Long-term Plan for the NHS

Lord Kakkar Excerpts

Tuesday 19th June 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord O'Shaughnessy]

The noble Lord speaks with great insight and makes a very important point. There is broad agreement on the need to simplify the structure of the health system but there has not to date been broad agreement on how we should do so. We are expecting in the next few months to explore the potential for the kind of streamlining that he is talking about. I hope that that can be done as a collaborative effort and, if it comes to primary legislation, that we can deliver it as a collaborative effort too.

[Lord Kakkar (CB)]

My Lords, I declare my interest as chair of University College London Partners Ltd. Although this substantial increase in funding has quite rightly been welcomed, important questions remain. It is essential that real progress is made in integrated care—integrated care between the community and secondary and tertiary sectors, and integrated care between hospitals and social care. It is vital that progress is made in the rapid adoption of innovation at scale and pace across entire health economies. It is also vital that a programme is put in place to ensure that there is a transformation of the healthcare workforce so that those who have committed themselves to being healthcare professionals can continue to be developed and serve their fellow citizens across an entire professional career. How do Her Majesty’s Government propose to achieve this? There has been much good intention and great commitment in this area over the past two decades, but we are now at a critical moment where a failure to deliver the transformation required will result in failure to achieve the long-term sustainability to which we are all committed.

[Lord O’Shaughnessy]

The noble Lord makes excellent points. It is right at this moment to applaud the wisdom and far-sightedness of the Lords Select Committee on the long-term sustainability of the health and social care system. It called for, among other things, funding of growth in line with GDP, delivering integration, a 10-year workforce strategy, a commitment to reduce variation and a joined-up Department of Health and Social Care, all of which, if we were not able to deliver it in time for our response to the report, we are delivering in short order afterwards.

One of the first ways in which we shall do it is to draw on the wisdom that resides in the NHS, in Parliament and elsewhere in the profession. In the Statement given by my right honourable friend, I point again to the commitment to take on integrated care, that being one of the tests of success. Equally, there is the commitment to transformation of the workforce, to make sure not just that we have enough people but that we have enough flexibility and digital skills, for example.

The final point, on innovation, is very close to my heart—and indeed the Secretary of State’s. We know that doing things in the same way will not deliver the standards we need. We really need a transformation in how we deliver healthcare, much greater digitalisation of the entire sector and the ability to take the amazing innovations that we develop in our laboratories and universities, such as the noble Lord’s own, and get them into use across the NHS. That is one reason why I was so delighted that we were able to announce today that the noble Lord, Lord Darzi, will be chairing our Accelerated Access Collaborative. It is hard to think of anybody more committed to this agenda than him.