Maternity Safety Strategy

Debate between Lilian Greenwood and Jeremy Hunt

Tuesday 28th November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

I thank my hon. Friend for her extraordinary campaigning on this issue. Yes, we want parents to get the answer more quickly, but we also want to be able to answer the question that every parent asks: “Can you guarantee that this won’t happen again?” The investigators will have an explicit dual remit: to get to the bottom of what happened, but also to spread that message around the system so that the same mistake is not repeated. That is the objective of setting up a new team of people to do this.

[Lilian Greenwood (Nottingham South) (Lab)]

My constituents Jack and Sarah Hawkins have spoken bravely about the tragic death of their daughter Harriet due to failures of care. Members may have heard them this morning. I spoke to Jack earlier and am pleased to tell the Secretary of State that they feel listened to and heard. They and I very much welcome his statement and his support for extending the power of coroners. However, Jack and Sarah need to be able to stop fighting and to begin healing, so I ask the Secretary of State to urge his colleagues at the Ministry of Justice to support the Bill introduced by the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton) to bring about that change as soon as possible.

[Mr Hunt]

Through the hon. Lady, I express my thanks to Jack and Sarah for bravely telling their story this morning in the media, which was incredibly moving and touched a lot of hearts. With respect to allowing inquests into full-term stillbirths, our objective is to move as quickly as any legislative vehicle allows. If I am able to work closely with my hon. Friend the Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton) to do that, that is exactly what I want to do.

Mental Health and NHS Performance

Debate between Lilian Greenwood and Jeremy Hunt

Monday 9th January 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

Yes, indeed, and I congratulate all the NHS and social care staff in Torbay on doing a fantastic job. I also congratulate them on the pioneering work they have done on health and social care integration, which has made a huge difference to my hon. Friend’s constituents.

[Lilian Greenwood (Nottingham South) (Lab)]

Over the new year, East Midlands Ambulance Service NHS Trust saw life-threatening calls up 42% on last year, and the chair of Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust described its emergency department as pushed to the limit, with, as the right hon. Member for Broxtowe (Anna Soubry) said, almost double the normal number of hospital admissions, so clearly these were necessary attendances, but surely many of them could have been prevented. The Secretary of State has already acknowledged the connection between inadequate social care and this entirely foreseeable crisis, so I ask again: will he commit his Government to fund this properly?

[Mr Hunt]

I find these questions about funding curious coming from members of the Labour party, as, had we followed its plans, we would be spending £1.3 billion less on the NHS this year than what the NHS is actually getting, and I just say to them that the reason why we are able to spend that extra money on the NHS is that we know how to run the economy.

CQC: NHS Deaths Review

Debate between Lilian Greenwood and Jeremy Hunt

Tuesday 13th December 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

I am happy to do that. The best way to understand what we are trying to achieve—this relates to what the right hon. Member for North Norfolk (Norman Lamb) said earlier about the speed of investigation—is to think about the tragedy of the recent Croydon tram crash. Within one week of the accident, the rail accident investigation branch produced and published a full investigation into exactly what happened, which made it possible to transmit that learning around the whole tram industry. That is what we are looking for. We have modelled the healthcare safety investigation branch on what happens in the transport industry. It has already been set up, and we are lucky that the person heading it up is Keith Conradi, who headed up the air accident investigation branch and knows exactly how these things should happen.

[Lilian Greenwood (Nottingham South) (Lab)]

The CQC clearly identifies the need for a change in culture, and the Secretary of State acknowledged that a number of times in his remarks today. The NHS has to be less defensive, and it needs to be more honest and open with families if there is to be a genuine commitment to reflect, learn and make sure that things are different in future. What does he think are the barriers to ensuring that that culture change takes place, and what steps does he intend to take to overcome those barriers?

[Mr Hunt]

There are a number of barriers, one of which is time. Staff feel very pressured for time. I strongly argue that it is a false economy not to allow time for lessons to be learned, because tragedies, when they happen, take up a huge amount of time. From a management and leadership point of view, we have to make sure that doctors and nurses are given the time for reflective learning as part of what they do.

Another thing is the management culture. If people feel that the management of their trust are open and listening, they are more likely to be open and listening themselves. If they feel that there is a hire-and-fire culture, they are less likely to take that approach. There are a number of lessons.

NHS Funding

Debate between Lilian Greenwood and Jeremy Hunt

Monday 31st October 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

My hon. Friend is right to point out that problem. For years, under the previous Government, there was a total resistance anywhere in the NHS to ensuring that the only people who received care free at the point of use were people paying for the NHS through the taxes that they or their families pay. That is something to which we will put a stop. There is much more work to be done. We have the second biggest aid budget in the world. That is the way that we help developing countries, but we cannot have an international health service.

[Lilian Greenwood (Nottingham South) (Lab)]

NHS trusts’ deficits are now the worst that they have ever been, with 85% of acute hospitals unable to balance their books. That situation will be made even worse as the falling value of the pound raises the cost of imported medicines and equipment. What assessment has the Secretary of State made of the extra funding needed to protect the NHS from the devaluation of sterling following the Brexit vote? What will he do to support trusts, such as Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust, which are already in deficit?

[Mr Hunt]

There are indeed a number of cost pressures in the NHS, but the NHS also has the advantage of being the single largest purchaser of healthcare products—equipment and medicine—in the world, and therefore we have huge scope to get better prices for those things than we currently get. We are supporting hospitals such as the one in the hon. Lady’s constituency by centralising procurement and bearing down on the cost of agency staff and locum staff. Given that pay accounts for more than 70% of the typical hospital trust, that will help.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Lilian Greenwood and Jeremy Hunt

Tuesday 11th October 2016 Commons Chamber

[Lilian Greenwood (Nottingham South) (Lab)]

Two years ago, Nottingham University Hospitals NHS trust privatised support services, including cleaning, handing them over to Carillion in an effort to save money. Since then there have been shortages of equipment, shortages of staff and an appalling decline in standards of cleanliness. Will the Secretary of State condemn Carillion for putting patients at risk? When will he ensure that hospital services in Nottingham are properly funded?

[Mr Jeremy Hunt]

The decision on whether to outsource services must be a matter for local hospitals. I know that that hospital has been struggling with its deficit. I have been to visit the hospital myself and I know it has been trying very hard to improve clinical care. If the contract is not working and the quality is not right, I would expect the hospital to change it, but it must be its decision.

A and E (Major Incidents)

Debate between Lilian Greenwood and Jeremy Hunt

Wednesday 7th January 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

The hon. Gentleman makes an important point. In fact, I was talking with someone senior at the Royal Cornwall hospital on Monday about the particular pressures there. Indeed, some of the funding that we allocated to the NHS in the autumn statement for next year is designed to do precisely that—to allow hospitals to maintain bed capacity while we ramp up facilities in community and primary care. It is very important to get the timing absolutely right.

[Lilian Greenwood (Nottingham South) (Lab)]

Yesterday the emergency department at Nottingham’s Queen’s Medical Centre faced such intense pressure that the trust was forced to enact its internal incident plan and cancel planned operations and out-patient clinics. Higher than expected admissions and delays in discharging patients who are well enough to leave hospital have been creating problems for many months. How can we resolve what is now a crisis if the Secretary of State will not even acknowledge that his Government’s deep cuts to social care are undermining the efforts of our dedicated NHS and social care staff?

[Mr Hunt]

We are doing an enormous amount to support social care. Some £3.9 billion of NHS funds has been given to the social care system over this Parliament, and we have strongly encouraged local authorities to ensure that any savings they have to make are done through efficiency savings, not cuts to front-line services. The hon. Lady’s local hospital has received £11 million in funding to help it through the winter. We are doing a huge amount to support the NHS through a difficult period, and she should support those efforts.

Five Year Forward View

Debate between Lilian Greenwood and Jeremy Hunt

Thursday 23rd October 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

That is a very good point and I agree with my hon. Friend that we should aspire to a smoke-free Britain. We are making remarkable progress. The point the report makes—this goes alongside what my hon. Friend has said—is that we need to integrate our thinking about public health with our thinking about the services the NHS delivers. The better care fund has shown how it is possible to get excellent collaboration between local authorities and the local NHS for the delivery of social care. Transformational things are happening up and down the country right now. I would like to see the same thing for public health as well.

[Lilian Greenwood (Nottingham South) (Lab)]

Alcohol abuse costs the NHS in Nottinghamshire more than £55 million a year and cuts in social services are making the pressures worse, especially for emergency departments. Dr Stephen Ryder, consultant hepatologist at Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust, wrote to me recently to express his deep concern that the Government are not taking forward the introduction of minimum unit pricing. Why are this Government ignoring advice and clinicians and ducking the issue of dealing with cheap alcohol?

[Mr Hunt]

We are doing a number of things to tackle alcoholism. Alcoholism rates have continued to fall under this Government, so we are making good progress. The approach to alcohol is different from that to cigarettes, because responsible drinking is perfectly okay for a person’s health; it may even be good for their health, depending on which doctor they speak to. We want to be careful that our alcohol policies do not penalise responsible drinkers who may not have large salaries and worry very much about the pennies their shopping basket costs.

NHS Services (Access)

Debate between Lilian Greenwood and Jeremy Hunt

Wednesday 15th October 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

The right hon. Gentleman is quite wrong. My right hon. Friend said that there was a list of three providers, all with private provision involved. When the right hon. Gentleman was Health Secretary, he accepted that all-private shortlist for the Hinchingbrooke decision. In other words, the biggest privatisation in NHS history happened because of a decision taken by the shadow Health Secretary.

Government Members are not ideological. We believe there are times when we can learn from the independent sector, but, normally, people use the private sector when they are looking for innovation or better value. Only a Labour Government would sign deals with the private sector, paying 11% more than the NHS rate, and ending up paying more than £200 million for operations that never happened. What a shocking waste of money. When the right hon. Gentleman next talks about privatisation, instead of inventing a privatisation agenda that does not exist, will he apologise for a botched one that existed when Labour was in office?

Finally, there is a comparison that Labour never wants to make when talking about NHS performance: what happens over the border in Wales. That is where the policies that the right hon. Gentleman supports are put into practice. Let us see the difference. A record one in every seven Welsh people find themselves sitting on an NHS waiting list, compared with just one in 17 people in England. The urgent cancer waiting time target has not been met once since 2008 in Wales, but it has been missed in England in only two quarters in the whole period. A and E waiting times have been met every year in England, but they have not been met since 2008 in Wales.

[Lilian Greenwood]

Will the Secretary of State give way?

[Mr Hunt]

No, I will finish this point.

The British Medical Association, no friend of the Conservative party, described the NHS in Wales as being in a state of imminent meltdown. The point is that the NHS in England, like the NHS in Wales, faces huge pressure, but politicising operational problems in England, while denying much greater failings in Wales, is the worst kind of opportunism. For Labour Members, good headlines for Labour matter more than poor care on Labour’s watch. They are playing politics with our NHS. That not only scares people in England, but betrays people in Wales.

I shall conclude—

[Lilian Greenwood]

Will the Secretary of State give way?

A and E Departments

Debate between Lilian Greenwood and Jeremy Hunt

Tuesday 21st May 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

As I said, we need to address all the problems with 111. The lack of confidence in GP out-of-hours care is one of the contributing factors to a lack of public confidence. The meeting that the hon. Gentleman mentions will be going ahead.

[Lilian Greenwood (Nottingham South) (Lab)]

Eighteen months ago, Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust experienced a sustained increase in visits to A and E and hospital admissions, resulting in thousands of cancelled operations. The trust conducted an independent investigation to help it to understand and respond to the crisis, which had multiple causes. Will the Secretary of State confirm that the study did not conclude that poor provision by GPs or the out-of-hours service was to blame?

[Mr Hunt]

If I recall correctly, the study said that there were multiple causes, but it was Nottingham university that said that poor out-of-hours GP provision was responsible for an increase in paediatric A and E admissions, so Nottingham university understands this issue.

Leveson Inquiry

Debate between Lilian Greenwood and Jeremy Hunt

Wednesday 25th April 2012 Commons Chamber

[Lilian Greenwood (Nottingham South) (Lab)]

Responsibility for the management and conduct of special advisers rests with the Minister. Will he admit that he showed poor judgment and failed properly to manage Mr Smith in such a sensitive role?

[Mr Hunt]

I will take no lectures from the hon. Lady or anyone in the Labour party on the behaviour of special advisers. With the exception of this particular incident, the behaviour of my special adviser was exemplary.