NHS: Long-term Sustainability

Lord Markham Excerpts

Thursday 18th April 2024 Lords Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health and Social Care (Lord Markham) (Con)]

I also thank the noble Lord, Lord Patel, for initiating this debate today. I am very happy to start off by answering the question of the noble Lord, Lord Hacking, by praising the NHS. The very ethos of the debate that the noble Lord, Lord Patel, brought up today is that, as critical friends, we know that we need to look at the challenges that the NHS is facing if it is going to be sustainable for the next 75 years.

I welcome the noble Baroness, Lady Ramsey. I enjoyed her journey and I shared some of her difficulties in finding her way around this building. I think I sum up the views of the whole House by saying that we are delighted that she has found her way to be with us here today and, generally, in the House of Lords.

I also thank all noble Lords for the constructive way in which this debate has taken place. Again, I praise the noble Lord, Lord Patel, for the way he framed this whole debate to bring that about. There were a lot of very thoughtful contributions, and in many ways we built on the debate that the noble Lord, Lord Scriven, called about six or nine months ago—this debate was very much in keeping with that. I particularly enjoyed the passion that the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott, brought to it all. I thought that at this stage I probably should not declare an interest in Costa Coffee—which I do not have, by the way. There were very many thoughtful contributions which I hope I will be able to build on, but I single out those by the noble Baroness, Lady Murphy, and the noble Lord, Lord Warner.

I want to avoid this being a political debate. Maybe contrary to some of the points of the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, we are seeing similar challenges across all four NHSs—across all four nations. I am afraid to say that maybe the worst-performing of those, from the records that many noble Lords will remember, whether we are looking at waiting lists or a number of other records, was Wales. These are challenges that we are all facing at this point. However, I want to be united in this debate in looking at the positive way forward.

I recognise that many noble Lords, including the noble Lords, Lord Hunt and Lord Warner, and the noble Baroness, Lady Murphy, brought up the overcentralised nature of the NHS. However, I disagree with the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, that this is due to direction from Ministers. The whole point of trying to set up the ICBs, as referenced by the noble Lord, Lord Carter, is to reverse that and put more power at a local level. These are early days in the life of ICBs but we definitely see them as the way forward.

I hope to answer the points made by the noble Lord, Lord Kakkar, and the noble Baroness, Lady Cavendish, on trying to make this into a long-term conversation. I freely accept that probably at this part of the political cycle we can have only so much of a conversation. However, on my part, whichever role I may or may not be in post election, I undertake to take part with whoever is in power in what I hope will be a constructive conversation. It needs to be the sort of environment where, as the noble Lord, Lord Allan, says, code wins the argument, and people are coming from all around and can have those sorts of constructive conversations. I think that will include a new contract between the NHS and the people, as the noble Baroness, Lady Hollins, says.

I will start by echoing some of the financial realities that the noble Lords, Lord Bethell, Lord Mawson and Lord St John, brought up. The reality of the situation is that we spend about 10% of our GDP on the NHS right now. It is going up as a proportion year after year, and it will go only one way. At the same time, no one is proposing major injections of cash. I think we all recognise the financial situation; the proposals that Labour made, for instance, amount to less than 1% of the NHS budget. Therefore, I think that what we can all unite on right now is that this is an argument not about pumping in lots more money but about finding other ways to try to make the NHS more sustainable, in many ways using, as the noble Lord, Lord Warner, says, a “tough love” approach where that is appropriate.

I want to talk about the things we are doing in terms of the infrastructure and capacity, as the noble Baroness, Lady Murphy, mentioned. When I talk about infrastructure and capacity I am talking about the labour supply, the productivity plan and the capital estate, and I then want to combine that with the new way we need to engage, whether it is around technology, prevention or primary community care, which to my mind are the ways in which we will create a sustainable NHS going forward.

Starting with the labour supply, I completely agree with the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Hacking, that staff are at the heart of every successful organisation. That begins with making sure that we have the right number of staff, which is what the long-term workforce plan is all about—trying to make sure that we have the proper recruitment, training and long-term resources.

However, more important than any of that are the points about retention and the right culture, made by the noble Baronesses, Lady Hollins and Lady Finlay, respectively, so that people feel that they are valued and are in a caring and supportive environment rather than the bullying environment we have seen all too often. In answer to the questions from the noble Lord, Lord Carter, and the noble Baroness, Lady Cavendish, I say that the Messenger report is vital.

The role of management is fundamental. In answer to the question from the noble Lord, Lord St John, I can say that when I first came into this, I did a lot of work trying to look at hospital performance. I did all sorts of analysis, looking at demographics in a local area and the relative funding. No matter what I did, there was always at least 50% unanswered in the multiple regression analysis and so on. The conclusion I came to, which is probably not earth-shattering, was that that 50% performance is all about the management, leadership and culture that drives it.

As the noble Lord, Lord Kakkar, said, a lot of that is allowing people to work at the top of their profession. If you allow them to do that, that is when they can make the new developments and innovations. That means using technology and AI to help reduce administration, which I will come to later when I talk about the productivity plan. It will also mean some uncomfortable conversations, using other staff to do some more of the administrative parts. Again, I totally support, welcome and appreciate the moves that the noble Lords, Lord Hunt and Lord Scriven, are making in the use of things such as physician associates, which is about trying to take away a lot of that burden so that doctors really can practise at the top of their profession.

In response to the point made by the noble Baroness, Lady Tyler, about productivity, that needs to be and is being put into a detailed plan that we can all review. We will have the opportunity to do so around July. As the noble Baroness, Lady Merron, said, we absolutely identify that we need to replace the inefficient IT estate, among other things. It is doing a lot of the basics in PCs, wifi and all the things mentioned by Joe Harrison, whom I know well; I work with him every week. It is about systems, EPR and arming the staff and clinicians with the basic equipment. You can start small, as the noble Lord, Lord Mawson, said. As well as electronic patient records and the FDP, those are the things from which we will get productivity improvements. When I talk about figures such as the £35 billion, I am talking about increased output, not savings. I am talking about how we can get increased treatments and output—and definitely by using the things mentioned by the noble Lords, Lord Reid and Lord Carter: payment by results and the right incentive systems; and, as the noble Lord, Lord Crisp, said, the use of the independent sector to supply, where relevant.

Of course, vital to all this is the capital estate. That is why the new hospital plan is a vital part of this. The work shows that if you put the right digital instruments in place and the infrastructure into hospitals, you get 10% more productivity. In answer to some of the questions from the noble Lord, Lord Warner, I say that if you put the right real estate in as well, the combination gives you 20% more productivity. That is not just time output but reductions in the length of stays. We all know that the sooner you can get people home, they are more likely to go on and live successfully in their environment.

Regarding the points around adult social care and the training and qualifications of the staff, which were made by the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Newcastle, the noble Baroness, Lady Warwick, and the noble Lord, Lord Turnberg, I totally agree. That is what we are trying to do. We have for the first time introduced a qualification for adult social care staff and training. We have put 18,000 different adult social care providers into a system where they can put up training and get easy management of payments for it all. More needs to be done long term for a fundamental funding model; that goes to the points raised by the noble Baronesses, Lady Warwick and Lady Cavendish. That will involve a covenant of care but, honestly, we need to do more work on long-term funding solutions.

I cannot say enough about prevention. My noble friend Lord Bethell said to me, “Very simple, your speech today: prevention, prevention, prevention”. There are a few more things but I will definitely add a few “preventions”. The long-term workforce plan and productivity plan are designed towards that. The screening programme that we are doing is because Chris Whitty’s biggest concern is that simple things such as blood pressure which were missed during Covid will now lead to excess deaths in heart disease. As the noble Lord, Lord Patel, mentions, those simple blood pressure measures and mid-life MoTs are fundamental to what we are trying to do. I will take a leaf from the book of the noble Lord, Lord Allan, because it is right: we need the champions in that space.

I agree with the points made by the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott, on the importance of dentistry and early check-ups being needed for the prevention agenda. Our new plan regarding school checks and water fluoridation is all to help with that. I see a future world, of which I will talk more later on, where you have a much more targeted screening programme. In addition to our mid-life MoTs, which are blanket programmes, AI needs to be used to help target screenings so that we can really help people in prevention.

I agree on the ever-increasing use and funding of acute hospitals, which none of us has solved, as raised by many noble Lords. There is a need to rebalance this towards primary and community care. I look forward to the report of the committee of the noble Baroness, Lady Pitkeathley, on the integration of it all and what we can learn from its points. Things such as Pharmacy First are good ways ahead. We have seen 98% of pharmacies sign up and already there have been 125,000 consultations. With the dental plan, we have had 500 new surgeries and a 50% increase in the numbers taking adult NHS patients. However, we need the new model of care mentioned by the noble Lords, Lord Scriven and Lord Crisp, care that is away from the acute hospital and in the community. I cannot speak more highly of the Bromley by Bow Centre, which I visited. The noble Lord, Lord Mawson, should be very proud of everything that I saw there. Of all the visits that I have done in almost two years in this job, it was one of the ones that I enjoyed the most and was most impressed by. That is the model we should take going forward.

That centre is doing exactly what the noble Baroness, Lady Chisholm, mentioned, in looking at the whole health of the person and seeing how it can really care for them in the community. Of course, that requires community nursing. My mother was a community nurse, so I realise that. It needs to be backed by technology. I am proud to say that I have been responsible for the app for the last 18 months and we have gone from 10% of people having their medical records to over 90%. As the noble Baroness, Lady Merron, said, we now have 33 million people using the app for digital prescriptions, medical records and appointments, which the noble Baroness, Lady Pitkeathley, had an example of just the other day.

We do need to broaden things out, so more people realise all the features that are on the app, but we really do see the app as the front door of access to the NHS. It will deal with future therapies, whether musculoskeletal, as many noble Lords have mentioned, or mental health. That gives opportunity for it all. On the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Parekh, the app does allow people to take control and to take power away, sometimes, from the experts, giving them control and putting the power in their own fingertips.

Data and AI are fundamental to this, to enable the sort of precision medicines my noble friend Lady Blackwood mentioned. I thank her, and Genomics England for all the work it is doing to lead on this. It is an institution we should rightly be proud of. That is the future of medicine, but it is all underpinned by the data. Funnily enough, I have kicked off cataloguing of that, because it is fundamental.

On adult care, we have increased digitisation from 20% to 60% quite quickly. Having the data at the heart of this will allow competition and innovation to take place. But we need to make sure that that conversation happens in the right way, so that we bring the public with us on that journey.

I hope that gives a vision of the things we are trying to do to put the infrastructure in place—the supply, workforce, technology, IT and capital—accompanying that with new ways of working, whether it is a focus on prevention, more input into primary and community care, or using AI, technology and genomics to lead the way forward. I think we all agree that that is the only way we will get a sustainable health service going forward.

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Patel, and all noble Lords who have contributed for the spirit of the debate and its thoughtfulness. I give special thanks again to the noble Baroness, Lady Ramsey, for choosing this debate for her maiden speech, and I thank the noble Baroness, Lady D’Souza, for joining us on her 80th birthday. As ever, I apologise to those whose contributions I have not managed to cover completely, and I promise to write giving a thorough wrap-up.