Oral Answers to Questions

Liz Kendall Excerpts

Tuesday 13th January 2015 Commons Chamber

[Liz Kendall (Leicester West) (Lab)]

Ministers have been repeatedly warned about the impact that their social care cuts are having on elderly people and that that is a key cause of pressures on A and E. Today it has been revealed that public health officials have issued an alert about a statistically significant and “sustained” decline in life expectancy in parts of the north-west. They say it is extremely unusual and that

“central government driven reductions in adult social care budgets”

are a possible cause. Will the Minister confirm that alert, say whether life expectancy is declining elsewhere, guarantee that Public Health England will urgently investigate the matter and promise that its findings will be published in full?

[Norman Lamb]

Although there was a fall in life expectancy for those aged 85 in 2012, preliminary analysis shows that there was no further drop in 2013. Incidentally, let me pay tribute to the people who work in social care. The system has performed remarkably well. Statistics on delayed discharges due to social care show that the number of delayed days is almost exactly the same this year as it was in 2010—a remarkable performance.