Preventable Sight Loss

Mark Hendrick Excerpts

Tuesday 30th April 2024 Westminster Hall

[John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Wirral West (Margaret Greenwood) on securing this debate. That was a comprehensive and detailed, but succinct, assessment of where we are at. Sometimes, the role of Members of Parliament is to identify an issue before it comes into crisis so that we can advise Government on the action that is needed, and that is exactly what my hon. Friend has done.

When some of my constituents identified this topic as the subject of an Adjournment debate, they approached me to raise an issue I have been dealing with for the last 20 years: people whose eyesight has been damaged as a result of refractive eye surgery, or laser treatment, as some know it. The refractive eye surgery sector is now a huge profit-making industry. Many gain through the use of refractive eye surgery, and their eyesight is benefited, but there are many others—in fact, thousands every year now—whose vision is damaged as a result of the surgery.

Many years ago, a campaign called My Beautiful Eyes was launched by a woman called Sasha Rodoy. Some people will know of her if they have dealt with these laser treatment issues in any way. She is a heroine. Each year, we organise a lobby of Parliament called Bad Eye Day. We bring together individuals whose eyesight has been damaged by refractive eye surgery and their families. When I say “damaged”, for many of them, it is to the point where their eyesight is nearly lost. Many others have heartbreaking stories of losing their employment or being severely disabled.

In 2004, Frank Cook, who was then a Labour MP, introduced a private Member’s Bill to address the issues confronting people whose eyesight had been damaged by refractive eye surgery. I co-sponsored the Bill, which basically called for regulation of the sector. In 2013, I produced a ten-minute rule Bill that reflected many of the proposals that Frank had put forward. We have had debates, meetings with the royal colleges and ministerial meetings. All we have been asking for over the past 20 years is greater regulation—effective regulation—but progress has been limited. Even in the Government’s own inquiry into cosmetic surgery, Sir Bruce Keogh identified laser surgery as something that should be subject to further regulation. To be frank, nothing has followed from all those ministerial meetings and debates, from all the legislation we put forward or from the Government’s own inquiry.

We need effective regulation that runs through every aspect of the process. The first aspect is the marketing and advertising of these treatments. As Sasha Rodoy says, the industry is notorious for making outlandish claims about the effectiveness of surgery. On a few occasions, we have taken companies to the Advertising Standards Authority and they have been found guilty of exaggerating their claims about the treatment.

Secondly, we want regulation of the advice provided to people who commission the surgery. It is about getting appropriate advice, and about whether the individual’s eye is appropriate for the type of surgery. At one stage, we found that advice was being provided by members of staff who were not qualified and were simply selling the product. We want the provision of advice to be regulated, supervised and monitored.

We also want surgical practices and professional standards to be supervised and monitored. I have dealt with several cases in which professional standards have fallen below what we would expect and people have been harmed as a result. When things go wrong, the company will often fail to put things right adequately. It will delay its response and will often try to get beyond the limit when legal action can be taken. Those individuals then have to fall back on the NHS.

Time and again, the NHS has to address complex injuries as a result of laser treatment, yet the financial burden falls not on the companies but on the NHS itself. We have argued that the performance records of those private companies and, if necessary, of the surgeons involved should be published to identify where harm has been caused as a result of action taken. Where NHS involvement is needed to correct or address the concerns that people have been left with, maybe there should be a levy on those private companies so that the cost burden does not fall on the NHS.

We are now 20 years on from that first piece of legislation, which Frank Cook brought forward because—if I recall rightly—he had gone through that experience and was interviewed by the media about it. All of a sudden, he received a flood of correspondence from people saying, “The same thing’s happened to me: I’ve had the same sort of injuries.” When I raised the issue in 2013, I had literally hundreds of emails coming in. We have a national lobby each time, and some of the stories are absolutely heartbreaking.

I know that there are demands on the Minister’s time, but it would be really useful if, like some of his predecessors, he met victims of refractive eye surgery who have become campaigners and the professionals they work with, so that we can address the current situation, get an objective overview of where we are and then agree a programme for reform. All that people are asking for is adequate regulation based on monitoring of professional practices, so that they feel protected. At the moment, as my hon. Friend the Member for Wirral West said, there is a real risk of eyesight loss. It is one of the worst things that can happen to people, because they become completely isolated from the world. It is incredibly distressing.

That request fits with the demand for a national eyesight strategy, which is desperately needed. What my hon. Friend described is happening across the country. There is a fear that if we do not address it now, we could quickly get into a crisis as a result of the loss of professional staff to the NHS in particular. My hon. Friend the Member for Leeds North West (Alex Sobel) also mentioned the postcode lottery of access to those services. I hope that the Minister will agree to meet campaigners on this issue, which is worth addressing, so that at least they can have their say and he can take advice on the programme of reform that we need.

[Sir Mark Hendrick (in the Chair)]

We now move to the Front-Bench contributions.

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[Andrew Stephenson]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for making those points. I am not instinctively anti-regulation; indeed, just a few weeks ago I put through this place the statutory instrument on the regulation of physician associates and anaesthetist associates. There are certain parts of the healthcare sector where regulation is very much needed and I would very much advocate for it. As I have said, I will defer to my right hon. Friend the Member for South Northamptonshire. This is her ministerial responsibility, and I am sure she will read the right hon. Gentleman’s comments with interest and may want to take the discussions further.

Finally, on research, the Government are backing scientists and researchers to take strides in understanding sight loss and in making new treatments available. Two years ago, we awarded £20 million to Moorfields Biomedical Research Centre to undertake another five years of vision research, and almost £6.5 million to Moorfields Clinical Research Facility to support cutting-edge treatments for all eye conditions.

Eye care services face challenges and we are taking decisive action to address them, both now and in the long term. The hon. Member for Wirral West and I will never agree on the use of the independent sector. I strongly believe, and think the Labour Front Bench team strongly agrees, that using the independent sector enables us to fully realise our healthcare system’s capacity and to reduce the time that patients spend on waiting lists. I would argue that that does not represent any move to privatise our NHS. As I have said on the record before, the overall proportion of NHS England’s spend on independent sector providers has not increased significantly in recent years. In 2013-14, 6.1% of total health spending was spent on the purchase of healthcare from independent sector providers; in 2022-23, the proportion was 6.5%.

This morning, the shadow Minister in the first Westminster Hall debate, the hon. Member for Denton and Reddish (Andrew Gwynne), talked about making better use of the independent sector to help to ensure that we deliver the best outcomes for patients, and the shadow Minister in this debate, the hon. Member for Birmingham, Edgbaston, reiterated that point. On the use of the independent sector, then, I gently say that it is something on which there is broad cross-party support. While recognising that there are always challenges with the use of the independent sector, it is not in any way a privatisation of the NHS.

I firmly believe that through prevention, innovation and investment in our workforce, we will deliver for all our people across the United Kingdom access to the important healthcare services, including ophthalmology services, that they deserve.

[Sir Mark Hendrick (in the Chair)]

I call Margaret Greenwood to wind up the debate.

Illegal Vapes

Mark Hendrick Excerpts

Tuesday 16th January 2024 Westminster Hall

[Sir Mark Hendrick (in the Chair)]

I remind Members that they should bob if they wish to be called in the debate.

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[Kirsten Oswald]

I am going to make progress, but if I have time, I would be happy to let the hon. Gentleman come in later.

Elf Bar is simply ignoring those regulations to get its products to market. In the UK, it is taking a different approach and complying with regulations so that it can—one presumes—sell the maximum number of its products. That means that we need different regulations that will stop the surge in young people vaping. Of course, if we banned all disposable vapes, it would be far easier to identify the illicit ones, because all vapes would be illicit. It is far better that we close down the distributors and that we do so in a wholehearted way.

I have spoken before about my own concerns about sports advertising of vapes. I spoke about Blackburn Rovers, and a 15-year-old footballer, who came on as a substitute in their FA cup win recently, made history as their youngest ever player. However, his shirt did not have the club sponsor, Totally Wicked, on it. Blackburn Rovers said that, as the legal vaping age in the UK is 18, under-18s cannot wear that logo—but they can still see it, because it is displayed on everyone else’s strip. We would not want tobacco companies advertising on sports strips. We would not want whisky, beer or cider companies on sports strips. None of those things should be acceptable to us, and advertising for vapes should not be acceptable to us either. If we are serious about dealing with the harms that young people experience because of vaping, we should expect sports clubs to take that seriously too. The claims by both Blackburn Rovers and Totally Wicked at the time that vaping had a positive and proven role in supporting the reduction of smoking are simply not credible when we think of the young people who are interested in football.

I will bring my remarks to a conclusion. I noticed recently that some vaping companies are actually going out and looking for sportspeople to sponsor. I think that is hugely dangerous and hugely unwelcome. I ask the Minister to give us some of her thoughts on that matter in her response.

[Sir Mark Hendrick (in the Chair)]

Order. I am conscious of the fact that there may be a vote shortly. Have you finished?

[Kirsten Oswald]

Well, I have now.

[Sir Mark Hendrick (in the Chair)]

Okay. There may be a vote so I may have to suspend proceedings. I call Preet Kaur Gill.

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[Dr Johnson]

I was talking to an industry representative about the issue of flavours in particular, and he told me that when a smoker decides to quit, they often start with a tobacco-flavoured vape. When their sense of smell and taste improves because they have stopped smoking, they then no longer like the taste of the tobacco vapes, so they move on to cherry cola or some other flavour. That actually can persist their addiction. The concern about removing the flavours is that instead of stopping using the vapes, people will continue—

[Sir Mark Hendrick (in the Chair)]

Order. Interventions are meant to be short. The hon. Lady has already spoken, and we still have the Minister to come. She requires 10 minutes at least, and it is now 5.19 pm. I suggest to the Opposition spokesperson that she makes an end to her speech fairly quickly.

[Preet Kaur Gill]

The next Labour Government would come down like a ton of bricks on companies profiting at the expense of our children’s health. As part of our child-health action plan, we will crack down on companies peddling vapes to children. We will work with local councils and the NHS to ensure that they are being used as a stop-smoking aid, rather than as a new form of smoking. We will tackle health inequalities, get serious about prevention and ensure that children born in Britain today are part of the healthiest generation that ever lived. I look forward to the Minister’s response.

Community Pharmacies

Mark Hendrick Excerpts

Thursday 14th September 2023 Westminster Hall

[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Sir Mark Hendrick (in the Chair)]

Order. May I remind Members that they need to bob if they wish to be called?

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[Taiwo Owatemi (Coventry North West) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Mark. I thank the hon. Member for Waveney (Peter Aldous) for securing this important debate and highlighting the challenges faced by the pharmacy sector. He spoke with great knowledge about many of the challenges around funding, and the opportunities for the pharmacy sector to address some of the primary care challenges faced by the NHS. I highlight the points made by the Chair of the Health and Social Care Committee, the hon. Member for Winchester (Steve Brine), who has been very supportive of the pharmacy sector and has played a key role in pushing for the Committee to publish a report on the role of the sector and the challenges it faces.

I declare an interest as a registered pharmacist, the chair of the all-party parliamentary pharmacy group, and a member of the Health and Social Care Committee. I apologise to Members present, as I might end up repeating some of the points that have already been made, but I will try my best not to focus on them.

The first challenge I will highlight is the massive issue of the medicine supply chain. Every time I speak to pharmacy owners and pharmacists they raise the impact that uncertainty has on their profit margins. I recently started engaging with the pharmaceutical sector to understand the issues. There are issues around medicine distribution in this country, and there are middlemen supply chain distributors who keep hold of medicines and who are sometimes involved in driving up the prices, but we also have challenges around the manufacturing of generics, which account for about 80% of medicines used by the NHS.

About 2.2 million generic drugs are prescribed every single day in this country and used by the NHS. Despite that, it seems there were some oversights in this area when we negotiated our exit from the EU. Currently, legislation allows EU generics to be recognised in the UK but does not allow the EU to recognise UK generics. That means that British manufacturers are unable to submit their marketing authorisation applications easily within the EU. Therefore, they have no incentive to produce these medicines, or increase their manufacturing of these medicines, in the UK. It also means that they are unable to compete with their European competitors.

A great example of what is happening is that the EU has started investing about £20 billion in the manufacturing of generics since we left. So far, the UK, according to figures that I have seen recently, has invested nothing. Essentially, our UK manufacturers are being left at a competitive disadvantage. Aside from that, the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency is facing significant challenges. It has lost a large amount of its workforce and is currently unable to process the regulatory applications coming through its doors—again, making it difficult for generic drugs to enter the UK. Essentially, there are regulatory difficulties and there seem to be limited financial incentives.

Secondly, I want to address the challenges of finance, which have been a massive issue facing the pharmacy sector. The sector has not been adequately funded in line with inflation for a very long time. That has led to many high street pharmacies closing down. In my constituency, Boots in Jardine Crescent had to close down because it was not financially viable for the business to continue. That has had a significant impact in an area of great deprivation and high health inequality.

Despite the challenges that community pharmacies face, there are also wonderful opportunities, which I have to admit the Government have started to recognise. I welcome their more than £600 million investment in the Pharmacy First programme, but there is a long way to go to fully take advantage of the potential that community pharmacies can offer.

Community pharmacies play an important role because they are the first point of call for patients, but they can play a bigger role in healthcare. Not only can they deliver the Pharmacy First scheme—I hope that will be rolled out and that the Government will add more clinical conditions to the list—but they can play an important role in other primary care services, such as vaccination, sexual health and the management of conditions such as cardiovascular disease.

I have always found it weird how a patient will come up to me in the pharmacy and say, “I have high blood pressure. I’m a bit concerned.” I say, “Sit down. Let’s check your blood pressure” and then I have to message the doctor to let them know. Then I will tell the patient to go to their GP to get a medication. In reality, that could have started and ended in a community pharmacy. That is something that hospital pharmacists easily do, and we regularly do it, so I encourage the Minister to look into the wider roles that community pharmacists can play in supporting GPs and primary care and in reducing some of the challenges it currently faces.

Many Members have spoken about the workforce crisis. To be able to fully take advantage of the potential of community pharmacy, we have to acknowledge the fact that, like many other healthcare professions in this country, pharmacies face a significant workforce crisis. We do not have enough pharmacists, and we are struggling to recruit and train more and to retain the community pharmacists we have.

Again, I welcome the Government’s workforce plan, but unfortunately it lacks the finer details of how community pharmacy will be supported in the long term. An integrated and funded workforce plan for pharmacy is needed if we are to enable pharmacies to support the community as well as the rest of the NHS. A larger number of designated prescribing practitioners is needed if community pharmacies are to assist with the provision of primary care. A clear pathway to ensure that that happens is important.

I know that the Government aim to ensure that we get as many prescribers as possible by 2026, and that is something I welcome. I am really happy that pharmacists are able to graduate with the ability to prescribe. However, there are many pharmacists in the workforce for whom there is no clear plan as to how they can become prescribers by 2026. I have spoken to many different pharmacy schools and they do not know how that is going to happen.

As the hon. Member for Waveney has explained, the process for getting sign-off is not easy. People have to ensure that they have found the right healthcare professional to shadow, as well as take time off work to do all the documentation and paperwork that is needed. Changes therefore need to happen, and further funding needs to be made available to incentivise healthcare professionals to take on more pharmacists and to mentor them and train them to become prescribers.

I also want to address areas that have not been mentioned in the debate so far. The first is technology, which has played a significant and positive role in the provision of the healthcare system. Since covid, technology has played an important role in allowing patients to have easy access to healthcare and allowing them to feel empowered. That is the reason we have seen an increase in the number of online pharmacies that are available, which has been quite positive.

However, I have some concerns. Figures recently published by the General Pharmaceutical Council, which is responsible for inspecting community pharmacies and online pharmacies, show that at least one in five of the online retailers it inspected in the past year did not meet at least one standard. If that was a community pharmacy, the store would be put on a clear supervision pathway to ensure that patients’ health was not put at risk. I would like to see the same happen to online pharmacies to ensure that they are better regulated as they continue to provide better access to medicines for patients.

I welcome the fact that the Government are looking at the supervision rules, which are outdated and were created at a time when we were making medicines in pharmacies and playing around with different active pharmaceutical ingredients. Pharmacy has changed since then, and the information available and the regulation around drug manufacturing has significantly improved. I welcome the consultation that is being carried out, and I encourage as many pharmacists as possible to give their feedback and engage with the consultation.

Lastly, I want to turn to the regulation of non-clinical managers. Community pharmacies either have a pharmacist as a manager or have non-clinical managers leading them. In the light of the Lucy Letby case, which highlighted the important role that non-clinical managers play, it is important that community pharmacists are also considered. Any new regulatory framework for unregulated management and leaders in healthcare should apply to not only those working in the NHS but those who have direct involvement in the provision of healthcare in our communities, such as community pharmacy.

Before I end, I would like to ask the Minister a few questions, which I hope he can answer today or respond to in a letter. Has any consideration been given to the generic industry, which, as I said earlier, accounts for a large amount of medicine supplies within the NHS? Can he direct me to the Minister who is responsible for drug manufacturing in this country, the changes in EU legislation and how we can bring about positive changes for our generic manufacturing industry? Do the Government have any plans to prevent future medicine shortages? I am already hearing pharmacies expressing concerns about the fact that winter is coming and they are expecting to have further shortages.

Are there any updates on the mutual recognition of medicines within the EU, and are any negotiations happening? Can the Minister provide an update on the prescribing scheme for healthcare professionals and whether any steps have been taken to address the issues I have raised? On funding, it would be helpful for many pharmacists to know whether there are any plans to help address some of the financial challenges they face. Lastly, as the chair of the all-party parliamentary pharmacy group, I wonder whether the Minister could spare some time to come and speak to key stakeholders in the sector, who would love to meet him and share some of their experiences.

[Sir Mark Hendrick (in the Chair)]

I thank Members for keeping to time. I call the shadow Minister.

New Hospital Programme and Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust

Mark Hendrick Excerpts

Tuesday 13th June 2023 Westminster Hall

[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Sir Mark Hendrick (in the Chair)]

Order. I remind Members to bob if they wish to be called in the debate. I now call Nickie Aiken.

[Nickie Aiken (Cities of London and Westminster) (Con)]

Thank you, Sir Mark, it is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship. I thank the hon. Member for Hammersmith (Andy Slaughter) for bringing forward the debate and for the points he has raised. As the Member of Parliament for the Cities of London and Westminster, I would like to focus my remarks specifically on St Mary’s Hospital in my constituency.

In September 2021, Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust set out the need for a complete redevelopment of St Mary’s: a new 840-bed, research-led major trauma and acute teaching hospital, which would release around five acres of surplus land for wider site regeneration. As I know the Minister appreciates, that development is of huge—

[Sir Mark Hendrick (in the Chair)]

Order. The sitting is to be suspended for multiple Divisions in the Chamber. We require approximately 15 minutes for each vote. There is an issue in that there may be more than four votes. I would imagine it could possibly be an hour before we come back. Those who have put in to speak should not worry, because there will be injury time.

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[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

It is a real pleasure to speak in this debate, and I congratulate the hon. Member for Hammersmith (Andy Slaughter) on securing it on this issue. He is indeed a hardy, dedicated and assiduous MP. I say that in all honesty, because I think the good people of Hammersmith have an excellent MP, and they should be very proud of the efforts he makes on behalf of his people in the Chamber and Westminster Hall.

This debate is about the new hospital programme, which applies to the UK mainland. I have come along to add my support to the hon. Gentleman, as I do for many right hon. and hon. Members, here and in the main Chamber. That is my purpose for being here. I am also here to discuss the new hospital programme, which was announced at the 2019 Conservative manifesto launch and would have delivered 40 new hospitals in the UK by 2030. I understand the reasons for the delays—the covid pandemic has focused attention elsewhere and taken away much of the funding—but there is a real need, and hon. Members have made that case today on behalf of their constituents.

I also understand the position of the hon. Member for Hammersmith on the refurbishment works at Charing Cross and Hammersmith Hospitals. As MPs, we want the best of care, access and opportunities for our constituents, and delays to any work are often frustrating, so I understand the request very well, and support his position and his ongoing commitment to his constituents.

I am pleased to see the Minister in his place. He responded to the first debate in Westminster Hall this morning on cancer very well. If he answers hon. Members in the same way in this debate as he did in that one, they will be more than satisfied. With the support of the new hospital programme, Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust is beginning the next phase of redevelopment planning work for its three main hospital sites, all of which are included in the 40 new hospitals that the Government have committed to building by 2030.

I will quickly give a Northern Ireland perspective: what is happening here is also happening back home. It is important that we all remember that the demands for hospital care and better hospitals are not just in London; they are across the whole of this great United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Northern Ireland has around 3% of all hospitals, with 40 across the Province.

In a constituency neighbouring mine, Belfast East, we have Ulster Hospital, which is the main hospital for us and is currently undergoing a £261 million revamp being done in stages. I believe that we are now going into section C of this refurbishment. So far there have been developments to a 30,000-square-metre in-patient block that is six storeys high, with a day surgery unit, an endoscopy unit, an angiography unit, and a cardiac investigation unit, with 12 in-patient wards. It is very much a modern hospital and very much of the modern programme that we have in Northern Ireland. The Minister is not responsible for that, but I just wanted to put it on record.

In order to clear our waiting lists, it is crucial that we do all we can to update outdated and old facilities. For a modern society and a fully functioning working hospital, things need to be modern and up to date. That is what the hon. Gentleman has asked for, and that is important. Hospital waiting lists in Northern Ireland are supposed to be banished by 2026—that is pie in the sky, in all honesty—according to a roadmap set out by the former health Minister, Robin Swann. More than 330,000 people are on some sort of waiting list in Northern Ireland and the new elective care framework proposes a £700 million investment over five years. It is important that the Government are committed to the requests of the hon. Member for Hammersmith and the hon. Member for Westminster North (Ms Buck), and to other requests that will follow.

[Sir Mark Hendrick (in the Chair)]

Order. Health is devolved in Northern Ireland, and the focus of this is very much on—

[Jim Shannon]

That is what I have done in my comments, Sir Mark. I just want to give you the example of Northern Ireland—

[Sir Mark Hendrick (in the Chair)]

But it is not a speech about the Northern Ireland health service, surely.

[Jim Shannon]

I have every hope that the Department of Health and Social Care will be able to give us timely updates on hospitals in England. This is a discussion I always have with those in the devolved Assemblies. We must—I conclude with this—do our best for our constituents and ensure that the collective facilities are in place to serve their needs. I hope the work in the constituency of the hon. Member for Hammersmith will commence soon as some reassurance for his constituents. He put his case forward—the Minister, I am sure, will respond—and I support him in what he has requested.

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[Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Sir Mark. I draw your attention to my revised entry in the Members’ Registry of Financial Interests: my spouse is chair of audit at the Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith (Andy Slaughter) for securing this important debate on the hammer blow that has been inflicted on west London—just one part of the funding and investment crisis being inflicted on the NHS by the Government.

Many of my constituents rely on services from the Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust, and particularly the St Mary’s, Hammersmith and Charing Cross Hospitals. For constituents in the eastern third of my constituency, Charing Cross Hospital is their local general hospital, whereas for those across my constituency, some or all treatments could be at Charing Cross, Hammersmith or St Mary’s.

My hon. Friend powerfully laid out the case against the Government and the complete neglect they have shown over the past 10 years to those across west London who need NHS care and those who work in the NHS. The sad thing is that I am not even surprised, because this is what we have come to expect from a Conservative Government—things such as the promises made by the now former Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip. He said there would be 40 new hospitals—that is a promise he drove into the ditch.

I expect that the Minister will make a valiant effort to shake the Etch A Sketch and pretend that the last four years did not actually happen, but patients and staff cannot pretend. Every delayed or inadequate repair or rebuild of any NHS buildings impacts on staff and patients. Leaking roofs, failing electrics, flooding sewage systems and structural faults put whole wards out of action. Operations have been cancelled, diagnostic units and pharmacies have suddenly closed, and much more. This all leads to delayed diagnostics, delayed treatment and delayed discharge.

The NHS backlog currently stands at over 7.3 million, and over 48,000 people in my constituency and the borough of Hounslow were waiting for treatment last year, including 50 who had been waiting over a year for an operation. Behind every single one of those cold numbers is a person whose life is put on hold or, worse, put at risk because of the delays to well-overdue investment. Examples of delay include people who are forced to go private, stroke victims waiting months for a physio, and a young man waiting over a year for an assessment for a broken hip. Behind every one of those stories is not just frustration, but a deeper anger—a righteous anger about just how bad the state of things is. How many of the delays that people are experiencing are made worse because of the failure to invest in the core infrastructure of NHS buildings? We should be clear that it is not the fault of NHS staff and boards. The Imperial trust has needed work to happen for years, and has been preparing and getting plans ready in the expectation that the Government’s promised support will arrive.

I will touch on another aspect that is not necessarily specific to the Imperial trust, but it has been raised with me recently and it is an example of the impact of cutting back on NHS capital investment. There has been a failure to invest in technology, equipment and buildings in testing labs. Without that investment, the NHS is becoming increasingly dependent on the private sector. Businesses are using their leverage position to demand unnecessarily high unit costs per diagnostic test from the already overstretched NHS revenue budgets. Of course, as my hon. Friend the Member for Westminster North (Ms Buck) has described, the annual additional maintenance cost is coming out of revenue budgets because of the lack of capital expenditure.

The failure to invest has left NHS staff, patients and their families down. I know from recently visiting West Middlesex University Hospital is Isleworth in my constituency how hard NHS staff are working, and the groundbreaking work they are doing, but staff say they get little to no support from Government. West Middlesex is not in the same position as the three hospitals mentioned in this debate; it had a complete rebuild on the core part of the hospital under the last Labour Government.

NHS staff and patients are fed up, and they feel ignored. Surely the failure to invest in our NHS estate and provide what was promised will be yet another kick in the teeth for them. The broken promises will have a huge impact on not just my constituents but all Londoners. As has been said, St Mary’s Hospital provides key clinical services and is one of London’s major trauma centres—I think there are only four across London.

[Sir Mark Hendrick (in the Chair)]

Order. Ruth, could you wind up?

[Ruth Cadbury]

In conclusion, my constituents, who already face record waiting lists, will face a longer wait and greater difficulty because of the Government’s decision to pause investment. The Government over-promise and under-deliver. The whole farce shows why, after 13 years in power, it is time for a change.

Dental Services: East of England

Mark Hendrick Excerpts

Tuesday 16th May 2023 Westminster Hall

[Mr Bacon]

My hon. Friend makes several good points. We did payment by activity for acute hospitals, and we got a huge amount of activity in acute hospitals. Mental health was then the Cinderella service, with what little was left. Of course, there are tensions, and my hon. Friend, as a practising hospital doctor, will know that better than most. How that needle can be threaded to get the desired results has confronted Governments for many years.

On my hon. Friend’s specific point, having gone through medical school or dental school and come out the other end, junior doctors and, I am sure, junior dentists are at the moment struggling in the way that many others are—including young professionals—to afford anywhere to live. We have hundreds of thousands of acres of public land, including Ministry of Defence land, NHS land, railway land and church land, which has a quasi-public flavour to it. Norfolk County Council alone owns 16,000 acres of land. I would say to these people, “Come and work for the NHS for a few years full time. Commit yourselves completely to this, and we will help you design, build and rent from us at a decent rent. And then, depending on the calibrated loyalty package, which I am sure we can easily work out, you will get the chance in future to buy the house that you have designed for yourself.”

To go back to the point that my hon. Friend the Member for Broadland has made, getting people to stay in a particular area has proved difficult, not least because we do not have a dental training college. However, this is also about people understanding that the area they are going to work in is particularly attractive. That is true of much of the east of England, except people do not realise it because not enough of them, certainly in dentistry, are educated there. There is a huge opportunity for the Government to get this right, and I am more concerned about ensuring that the plan that comes from the Minister in the next few weeks or months is correct.

The fear I have is the potential downside. My constituent who, before Christmas, booked an appointment for her children for 9 May but found out recently that it was cancelled in a text message from the Harleston Bupa practice—she has been phoning to find out what is going on—will not care or know about the interstices of the 2006 dental contract, which was perhaps well intentioned but is deeply flawed and has led to many of the problems we are grappling with. She will just care that she cannot get an appointment.

Although the Opposition have not been particularly fleet of foot in recent years, even they can see that this will become a very salient issue at the next general election. We have our five points: halving inflation, growing the economy, reducing the national debt, cutting NHS waiting times and stopping the boats. Those are fine, but they are not a programme for Government. We need to do those things to restore confidence after the events of last autumn and—it might be best if I quote Mark Twain—to try and draw a veil and hope that not too many people remember them. However, the fact is that we need a better programme for the election, and I am sure we will have one.

The hon. Member for Denton and Reddish (Andrew Gwynne) will be sitting there with his chums, thinking, “What are our five points going to be?” If we do not get this right—mark my words, Sir Mark—the Opposition parties will say, “They have had 13 years to talk about it. It started with the 2006 dental contract, but they have had long enough and have not yet sorted it.” It will then become one of their five points. We are talking about such piffling sums of money compared with the overall cost of the NHS that it is simply incomprehensible that we would not deal with this properly.

The issue of dental care has been of growing concern to our constituents for many years, and the concern has only grown as successive Governments have failed to grapple with the issues properly. On present trends, it will continue to get worse—much worse—unless the Government make a decisive step change and match that decision with the right resources in the right places within a contractual framework that incentivises the right behaviour. That is what the Government need to do.

[Sir Mark Hendrick (in the Chair)]

I remind Members that they should bob if they wish to be called in the debate. I call Andrew Selous.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Richard Bacon]

It might make it more of a pentagram, but I did mean to mention Cranfield, of course. My hon. Friend knows that in South Norfolk we speak of little else. I do not want to take up too much time, although we are slightly ahead.

My hon. Friend the Member for Boston and Skegness said that he is not technically in the east of England. I had a mad great-great aunt who lived in Brigg in Lincolnshire, and Lincolnshire has always been in the east of England, as far as I am concerned. He is very welcome at this debate, and I had a great interest in what he said. However, if it is true that the wilder fringes of the internet have got worse in recent years, and if my hon. Friend was responsible for 5G, to whom should we attribute the extra growth in the wilder fringes of the internet, if not to him? I only pose the question.

The hon. Member for Denton and Reddish (Andrew Gwynne) surprised me. I remember when he was shadow Secretary of State for the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government portfolio. He mostly appeared at the Dispatch Box like an angry avenging angel. The fact that he is capable of sounding rather rational and sensible was a surprise to me. I am afraid he also confirmed my worst fears—

[Sir Mark Hendrick (in the Chair)]

Order. Can we confine ourselves to the issue of dental services, please?

[Mr Richard Bacon]

As the hon. Member for Denton and Reddish said, dentistry definitely needs to be improved. He has confirmed my worst fear, which is that if the Minister does not focus on this sufficiently, the hon. Member and the Opposition will. They will produce a solution which—whether it is delivered or not—too many people will find attractive, I fear.

Fortunately, we have in the Minister someone in whom several colleagues have reposed confidence, and have said so publicly. On one occasion, when we were both on holiday, I bumped into the Minister in a second-hand book shop in Hay-on-Wye. I know he is a cerebral fellow who thinks carefully about these issues, and I take seriously the assurances I have had from colleagues that he is looking at this extremely closely.

I say one thing to him in conclusion, and this is the acid test. If he produces a dental plan that can be delivered speedily, and if he negotiates successfully not just with his Secretary of State and east of England MPs, but with the Treasury, to produce the resources required to do that, he will quickly give our constituents reassurance that NHS dental provision can be a place where dentists want to work, thrive and have successful careers. If he can do that, he will make a significant contribution to our success at the next general election. Not to put any pressure on him, but I believe that getting this right—reflecting on what I said about the issue being such a salient one—puts on his shoulders the enormous burden of getting the right answer so that our constituents have dental provision that works.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered dental services in the East of England.

Urgent and Emergency Care

Mark Hendrick Excerpts

Monday 5th September 2022 Commons Chamber

[Steve Barclay]

First I acknowledge on the record the campaigning that my hon. Friend and colleagues have done for a new hospital at Kettering. They particularly demonstrated the urgency of addressing issues with the energy plant, so I was pleased that we were able to get that enabling work done. All A&E facilities have been under pressure over the summer, which is why we have announced the additional funding. It is about boosting capacity in call centres, looking at how we address variation in performance among ambulance trusts, particularly on conveyancing, and looking at how we get more flow into hospitals. That is why, along with the hospital, I also visited a care home in my hon. Friend’s constituency, in order to look at how we better address the issue of delayed discharge.

[Sir Mark Hendrick (Preston) (Lab/Co-op)]

Can I bring to the Secretary of State’s attention the planned closure of the Preston ambulance station on Blackpool Road, Preston, and the closure in Broughton, just outside my constituency, which are to be replaced by an ambulance station 5 or 6 miles away on Sherdley Road in Lostock Hall? The decision was made by the North West Ambulance Service NHS Trust without consulting any staff or hospital heads, including the chief executive of the NHS Trust in central Lancashire, and without consulting trades unions and other stakeholders, including the councils. Will he look into this matter and see what has happened? It will add 26 minutes to a journey from the proposed site to the Royal Preston Hospital, which cannot be in the interest of any patient.

[Steve Barclay]

I am happy to draw that case to the attention of the relevant parties and ensure that the hon. Gentleman gets a written explanation.

Covid-19 Update

Mark Hendrick Excerpts

Wednesday 8th December 2021 Commons Chamber

[Sir Mark Hendrick (Preston) (Lab/Co-op)]

Does the Secretary of State feel that the important messages and measures that he has announced today will be undermined by the fact that we have a Prime Minister who does not lead by example, and who has a cavalier attitude towards mask wearing, particularly in places such as hospitals—as well as the issue of the alleged parties that have taken place at No. 10? Is it not one rule for him and another for everybody else?

[Sajid Javid]

The Prime Minister has addressed both those issues.

Covid-19 Vaccine Update

Mark Hendrick Excerpts

Thursday 4th February 2021 Commons Chamber

[Nadhim Zahawi]

I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s congratulations. I stand on the shoulders of heroes; it is the army of the NHS family, volunteers and our armed forces that is doing the real heavy lifting in this deployment.

I visited Cullimore chemist in Edgware, a brilliant independent chemist that is delivering the vaccination programme. At the moment, the limiting factor is the ability to do 1,000 vaccine doses a week because of the finite amount of vaccine. However, as we get more volume through, I, like my hon. Friend, want to see convenience, so that someone can walk down the road to their local chemist. I look forward to doing that with him, I hope, one day.

[Sir Mark Hendrick (Preston) (Lab/Co-op) [V]]

We know that all vaccinations are captured in real time and populate GP records within 24 hours. However, only the aggregated data is provided to local vaccination leads. It is absolutely necessary that they receive line-by-line data at citizen level to enable them to respond immediately to low uptake—for example from BAME communities—or accessibility issues in identified cohorts. When will the Minister provide local vaccination leads with the detailed line-by-line vaccination data that is required to level up the fight against this deadly disease, and can he explain why it is not already being shared?

NHS and Social Care Funding

Mark Hendrick Excerpts

Wednesday 11th January 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Mark Hendrick (Preston) (Lab/Co-op)]

We have heard from Conservative Members about the so-called annual winter crisis, as though the situation we are in at the moment has always existed. Well, there have been crises in the past, but nothing like on the scale that we have seen recently. We are hearing about corridors being used as wards. I saw this in my own local hospital when I had to take my young son there. We went through into the ward and saw queues of trolleys with patients on them before my little son was seen to.

Last December, I wrote to the Department with a question—it was answered by the Minister of State, the hon. Member for Ludlow (Mr Dunne), who is in his place—about whether the Government could give the figures for the number of patients left queuing in corridors. I was told that there were no such figures. The Government and the Minister are well aware that this is going on in hospitals up and down the country. If the Government do not collect those figures centrally, but hospitals themselves collect them, the Government should ask for them; and if hospitals do not collect them, they are not carrying out their duty of care to our constituents, because it is important that people know how many patients are being held in corridors.

We hear stories about ambulances being redirected and bed occupancies being well over the 85% recommended level, and in many cases well over 95%. We have heard about the £4.6 billion of cuts in social care funding. Already, while it has not been made explicit, we are hearing talk of downgrading the four-hour A&E wait. In Preston, as I know myself, it is difficult to get GP appointments. If I ring and ask to see the doctor I want to see, I am often told that I will have to wait two to three hours—I mean weeks—to see that doctor. It probably will be two to three hours, at the very least, if I go to the hospital and it is a serious case. It is no wonder A&E is in crisis. A whole cohort of doctors in their mid-to-late 50s are looking forward to retirement. The number of doctors has increased, as we heard from the Health Secretary today, but that increase is nowhere near matching the number of doctors who are leaving the service or going to work elsewhere.

On the social care sector, we have seen tens of millions of pounds of Government cuts forced on Lancashire County Council. That is leaving the elderly vulnerable and more likely to have accidents at home, putting pressure on A&E as well. The mental health services—the Cinderella services—continue not to get the support they deserve. Since the closure of the acute mental health ward in Royal Preston hospital, the Avondale unit, I have seen mental health patients being decanted around Lancashire because they cannot get the care and support that they need in Preston.

Over a five-month period to August last year, we saw a 16% increase in attendance at A&E at Royal Preston hospital. Over the same period, average daily patient attendance increased from 217 per day to 255 per day. A small percentage of that increase was due to the closure of Chorley and South Ribble hospital’s A&E. I am sure that if the Deputy Speaker, my right hon. Friend the Member for Chorley (Mr Hoyle), were here, he would echo what I have said. However, it is not all due to the closure of Chorley’s A&E. Many patients who would have gone to Chorley are now attending the A&E in Wigan, or elsewhere. The Government should not be allowing wards to close when the demand is so high. The daily average for the number of ambulance arrivals has increased from 68 to 91, according to the North West Ambulance Service. In the meantime, a return to a 24-hour accident and emergency service at Chorley hospital has been ruled out. At best, there will be a 12-hour A&E service sometime later this month.

Preston has one of the 134 of 138 A&E departments up and down the country in which 95% of patients are not seen within four hours. I believe it is an absolute disgrace that only four A&Es in the country are meeting the four-hour standard. It is testimony to the cuts and austerity being forced on the NHS and local government social services departments up and down the country. I call on the Government to increase spending on social care and to fund the NHS further in this year’s Budget as a matter of urgency.

NHS Sustainability and Transformation Plans

Mark Hendrick Excerpts

Wednesday 14th September 2016 Commons Chamber

[Margaret Greenwood]

My right hon. Friend has hit the nail on the head.

Monday’s Liverpool Echo leaked some of the detail of Merseyside and Cheshire’s STP, reporting an anticipated £1 billion deficit by 2021. The STP talks about a

“need to reduce demand, reduce unwarranted variation and reduce cost.”

Those are all very nice ambitions, but the idea of trying to reduce demand just to plug a £1 billion funding gap is, frankly, the wrong way to deal with planning a sensible health service. The STP also says that there is an “appetite” for hospital reconfiguration—an appetite among whom, one might ask—as the existing set-up is unaffordable. It says there will be a requirement for

“our hospitals to be reconfigured, consolidated with less sites and clinicians and consultants working increasingly in new emerging networks.”

There is a problem with commas in the document, so who knows what it means. In other words, there will be cuts to staff and cuts to hospitals.

[Mr Mark Hendrick (Preston) (Lab/Co-op)]

Does that not show—it was certainly the case in the Chorley A&E closure—how this is being done by stealth? There has clearly been an increase in demand, but the support has been spread, rather than targeted at localities.

[Margaret Greenwood]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right.

The plan goes on to say that

“the shape and size of the hospital’s bed base will need to be reconfigured”.

In other words, there is a real threat to the number of available hospital beds we will have, and I am particularly concerned about Arrowe Park hospital in my constituency. One radical proposal is the merger of four major hospitals in the area.

Let us be clear: the STPs are vehicles for cuts. They are being devised in secret—hence the need for the local paper to leak the details—and are to be delivered by local areas at arm’s length from the Secretary of State, just as the Health and Social Care Act 2012 allows. He can just shrug his shoulders and say that it is nothing to do with him. That is absolutely not good enough.

The Government must publish the STPs in full. They must provide time and resources for meaningful consultation with healthcare workers, the public and elected representatives, and provide the extra funding the NHS so desperately needs. Otherwise, the STPs will prove the final piece in the privatisation jigsaw, and we will see the sale of assets, our hospitals sold off, and the break-up of services, with patients having to find their way around a fragmented and dwindling healthcare system. Our hard-working NHS staff will see more and more of their jobs moving to private providers and their pay, terms and conditions being undermined. The public absolutely do not want that. They know what the Government are up to—I have had such a big mailbag on this issue. People are concerned and absolutely understand the context. There is a way around this: it is time for the Government to hold up their hands, admit that they have been rumbled and put an end to their privatisation of the national health service.