their ability to pay.

The health service was built on a tripartite structure of hospital, GP and community services. In return for good terms and conditions, clinical freedom and autonomy in the system, the doctors finally agreed and the NHS was born. It was a wonderful achievement, but it was also a wonderful compromise. Over the past 70 years, the tensions in that compromise—the local versus the national, the role of clinical autonomy, priorities and the quality of the service—have regularly surfaced. There are always crises—astonishingly, every year there is a winter.

We now treat 1 million people every 36 hours, and employ nearly 2 million people. We are very grateful for everything they do, and we celebrate them today on this 70th year. However, the challenges are different today, and the service should therefore be different in the next 70 years. This anniversary is an opportunity to celebrate the achievement, revisit the compromise and set a course that is as resilient for the next 70 years. The diseases that are with us today—cancer, and cardiovascular, respiratory and liver disease—are very different. Depending on a person’s social class, dietary risks, tobacco and obesity are the biggest contributors to early death and disability. Alcohol and drug misuse, and lack of physical activity, are also key. We are finally starting to appreciate the impact of mental health and social isolation on physical health.

Life expectancy has increased, but the prevalence of people living with one or more limiting long-term illnesses has changed the picture of healthcare demand, and that requires the system to change. In Bristol, women live an average of 64 years in good health, but a further 19 years in poor health. For men, the figures are 63 and 15 years, but that average masks a huge range in social class. Several areas of my Bristol South constituency are in the bottom 5% in England for male life expectancy. In 2010 the Marmot review told us that such health inequalities cost us approximately £36 billion to £40 billion in lost taxes and costs in welfare and to the NHS—that is a huge amount of money. We must prevent and manage life-limiting diseases and address the silent misery of families who support and cope with people living with them.

Accountability is a major issue for the service in the next 70 years. We need to start treating patients and the public as assets to the health service, not as nuisances. We need somehow to introduce democratic accountability into decision making. The complex fragmentation of the health service makes it wholly unclear where responsibility, and hence accountability, lies. From the bottom up, hundreds of bodies are involved. The 200-odd clinical commissioning groups are members’ clubs with no element of either direct or representative democracy, and they are plagued with conflicts of interest. At the top, there is not just the Department and Ministers, but a raft of arm’s length bodies, which Members of Parliament find it impossible to navigate. I worked in the system for a CCG, and I still find it really difficult—it is an absolute mess.

One reason for the mess is the disaster of the Health and Social Care Act 2012, but the NHS has been poor on accountability since the early centralisation. It has always been fragmented in a way that makes accountability harder, and it has always seen itself as separate from the rest of the local system, which has democratic accountability. That is a problem. It has always been riven by powerful vested interests that distort the general accountability. That is a key part of Bevan’s compromise, and I think we need to revisit it.

Presented with a well-made case that is supported by, dare I say it, experts or informed leaders, the public will make difficult decisions. I know local politics can make things difficult when tough issues such as service changes are necessary, but excluding people does not make that any easier. Making a hard case to local people and their MPs is challenging work, but if that does not happen decisions gain no legitimacy. We can keep the “N” in the NHS, but we need to give local people far more control to make it more resilient for the next 70 years.

It looks like we are going that way. We have heard about the experience in Scotland, and this is also a devolved matter in Wales. Very interesting things are happening in Manchester, but we need a much better debate about what local looks like. We must recognise that the key issues for now are the money and the workforce. Technology gives us huge opportunities, including on some of the workforce issues.

I want to finish by talking about leadership. I joined the health service as a manager in the late 1980s, and I am very proud of the role that managers play in the services. General management, which was introduced in the 1980s, has few friends, partly because it was associated with the Thatcher era of reforms, and partly because it threatens clinical autonomy and freedom, which were fundamental to Bevan’s compromise. We should use this anniversary to celebrate managers and leadership in the NHS. We need good clinical and non-clinical managers to make the changes we want to see, deliver the efficiencies we need and keep making the system safer. I hope that they can also help leaders make the NHS more open and accountable. We need that for the next 70 years.

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[Mrs Sharon Hodgson (Washington and Sunderland West) (Lab)]

Mr Hosie, it is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship this morning in this very important debate.

I start by thanking my hon. Friend the Member for Blaenau Gwent (Nick Smith) for securing the debate and for his excellent speech. He is rightly proud of his roots in his wonderful constituency and the connection that it holds with Nye Bevan and the founding of the NHS. I am sure that he and his constituents will enjoy the 70th anniversary celebrations, and I look forward to hearing all about them.

I would also like to thank the other hon. Members who spoke this morning for their thoughtful contributions to the debate—the hon. Members for Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock (Bill Grant), for Henley (John Howell), for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (Jamie Stone) and for Airdrie and Shotts (Neil Gray), who speaks for the Scottish National party, and my hon. Friends the Members for Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill (Hugh Gaffney), for York Central (Rachael Maskell) and for Bristol South (Karin Smyth).

This is the first speech that I am giving on the 70th birthday celebrations of the NHS, and it is a genuine honour and privilege to be able to do so here today as the shadow Minister for public health. On 5 July, 70 years ago, the Health Secretary, Aneurin Bevan, was handed the keys to Park Hospital in Manchester, now known as Trafford General Hospital, and launched our national health service. I have my own little photocopied memento of a leaflet distributed before that launch—I wish I had a better copy, but I treasure this one. It says:

“Your new National Health Service begins on 5th July. What is it? How do you get it?

It will provide you with all medical, dental, and nursing care. Everyone—rich or poor, man, woman or child—can use it or any part of it.”

It went on to say:

“But it is not a ‘charity’. You are all paying for it, mainly as taxpayers, and it will relieve your money worries in time of illness.”

The crux of it for our citizens was that they would no longer have to make that awful decision—the choice between debt or, in some unfortunate cases, death. Everyone would now receive healthcare publicly provided and free at the point of use.

I have got my own family anecdote which, as we have the time, I am going to share with you all this morning. I am sure we have all got these family anecdotes. Mine involves my Aunty Ella and my mam. My Aunty Ella was born before the start of world war two and my mam was born in 1945—so you can see straightaway that there is going to be a great anecdote here.

Now, I do not know why—they must just have been unlucky—but in both of their childhoods they suffered from pneumonia. Pre the NHS, when it was my Aunty Ella who had pneumonia, my nana had to go to the doctor’s surgery every morning, where he would hold out his hand, and into his hand she would place a coin—a shilling or whatever. Then she would hold out her hand and into her hand he would place a tablet—obviously, penicillin or some form of medicine. Then she would go home and give it to my Aunty Ella. This went on nearly a week.

My nana was very poor, working class, and she says that in those days, in order to get the money to get that tablet, she would pay a visit to the pawn shop on her way, and pawn whatever was valuable to her at that moment. It tended to be sheets, or a son’s suit or her husband’s suit. She did that in order to get the tablet.

Now fast forward to when my mam, who was born in ’45, got pneumonia, after the health service came in in ’48. My nana did not have to pawn anything; she did not have to go to the doctor’s surgery at all, because a district nurse knocked on the door every day and went upstairs to where my mam was lying in bed with pneumonia, gave her an injection and left. No pawning of sheets, no handing over of money, no stress—that was the difference. Therefore, all of us—I do believe that it is all of us—are committed to those founding principles. We on the Opposition side of the House especially, will continue to fight against the privatisation of our NHS for those reasons.

To quote a phrase often falsely attributed, I now understand, to Bevan, but one I repeat because it rings true no matter who said it:

“The NHS will last as long as there are folk with the faith to fight for it.”

I am pleased to say that 70 years on, there are still plenty of people with the faith left to fight for it. I hope that we will all—though maybe not us personally—be celebrating our NHS for 70 years more, and 70 years after that, and so on. It changed the lives of people then and it is still changing the lives of people today.

Bevan had huge ambitions, but he never would have imagined all those years ago the successes we have had in medicine because of the development of the NHS. I will talk about a few of them now. In 1952, Francis Crick, a British scientist, and James Watson, an American student, made one of the most important scientific breakthroughs of the 20th century, when they discovered the molecular structure of DNA. The discovery helped revolutionise medical treatments in the NHS and elsewhere, improving prevention and treatment of disease. For example, we know now that a BRCA gene mutation can cause a number of cancers in both men and women, who now have the option to have preventive surgery in order to reduce their risk of developing cancer.

In 1954, Sir Richard Doll, a British scientist, published a study in The British Medical Journal co-written with Sir Austin Bradford Hill, which established the link between smoking and lung cancer. That very important study has since led to increased smoking cessation policies from successive Governments, including the ban on smoking in public spaces by the Labour Government in 2006 and the current Government’s—and the Minister’s—tobacco control plan. Smoking prevalence is decreasing across the country, and I am pleased to say that smoking rates in the north-east are declining faster than the national average, thanks in no small part to support from programmes such as Fresh North East, which has seen around 165,000 people quit smoking since 2005.

In 1958, vaccinations for polio and diphtheria were launched, to reduce deaths from both diseases. I am pleased to say both those terrible diseases have now been eradicated from the UK. Others, such as TB and MMR vaccinations, have now become a key part of NHS prevention work. We were in this Chamber just two weeks ago debating the extension of the HPV vaccination to boys after its successful roll-out to girls in order to prevent cancers caused by that virus. Bevan could never have imagined such developments—or maybe he did, such was his vision.

In 1960, doctors at the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh completed the UK’s first kidney transplant, using a set of 49-year-old twins. Incidentally—perhaps it was the pneumonia—my Aunty Ella, who I have mentioned once already, went on to have kidney failure; and just a decade after the first transplant in Edinburgh, she became one of the first to receive a kidney transplant in Newcastle Freeman Hospital. That helped her live long enough not only to see her own children grow up, but to see her first grandchildren born. In 1968, a team of 18 doctors and nurses at the National Heart Hospital in London, led by surgeon Donald Ross, carried out the first heart transplant in this country. There are now more than 50,000 people living with a functioning transplant thanks to organ donation and transplantation in the UK, giving them more time to spend and treasure with their families.

In 1988, breast cancer screening was introduced, offering mammograms to women over 50. We have now increased the number of women who are eligible for breast screening. That helps with early diagnosis and survival rates, which are now at 78% for 10 years or more—excellent figures. None of this would have happened if it were not for our NHS and the everyday heroes that work within it. The NHS is the UK’s largest employer, with over 1.5 million staff from all over the world and more than 350 different careers. Those people are kind, caring and passionate about their patients. They just want to get on and do their job, but sadly, they are finding this more and more difficult, with funding cuts and thousands of unfilled vacancies, when more and more is expected of them.

We on the Opposition side of the House do not take our NHS or the workforce for granted, and neither should the Government. It has to be said that for the last eight years, the NHS has been in crisis. We have ever-growing waiting lists, patients waiting on trolleys in overcrowded hospitals, and people being told not to go to A&E unless it is an absolute emergency. Earlier this year, the Prime Minister announced a funding plan to mark the 70th anniversary of the NHS. I hope the Minister will inform the House how much of that funding will go to improving and establishing public health services. There is a huge funding gap within the NHS, but with the right public health services we can help people to live healthier lives and support them in their endeavour to do so, which, in turn, will save money.

It is estimated by the King’s Fund that since local authorities became responsible for public health budgets in 2015, on a like-for-like basis, public health spending has fallen by 5.2%. That follows a £200 million in-year cut to public health spending in 2015-16 and there are further real-term cuts to come, averaging 3.9% each year between 2016-17 and 2020-21. On the ground, that means cuts to spending on tackling drug misuse in adults—cut by more than £22 million compared with just last year—and smoking cessation services—cut by almost £16 million. Spending to tackle obesity has also fallen, by 18.5% between 2015-16 and 2016-17, again with further cuts in the pipeline in the years to come. These are vital services for local communities, which would benefit their health and life expectancy, but sadly, they continue to be cut due to lack of funding.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Blaenau Gwent said in his excellent opening speech, an ounce of prevention is better than a pound of cure—a line that I will certainly be stealing for future speeches—and that is why, 70 years on, we must focus on public health initiatives. That is why I am so pleased that he made today’s debate about public health, rather than its just being on the 70th anniversary generally. Not only can such initiatives help people live healthier lives, but they will save the NHS—and, in turn, the Treasury—money. I think the technical term for that is a no-brainer.

In closing, I will return to Bevan’s wise words. He said:

“No society can legitimately call itself civilised if a sick person is denied medical aid because of lack of means.”

This Government have the means to make people in this country some of the healthiest in the world. I hope that they will take those means and ensure that vital public health services are provided to society to do just that.

[Karin Smyth]

My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech, as usual. Does she agree that one of the issues with devolution, and some of the experimentation we have seen, is the separation of knowledge between the health service and providers of our public services, particularly in England? We can learn from the experience that has been gained, particularly in Wales, where there is much more integration between those areas, and transfer the learning about public health that has come into local authorities, so that they understand the need to work better with local health services.

[Mrs Hodgson]

Absolutely. That point had not been covered, so I am pleased that my hon. Friend has made it. There is best practice in Wales, and even in Scotland—we are always hearing in these debates about some of the wonderful things going on in Scotland, aren’t we, Minister? We should learn from where there is best practice. Where good things are happening, that knowledge should be spread across the NHS, especially if it will lead to better public health and, in turn, save money.

I was just coming to the end of my contribution. I just wanted to say that we want to go on to see more successes, such as the ones I listed earlier, over the next 70 years. I am sure we will. With medical technology and science the way they are, we probably cannot even imagine the sorts of advances that we will see. I hope those will all be within the publicly funded national health service that we are all so proud of, for many years to come.

Learning Disabilities Mortality Review

Karin Smyth Excerpts

Tuesday 8th May 2018 Commons Chamber

[Caroline Dinenage]

My right hon. Friend is right to raise the Mencap report, because in many cases it reflects the recommendations that have been put forward in this particular report. The mandate to NHS England requires a reduction in the health gap between people with mental health problems, learning disabilities and autism and the population as a whole, and requests support for them to live full, healthy and independent lives. That is something that NHS England has a mandate to deliver, and we of course support it in doing that.

[Karin Smyth (Bristol South) (Lab)]

If it is a crime to politicise the vulnerability of some people and the Government’s cuts, I stand guilty as charged. Further to the question from my hon. Friend the Member for Leicester West (Liz Kendall), what we have seen since 2013 is the complete decimation of services working together on the ground. This is a local government and health issue locally, so may I press the Minister to tell us what action will be taken to make this happen at local level?

[Caroline Dinenage]

It is not about that. This is about inquiring into the deaths of people who have died in our care. Despite all the really difficult decisions we have had to make to deal with the financial challenges this country faced, which the hon. Lady’s party will be well aware of, we have made progress on this issue in terms of transforming care and the healthcare checks on people with learning disabilities, and this very report on the learning from deaths programme proves how absolutely committed we are to ensuring that not one single one of those deaths goes unrecognised or uninvestigated.

Social Care

Karin Smyth Excerpts

Wednesday 25th April 2018 Commons Chamber

[Barbara Keeley]

Indeed. As I have said, the Government have pushed the problem on to councils, which have been forced to use their reserves, and pushed the council on to council tax payers, who have had to pay the levy.

I was talking about the heroic efforts of some councils. Despite budget cuts, which are now running at between 40% and 50%, my local authority, Salford City Council, and neighbouring Manchester City Council have acted to ensure that care providers with which they contract will pay care staff a real living wage, and I know that Labour councils in Lambeth, Southwark and many other London boroughs have committed themselves to paying their care staff the London living wage.

[Karin Smyth (Bristol South) (Lab)]

As my hon. Friend is mentioning many councils, may I draw her attention to the work of Bristol City Council under Councillor Helen Holland? It is leading an important Proud to Care campaign to encourage more care workers back into sector, particularly at a time of increasing demand and labour shortages. Will she join me in commending Bristol City Council’s work in this area?

[Barbara Keeley]

I will indeed, because given the cuts that many councils have been facing—I am sure Bristol is the same—these efforts to protect care services are really excellent.

I was talking about those London boroughs that have committed to pay care staff the London living wage, which, at £10.20 an hour, is way above the Government’s so-called living wage of £7.83—a commitment that is no small undertaking. That is a further example of the good that Labour-run councils are doing for the most vulnerable people in their communities. We on this side of the House—this ties in very much with the point that my hon. Friend has just made—see the need for social care to be valued as a career. At last year’s general election, Labour pledged to implement the real living wage for all care staff and to ensure that care staff were paid for travel time, that 15-minute care visits were scrapped and that zero-hours contracts were ended for care staff. Those are important steps, but we know that we have to go much further if we are to improve care quality.

It is clear from the reports of the Care Quality Commission that staffing levels are still a major issue in those care services rated as inadequate or requiring improvement. Much of the care workforce are underpaid, undervalued and overworked, which leads to high turnover and vacancy rates in the sector among care staff and, more importantly, the registered managers who are responsible for overseeing care quality. Improving pay for care staff will help with that, but we also need to commit to improving care staffing levels to reduce the workload pressure and offer better training and career paths.

The National Audit Office has criticised the Government for failing to have an up-to-date workforce strategy for the care sector and for their lack of oversight of workforce planning in local areas. Indeed, the Government have no major workforce strategy for social care. It was the Labour Government who produced the last strategy, in 2009. The head of the National Audit Office has said:

“Social care cannot continue as a Cinderella service—without a valued and rewarded workforce, adult social care cannot fulfil its crucial role of supporting elderly and vulnerable people in society.”

Skills for Care has a budget of only £21 million for care staff training, whereas Health Education England has a budget of £4.7 billion. That disparity in budgets between health and social care says it all about the Government’s lack of priority for improving the quality of social care.

At the 2017 election, Labour pledged an extra £8 billion for social care across this Parliament, with an extra £1 billion to ease the crisis in social care this year. That aimed to relieve the pressure on the social care system. It would have been enough to begin paying care staff the real living wage and would have sought to offer more publicly funded care packages for people with different levels of need. Today’s debate is not primarily about the long-term funding of social care, but Labour has made it clear that maintaining the current funding system is not an option in the long term. Recently, polling by the Alzheimer’s Society has shown that paying for social care is a growing public concern and that there is overwhelming public support for a cap on care costs. The next Labour Government will implement a lower cap on care costs than the cap set under the Care Act 2014. We will also raise the asset threshold to a higher level than under the current system.

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[Caroline Dinenage]

The hon. Lady had plenty of time to make her comments, so I will make a little progress.

When the Conservative party formed the coalition Government in 2010, it is worth remembering that not only did we have to deal with the parlous state of the country’s finances, but we inherited a burning platform of social care. Of course, that meant taking difficult decisions in those early years, which were challenging times for local authorities.

[Karin Smyth]

Will the Minister give way on the cap?

[Caroline Dinenage]

I will be coming on to the cap later.

To give the Labour party its due, it recognised that we had difficult decisions to make. Had Labour stayed in government, it planned £52 billion-worth of cuts to local government budgets by 2015. However—enough of the history lessons—I intend to make progress and answer many of the shadow Minister’s questions.

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[Karin Smyth]

The 2015 Tory manifesto was very clear on the commitment and the assurances about the cap. The 2017 manifesto abandoned that. I think the Minister said earlier that it is still part of the Government’s considerations. Will she clarify from the Dispatch Box today what we are to expect in the Green Paper with regard to the cap?

[Caroline Dinenage]

The Prime Minister said last year in the general election that we would be consulting on the cap in due course and that will be part of the Green Paper. Building a sustainable care and support system will require some big decisions, but getting this right promises a better system in which everyone can have confidence, where people understand their responsibilities, can prepare for their future and know that the care that they receive will be to a high standard and help them to maintain their independence and well-being. The paper will set out options to put the social care system on a more secure footing and address issues to improve the quality of care and reduce the variation in practice.

NHS Wholly Owned Subsidiary Companies

Karin Smyth Excerpts

Tuesday 6th March 2018 Westminster Hall

[Stephen Barclay]

I will happily take interventions, but first I will finish this point, addressing the previous issue. The recent staff survey was extremely positive: 86% felt part of the Gateshead Health NHS Foundation Trust group. Furthermore, the figure for those with a positive response to the level of pay was 15% higher than the NHS comparator. The idea that the arrangement is exploiting people when the staff survey shows them to be 15% more approving than in other areas is again not a fair representation of the case.

[Karin Smyth (Bristol South) (Lab)]

In the short time remaining, I would like to move the Minister on to the issue of accountability for public money. Following a freedom of information request, in the case of Yeovil we understand that the benefit to the trust is several million pounds-worth of income, which is a lack of income from the Treasury—I have written to the Minister about this and I will be grateful for an answer. Is the Government’s position that they would be happy to forgo the expected income to the Treasury so that those companies can be set up to undercut wages?

[Stephen Barclay]

As I set out in my reply to the hon. Lady, the Department has been clear that setting up a subsidiary is not a vehicle to avoid VAT—that is not acceptable. In the autumn, we sent out guidance to make that clear. As a former Treasury Minister myself, I assure her that Treasury Ministers would take a very close interest if they felt that an abuse of VAT was taking place.

The reality is that commissioners and regulators are responsible for ensuring that NHS providers act in the best interests of patients and taxpayers. We would expect providers to work closely with their employees in any developments.

Diabetes

Karin Smyth Excerpts

Monday 26th February 2018 Commons Chamber

[Liz McInnes]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. It is actually the fifth point of the survey—support and understanding at work and school—and I will go on to talk about that. He explained the whole point very well, and I totally agree with him.

To go back to the education programmes, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence recommends that people should be offered a course around the time of diagnosis of type 2 diabetes, and six to 12 months after diagnosis for people with type 1 diabetes, with annual reinforcement and review. The Care Quality Commission survey found that, in general, people who had attended structured education courses were very positive about their experiences. The majority of people said that it was helpful in improving their knowledge and ability to self-manage. People identified benefits, including improved understanding and knowledge about their condition; improved self-control and management, such as diet and exercise; and the opportunity to discuss concerns and share information with other people. However, there was a clear theme of people saying that, although the courses were helpful, they wanted more opportunities to attend refresher sessions.

The fifth point is that people living with diabetes want more support and understanding at work and school. Good care at school is vital and all schools should have an effective care plan in place. For those in work, an understanding and informed employer can make the difference between that person being able to continue in productive work, and being forced to leave because of difficulties in managing their condition while at work.

Finally and most importantly of all, people living with diabetes want hope for the future. Once diagnosed, people live with diabetes for the rest of their lives. They want to know what is being done to work towards a world where diabetes can be prevented and cured. It is for that reason that I asked for this debate—so that we can discuss research, funding, awareness, treatment, support, information and education for those living with diabetes.

[Karin Smyth (Bristol South) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that groups such as the Bristol South Diabetes Support Group are really important in bringing together volunteers to support people across the country? Does she support those volunteers, who not only supplement the work of the NHS but give people the confidence to manage their work?

[Liz McInnes]

My hon. Friend makes a very important point. It is up to healthcare professionals to encourage those voluntary groups to get together, to enable people to give each other support. That was one of the findings of the Diabetes UK survey: people wanted to come together to offer each other support.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health (Steve Brine)]

I thank the hon. Member for Heywood and Middleton (Liz McInnes), whom I know well and have worked with already on this in my time as a Minister, for giving us the opportunity to debate such an important issue. The turnout for this Adjournment debate suggests that it is of great interest to the House. It is normally just me, the Member introducing the debate, my Parliamentary Private Secretary and the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon). Tonight’s turnout has been a revelation. In November, I remember the hon. Lady introducing me and leading the event in the Terrace pavilion for the launch of the “Future of Diabetes” report by Diabetes UK, which is the biggest study of its kind. I promised then that I would respond recommendation by recommendation to the report, which I believe I have done. The offer I gave then is the offer I repeat now, which is to work with the all-party group and the charity on each and every one of those recommendations. I hope she knows I am sincere in saying that.

I would like to use this opportunity to pay tribute to Diabetes UK—led by the excellent Chris Askew, whom I have known for many years wearing other hats when he used to lead the breast cancer charity Breakthrough—which continues to work both with us in government and independently to improve the lives of so many people who are at risk of this increasingly common condition.

Diabetes is one of the biggest health challenges facing the country, and the figures are truly sobering. There are currently 3.5 million people in the UK who have been diagnosed with diabetes. If nothing changes, by 2025 more than 5 million people will have the condition. That is a significant public health challenge. Type 1 diabetes affects 400,000 people in the UK and its incidence is increasing by about 4% a year. It is not preventable, so the emphasis is on improving the lives of people with type 1 diabetes and helping them to manage their condition. During half-term recess, I paid a visit to a brilliant charity in your constituency, Mr Speaker, called Medical Detection Dogs. I met a brilliant dog who looks after a lady with diabetes. As if on cue, when I walked into the room to meet her he sat and put his paw on her knee, which was him assessing her levels and indicating that she needed to take action. It was incredible to watch. If Members are not familiar with Medical Detection Dogs, please do look it up.

Type 2 diabetes, as we have heard, is much more common. It is a leading cause of preventable sight loss in people of working age and a major contributor to kidney failure, heart attacks and strokes, among the many other conditions the hon. Lady read out in her cheery list. Diabetic foot disease, including lower limb amputations and foot ulcers, accounts for more days in hospital than all other diabetes complications put together. According to Diabetes UK, 11.9 million people in the UK are at high risk of developing type 2 diabetes, which is largely preventable.

Aside from the human impact on people’s lives, the financial cost of diabetes and its complications is huge. It already costs the NHS in England over £5.5 billion a year and that figure continues to rise. Managing the growing impact of diabetes is one of the major clinical challenges for us in the 21st century. That is why, as the hon. Lady and the right hon. Member for Leicester East (Keith Vaz) who chairs the all-party group so well rightly say, preventing type 2 diabetes and promoting the best possible care for all people with it is a key priority for the Government.

The hon. Lady mentioned the child obesity plan. She was absolutely right to do so. She knows I am passionate about delivering part 1 of the plan. We always said that it was the start of a conversation and that it was called part 1 for a reason. I am absolutely committed to taking further action if necessary, particularly across marketing, reducing portion sizes and price promotions, to help young people and to make healthy choices become the easiest choice of all. I think she knows me well enough to know I mean what I say and I say what I mean. If we need to take further action we will do so and she should watch this space.

[Karin Smyth]

I just inform the House that this morning, Committee D of the British-Irish Parliamentary Assembly, of which I am vice-chair, had a session in Portcullis House on childhood obesity with Members from all parts of the islands. We produced a report recently and are doing further work. If I may be so bold, I will make sure that the Minister has a copy of that report. He will be interested in some of the reflections that we are bringing together from across the Republic of Ireland, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales, and they might help to inform that work.

[Steve Brine]

That would be very interesting—if the hon. Lady did that, I would be grateful. We are working hard to improve diabetes services. The Government are strongly committed to taking action to prevent diabetes and to treat it more effectively. The Government’s mandate to NHS England for 2017-18 includes an objective for NHS England to

“lead a step change in the NHS in preventing ill health and supporting people to live healthier lives.”

Oral Answers to Questions

Karin Smyth Excerpts

Tuesday 6th February 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

The hon. Lady is absolutely right to highlight that area. It is one of six high-impact areas we are focusing on throughout the country. We are making progress, but we know we could do a lot better.

[Karin Smyth (Bristol South) (Lab)]

9. If he will hold discussions with the Chancellor of the Exchequer on the VAT status of NHS trusts.

[The Minister of State, Department of Health and Social Care (Stephen Barclay)]

There are no plans to hold discussions with the Chancellor of the Exchequer on the VAT status of NHS trusts.

[Karin Smyth]

I am grateful for that reply, although I suggest it ought to be reconsidered. NHS trusts desperate to avoid financial difficulties appear to have found a new magic money tree: setting up wholly owned subsidiaries to avoid paying substantial amounts of tax to the Treasury. Rather than encouraging this tax dodging and further fragmenting the NHS, why do the Secretary of State and his friend the Chancellor not either ban this practice or agree to let them all have the VAT exemptions?

[Stephen Barclay]

The Department wrote to all NHS and foundation trusts in September 2017 to remind them that tax avoidance schemes should not be entered into in any circumstances, but the hon. Lady makes a slightly strange point. She seems to be arguing that NHS hospitals are, in essence, paying too much tax to the Treasury, rather than having that money within the NHS. These subsidiaries are 100% owned by trusts themselves.

NHS Winter Crisis

Karin Smyth Excerpts

Wednesday 10th January 2018 Commons Chamber

[Karin Smyth (Bristol South) (Lab)]

It seems like only yesterday that I was working in the NHS, leading a group of GP commissioners preparing for the Health and Social Care Act 2012 and, every year, preparing for winter. Such was my experience of preparing for that Act that it led to my giving up my day job and deciding to become an elected politician and to enter this House. My colleagues at the time said to me, “Try to bring some sense to the debate going on, which is often so ill informed.” Today, we have heard some very well informed contributions, and I hope to offer some prospect of moving forward.

I want to talk about the 2012 Act. Its purpose was to modernise and avoid a future crisis, as well as to put clinicians at the centre of commissioning, free up providers to innovate, empower patients and give a new focus to public health, and it has categorically failed on all counts. Does the Act matter to patients? All reorganisations take people’s eye off the ball, but this one has been in an altogether different league. Long-standing problems have persisted and necessary changes have been put on hold as managers try to put back the infrastructure that was so wantonly destroyed by the Act.

In my constituency, South Bristol Community Hospital, a long-awaited community hospital, serves an area of very high health need. It is intended to support those with chronic illness in the community and to work with GPs, as well as to provide an urgent care centre and access to therapies. Much has been achieved by those on the frontline in the hospital, but it falls between five NHS bodies.

This week, a constituent highlighted a problem after she was told that her appointment had been cancelled because the person it was with was no longer in post. She persevered with the booking, but it was not possible to tell her whether another appointment would be forthcoming. I have taken the matter up on her behalf, but I have to write to three different people to try to find an answer. Colleagues know that that is the situation across the piece.

No one body is assessing health needs, talking to the local population and ensuring that services meet those needs and are reversing health inequalities, so how do we move forward? My strong view is that we should not be talking about the superstructures or the money, although the money is important. We are at a critical point. We have had centralised planning and control. It did not work, ultimately, and the era of the market and competition is also not working. We need now to put accountability at the very heart of the system.

Accountability can be a key driver of change and improvement, and it is vital in a functioning democracy. All the bodies involved spend taxpayers’ money, but no one understands who is responsible and who is accountable for how they spend that money. That includes us in the House; we are also mystified.

Local MPs are expected by their constituents to stand up for local services, ensuring that there are enough resources, and to be able to make a difference when things go wrong, but we have no role locally in how the mandate is delivered or in the alignment of the voted national budget with local delivery. Critically, neither do local people. They do not understand how their national taxes relate to the local service.

We are pivotal in helping with that understanding. Local managers should be supported in sharing the great work that they do, but they also need to share the realities of cost and quality with MPs and local people so that we are all well informed. However, that will happen only if national leaders are supported when they fulfil their duty of candour and speak out about the reality of choices, which national leaders have done.

It is no secret that the money the NHS is allocated is insufficient to do all that is promised in the NHS constitution, to the quality that we expect. It is also well evidenced that we have the most effective and efficient service in the world, with productivity outstripping other sectors of our economy. So on behalf of our constituents, we should be putting the public centre stage, considering how to actively improve the NHS and understanding what the money can deliver. We have to give patients and the public genuine influence over decisions affecting the care that they, their families and their communities receive, and the responsibility that goes with that influence.

Being able to follow the money is a key part of accountability. We should all be part of that to help to inform the next stage in the development of the NHS.

Oral Answers to Questions

Karin Smyth Excerpts

Tuesday 19th December 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

I can reassure the hon. Lady that we are putting a lot of extra funding into mental health— £575 million last year alone—to meet those and other obligations.

[Karin Smyth (Bristol South) (Lab)]

NHS Property Services exists on a merry-go-round of taxpayers’ money. Will the Secretary of State give us all a Christmas present by closing it down and returning the control of property to local health communities?

[Mr Hunt]

I understand why the hon. Lady has asked that question. I think it fair to say that NHS Property Services has been on a journey and needs to do even better, but we also want to ensure that NHS land is made available for housing for NHS staff.

King’s College Hospital Foundation Trust

Karin Smyth Excerpts

Tuesday 12th December 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Dunne]

The NHS is the largest organisation in the country and everybody who works in it will have their own political views and persuasions. Very few of them are brought to the board table. It is the case that when in government parties on both sides appoint individuals with political representation from the other side, so I think we have to be balanced about this. I would gently point out that Lord Kerslake sits as a Cross Bencher, although he may provide advice to one party more than another.

[Karin Smyth (Bristol South) (Lab)]

Does the Minister believe that the duty of candour extends to NHS leaders?

[Mr Dunne]

The duty of candour applies right across the NHS.