Foreign Affairs Committee

Debate between Kevin Foster and Sarah Wollaston

Tuesday 19th March 2019 Commons Chamber

[Kevin Foster]

I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention. In relation to Committee Chairs, he is absolutely right that we select as the whole House. They are appointed by the whole House, and I would be reluctant to set a precedent, if Chairs of the Committees were to change their political affiliation—there has been one such change—that they were delegates of one party or another. At the start of the Parliament, we makes the allocations. If there comes a vacancy, that would potentially make a difference.

For me, there is a challenge in this. This matter is being debated on the Floor of the House. Members are appointed by the whole House to be Chairs and members of Committees, but we are talking about the Opposition’s spaces, and I do have a view on that. Although I suspect that, in this Parliament, things will be handled quite maturely—in fact I suspect that, under a number of Labour Governments, things would be handled well—we could be setting quite a precedent if Government Members, particularly Government payroll Members, started choosing the Opposition members on a Committee, regardless of what I might think on this particular occasion. It is different for those who are not on the Government payroll.

[Dr Sarah Wollaston (Totnes) (Ind)]

rose—

[Kevin Foster]

I will give way to my hon. Friend.

[Dr Wollaston]

I thank my hon. Friend and neighbour for giving way on this point. I will, if I may, try to persuade him. Does he agree that Select Committees are at their best and acting on behalf of the public when their members can leave tribal politics at the door, focus on the evidence and work collaboratively to come up with solutions? That is what the public wants to see from this Parliament, as opposed to the often confrontational picture that they might see. This is the part of Parliament that often shows us at our best. My concern is that what we are seeing tonight will fundamentally undermine and degrade the important reforms that were brought in a decade ago, so I really hope that he will join me in the Lobby this evening.

[Kevin Foster]

I thank my hon. Friend—and I mean that—for her intervention. She is right that the Select Committees are at their best when a member of the public attending a sitting would not be able to tell which party label applied to which Member of Parliament. I remember the time that I spent on the Public Accounts Committee, and the questions there were as fearless from Government Members as from Opposition Members. That is the strength of Select Committees. The fact that we work by consensus in most instances gives strength to our reports. If an inquiry was just an attack by an Opposition motivated by party politics, it would not get the support of Government Members. And ditto—if a report were trying to praise the Government too much, funnily enough Opposition Members would probably not sign up to it.

It is right that people do not take their party labels into Select Committees, but the conflict for me is the issue of the Opposition having certain protections in this place. In a situation where a Government had a significant majority, they could in theory start playing a game with these sorts of motion. I think it is safe to say that a game is being played this afternoon, but it is quite clear to me that there is a difference between Members on the Government payroll and other Members. Each Member can take their own view; I just feel a slight difficulty in choosing the Opposition Members on a Select Committee from my position.

--- Later in debate ---

[Dr Wollaston]

Does my hon. Friend feel that it would undermine the system if we were in a position where members of a Select Committee were always having to look over their shoulder, because they might suddenly find that their place had been made unilaterally vacant on their behalf if they were not following the party line? In this case, there will still be the same number of Opposition Members on the Foreign Affairs Committee.

[Kevin Foster]

I accept that the balance of Opposition Members will be the same. This is not, for example, about someone having gone from the Government Benches to the Opposition Benches, and then a motion trying to flip back the balance. For me, though, this is about choosing the Opposition Members on a Select Committee. Let us be candid: there will be occasions when the Government might not particularly want certain individuals from the Opposition on a certain Committee. That is where the conflict lies. This is about Government Members —particularly those in the Government—choosing the Opposition Members on a Select Committee.

Stalking Protection Bill

Debate between Kevin Foster and Sarah Wollaston

3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Friday 23rd November 2018 Commons Chamber

[Dr Wollaston]

This week we celebrate the 100th anniversary of the first woman taking her seat in this House. I am immensely proud, as a Devon MP, that that woman was Lady Nancy Astor, and I think all of us in this House owe her an enormous debt of gratitude for the work she did, particularly in fighting on behalf of women and girls. I am proud that this Government have continued that work. Indeed, Members from across this whole House have done so much to advance this cause.

Of course, stalking does not just affect women—it affects men as well, and it is a vile crime of an insidious nature. I am very grateful to all those, both within this House and beyond, who have contributed to the passage of this Bill, including with advice, which has caused me to table some important amendments. They are minor in nature, but I think they will greatly improve the Bill.

Amendments 1, 2 and 6 would enable the chief constables of the Ministry of Defence police and the British Transport police to apply for stalking protection orders and interim orders, and to initiate related proceedings in connection with the variation and renewal of an order. That is because stalking occurs across a range of contexts and situations, with devastating consequences, and it is essential that a stalking protection order is available to police in a variety of situations. There may be circumstances in which the British Transport police or MOD police are best placed to seek an order, for example if the stalking conduct has taken place on the railway network or a perpetrator lives or works in MOD premises.

Amendments 3 and 4 would modify the notification requirements on a person subject to a stalking—

[Kevin Foster (Torbay) (Con)]

I know that my hon. Friend was about to move on, but I just wanted to inquire about a thing not included in this list: the Civil Nuclear constabulary. The MOD police are included, and they protect particular areas. I welcome the amendments, but is there any particular reason why the Civil Nuclear constabulary is not included?

[Dr Wollaston]

I thank my hon. Friend for his point, which we could consider in the House of Lords as the Bill continues its passage.

Amendments 3 and 4 would modify the notification requirements on a person subject to a stalking protection order. Under the notification requirements, as drafted, a perpetrator must notify the police within three days of a change taking place. These amendments simply enable the perpetrator to give such notice in advance of a change taking place, and I hope that colleagues from across the House will recognise that that is a small, technical, but important change.

Finally, amendment 5 also relates to notification requirements. It caters for circumstances where the subject of a stalking protection order has no home address. In such a case, the amendment provides that the perpetrator can instead notify of a place where they can regularly be found. That simply mirrors notification requirements related to registered sex offenders. My hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch (Sir Christopher Chope) also has an amendment in this group, but I do not see him in the Chamber today, so I think we will assume that he does not wish to press that amendment. For now, I commend the amendments standing in my name to the House.

Department of Health and Social Care and Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government

Debate between Kevin Foster and Sarah Wollaston

Monday 2nd July 2018 Commons Chamber

[Dr Sarah Wollaston (Totnes) (Con)]

It is an honour to speak in this estimates day debate on the 70th anniversary of the NHS. I am privileged and proud to have worked in the NHS for 24 years before coming to this place, and I would like to start by saying thank you to all those who work in the NHS. The principle behind it is as strong now as it was on the day it first opened its doors: it should be free at the point of delivery, available to all, and based on need, not the ability to pay. That is as important now as it ever was; it is truly the thing that makes us most proud to be British. This is not just the anniversary of the NHS, however; it is also the 70th anniversary of the National Assistance Act 1948, which swept away the poor laws and introduced our system of social care, so it is absolutely right that we should be having this joint estimates day debate.

I absolutely welcome the uplift in funding announced by the Prime Minister, but I would like to talk about how we will get the most from those funds, and also how we will pay for this. One of the key challenges that we have long faced is that although the NHS is free at the point of delivery, social care has been means-tested from the outset. That has created a huge challenge in bringing the systems together and providing the integration that patients expect but often find, to their surprise, is not there. Moving towards more integration would have great benefits for patients, and would create savings and a much more logical, patient-centred approach for both systems. I urge the Minister to look closely at the report of both Committees into social care, in which we touched on that issue and made recommendations, which I will talk more about later.

[Kevin Foster (Torbay) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is providing an excellent introduction to this debate. Does she agree that both Front-Bench teams could look at the example of Torbay Council—the local authority we share—which now has an integrated care organisation that brings together adult social care and the NHS for the benefit of our local residents?

[Dr Wollaston]

Indeed; Torbay has led the way. When the Health and Social Care Committee visited Norway and Denmark, we were shown slides from Torbay, because its approach, referring to a Mrs Smith and actually trying to envisage how everything would work around the patient, has been hugely influential abroad as well as at home.

Ambulance Services (Devon)

Debate between Kevin Foster and Sarah Wollaston

Wednesday 12th July 2017 Westminster Hall

[Dr Wollaston]

I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention. Likewise, very considerable concerns have been raised in my constituency about the withdrawal this month of rapid-response vehicles from Dartmouth and Kingsbridge and in Totnes. I understand the reasoning that double-crewed ambulances can provide the conveyance that people need to hospital and that utilisation of the single vehicles is less—about 24%. I understand the rationale behind it, but equally I ask the Minister to respond to precisely the concerns that my hon. Friend the Member for North Devon (Peter Heaton-Jones) has raised, because the worry in communities such as mine is that once the double-crewed ambulances are conveying a casualty to an urban centre, they tend not to come back again, whereas the rapid-response vehicles did. There is a genuine concern about how we will ensure that the double-crewed ambulances come back.

As I have said, I welcome the increase in the double-crewed ambulance resource as the rapid-response vehicles come away, and I am aware of the data whereby efforts are being made to provide a reassuring response that actually the number of hours in total will increase. However, that change is just coming in this month, and I would like the Minister to assure the House today that he will look very closely at the data as they emerge over the next few months, to ensure that those vehicles are returning to the rural areas, because I fear that otherwise we will again see that SWASFT is meeting the overall, top-line target for the entire patch, but that will be at the expense of rural constituencies such as my own, where there will simply be a worsening of the response. We need to look at that very closely, and I would like the Minister to assure me that, following this debate, he will specifically ask SWASFT to ensure that there is a response available and it does not worsen in the rural parts of Devon.

I would also like to address the matter of the workforce, which is an issue across the NHS as the Minister knows. Within our paramedic resource there is actually an 11% turnover of paramedic staff, in part because they are such a skilled and valued workforce, which means in many cases they are being attracted into other parts of the NHS, for example to work in casualty departments and minor injuries units. Everyone can understand that, but we need to make sure that we are recruiting and retaining within our blue light response services as well. For example, there are currently about 100 vacancies over the whole of the SWASFT area, and 16 whole time equivalent vacancies in Devon alone. What is the Minister doing to work alongside Health Education England to address the workforce issues? I will again make the point I have done in previous debates about the impact of the pay cap on the recruitment, retention and morale of the workforce. Again, I call on Ministers to consider giving the pay review bodies greater flexibility to be able to increase the rates of pay.

We know that there are pressures on our ambulance services, but we cannot view them in isolation. I would like the Minister to consider the impact that this is having on our other blue light services, particularly the police. They have raised some worrying concerns with me about not only the amount of time that they are having to spend on scene—as they did the other day in the incident that I described—while they wait for an ambulance resource to arrive, but the fact that on occasion they themselves have to take people to hospital who should really be conveyed by an ambulance resource. To clarify, in May this year there were 226 incidents where an ambulance was requested but no ambulances were available to be assigned in the Devon and Cornwall police area, and in June there were 158. These long waits are having a knock-on on the police’s ability to carry out their other duties, and that should concern us all.

[Kevin Foster (Torbay) (Con)]

I thank my hon. Friend and neighbour for giving way and congratulate her on securing this much needed debate. As she will be aware, it is not only the police who are experiencing long waits. One of my constituents, Susannah Tandy, has got in touch about an incident a week ago when her 12-year-old son fell 11 foot from a tree. An ambulance was called at 1 pm but did not arrive until about quarter to 4. These sorts of waits not only build up anxiety but could see situations get much worse. Thankfully Murphy appears to be making a recovery, but it could have been a lot worse.

[Dr Wollaston]

I think we are all glad to hear that Murphy is making a good recovery. As my hon. Friend says, we must focus not just on the immediately life-threatening incidents but on the kinds of incidents that he described, where an ambulance is very important and somebody’s condition could deteriorate because of a long wait. For SWASFT we must keep an eye on not just the category 1 incidents, but the others as well, and I hope the Minister will do so.

In this debate we should also celebrate the successes, because there are undoubtedly those as well. We have seen examples of very good co-working between our blue light services. For example, in the “collapsed behind closed doors” scheme fire services co-operate with the ambulance service where there are concerns that somebody might be collapsed in a residence. In the past the police may have responded, but now the fire service can also provide that assistance, and I pay tribute to those co-responders in the fire service. From my time as a rural GP in Chagford, I remember the number of occasions when people phoned me in surprise because the fire service had arrived instead of the ambulance service, but it is actually providing a fantastic resource. On occasions when it is absolutely critical that somebody has a defibrillator on site as soon as possible, the fire service can and does perform an amazing job. We have got further to go, particularly in remote rural communities where a fire resource might be closer to hand. I hope the Minister will look at how we can go further to make sure that we develop a multi-skilled workforce who are properly rewarded for the expertise and skills that they develop across the fire service.

Broadcasting (Radio Multiplex Services) Bill

Debate between Kevin Foster and Sarah Wollaston

2nd reading: House of Commons
Friday 13th January 2017 Commons Chamber

[Dr Sarah Wollaston (Totnes) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on bringing forward this excellent Bill to broaden choice for community providers. Will he join me in paying tribute to the volunteers who work in community radio stations throughout the country? I very much welcome the opportunity to expand the role that they play in our communities.

[Kevin Foster]

I thank my hon. Friend and neighbour for that intervention. Hospital radio absolutely provides an opportunity for volunteers to be part of delivering something to patients, and it also develops skills and talents that may well sustain them in a future paid career. There will be stories of people who have started off presenting a hospital or community radio show as a volunteer, but displayed talent that they could take much further. My hon. Friend will know Torbay Hospital Radio, which regularly provides the outside broadcast system for community events and fairs. The image of hospital radio is just someone sat in a broom cupboard at the bottom of the hospital, playing requests, but they actually get out in the community and do interviews, and they look to be more than just a station that people listen to in their hospital beds; they really want to make a contribution.

Junior Doctors’ Contracts

Debate between Kevin Foster and Sarah Wollaston

Wednesday 28th October 2015 Commons Chamber

[Dr Sarah Wollaston (Totnes) (Con)]

I start by declaring a relevant personal interest in that my daughter is a junior doctor, and one of many hundreds who have moved to Australia to work. Because of that very clear conflict of personal interests, I shall abstain in this evening’s vote. I want to speak, however, because I have relevant personal experience, as before I came to this place I taught junior doctors and medical students for 11 years.

I can tell the House that this dispute is about far more than pay. It is about junior doctors feeling valued. The junior doctors I used to teach, including F2 foundation year doctors, felt that they were not being supported at the weekends, disliked the inability sometimes to work in the same county as their partner and disliked obstructive attitudes about rostering. That presents us with an opportunity to bring all those issues into the negotiations in this current dispute.

One thing I do know is that young people do not go into medicine because they are motivated by pay. I hope that the House sends a very clear message to junior doctors that we value what they do and are grateful for what they do on behalf of patients. What we must do is avoid a strike at all costs. A strike would be immensely damaging for patients. I would say to junior doctors that there is no meaningful industrial action that they can take that would not harm their patients. I urge them to step back from such a move. A strike would be damaging not only for patients, but for the professional reputation of doctors, and of course politically. That should not be the consideration. Our main consideration should be how we encourage junior doctors to walk back through the door of the Secretary of State’s office, as he has stated. The best way to do that would be to start again.

Many elements of the dispute feel similar to the one we had in 2007, when I was teaching junior doctors, over the medical training application service—or MTAS, as it was known. It was a very unloved, unlovely scheme that collapsed, after a much-needed apology, in 2007. The Government of the day went back to the drawing board and started again. I think it would be right to do so on this occasion. We need to remove the barricades that are preventing junior doctors from walking back through the door. It would be right to take away the preconditions, the red lines and the threat to impose—and start again, looking at all the issues in the round.

Junior doctors share many of the Government’s objectives. They want to improve care for patients; they recognise that shortage specialties in the NHS are a real issue and that if we are going to put patients first, we need to incentivise entry to specialties such as accident and emergency, general practice, psychiatry and so forth. We need mechanisms to make that happen. They recognise, too, the need to address variation across the NHS, including with respect to weekends, but we need to look at that in the round. It is not just about senior and junior doctors either; it is about nursing, access to diagnostics, being an outlier on a ward that someone should not be in because the hospital is over-full.

[Kevin Foster (Torbay) (Con)]

I am sure that my hon. Friend would agree that one thing about which junior doctors want certainty is no longer having whole weeks of nights or having to work beyond 72 hours. The Government need to be clear about how they will achieve that.

[Dr Wollaston]

I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention. There is much to be welcomed in the new contract, but we need honesty about some of this. I am very pleased that the Secretary of State has given an assurance today that no junior doctor will be worse off, but I hope that when he sums up the debate, he will tell us what will happen to a junior doctor working 70 hours a week, perhaps in a specialty such as accident and emergency or anaesthetics. If the pay envelope is the same and some junior doctors will be better off, the maths indicates that some will be worse off and we need to clarify which ones. We need much more clarity, not just about whether an individual will be no worse off as a result of changing from one job to the next over the transition period, but about what will happen to the pay for that post over the coming years.

While I welcome many of the elements of the junior contract, I feel that, because the debate has become rather toxic, we should take the opportunity to begin again to examine all the issues in the round, and ask junior doctors themselves to work with the Secretary of State in establishing how we can achieve our common aims on behalf of patients. We should also take the opportunity once more to welcome junior doctors and value everything that they do.