NHS and Future Trade Deals

Mike Hill Excerpts

Monday 22nd July 2019 Westminster Hall

[Mike Hill (Hartlepool) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered e-petition 242300 relating to future trade deals and the National Health Service.

It is a pleasure to speak under your chairmanship, Sir Roger. I thank Mr Byron Davis for starting the petition, which to date has attracted 166,998 signatures, including more than 200 from my constituency. The petition is entitled, “Don’t put our NHS up for negotiation”, and it asks the Government to,

“Please introduce concrete safeguards that will make sure our NHS is kept out of any future trade deals after Brexit.”

It goes on to say:

“Words aren’t enough—we want watertight protections that will keep our NHS off the negotiating table. Why is this important? When done well, trade deals can be good for the UK. They can help create jobs and build opportunities… But this plan would put our health service at risk.”

The Government responded on 17 June 2019:

“The Government has been clear: the NHS is not, and never will be, for sale to the private sector. The Government will ensure no trade agreements will ever be able to alter this fundamental fact.”

The Department for International Trade went on to provide a detailed 491-word response to the petition, which can be found on the Petitions Committee website. It includes commitments such as:

“the NHS is not, and never will be, for sale to the private sector, whether overseas or domestic.”

[Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

This is a crucial debate. The Government have already awarded £9 billion-worth of contracts. Section 75 of the Health and Social Care Act 2012 is the biggest threat to the NHS, as it opens up the whole NHS to the market. Does my hon. Friend agree that the Government must urgently repeal section 75 to safeguard our NHS?

[Mike Hill]

My hon. Friend makes a powerful point, and I completely agree that the Government need to pay urgent to attention to that.

The Government’s response continued:

“the Government will continue to ensure that decisions on how to run public services are made by UK Governments, including the Devolved Administrations, and not our trade partners.”

It also said:

“Trade agreements do not prevent governments from regulating as they see fit, and they also do not require governments to privatise any services… The Government will ensure that nothing in our future trade agreements dilutes the powers of UK regulators to maintain the NHS’s position as the best health service in the world.”

However, as the petitioner says, words are not enough. By tomorrow, we will have a new Prime Minister; by the end of the week, we will probably have a new Cabinet, a new Secretary of State for Health and Social Care and possibly a new Government position on these matters. Although we hear time and again, from across the Benches, support for the great institution that is the national health service and for its abiding principle of being free at the point of need, those are only words without deeds.

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on opening this debate. I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for York Central (Rachael Maskell) that the Government should repeal section 75 as a matter of urgency, because it if they do not, they will throw the national health service to the dogs. Nobody wants that to happen, particularly with predators such as Donald Trump’s Administration. Does my hon. Friend agree?

[Mike Hill]

I agree that it is truly a case of words, not deeds.

Although people may find it reassuring to hear the current Secretary of State for Health and Social Care say that the NHS is not for sale and will not be on the table in any future trade talks, we cannot take his word for granted. Equally, we cannot ignore the remarks to which he was responding. They were made by the US ambassador to Britain, Woody Johnson, in an interview with the BBC’s Andrew Marr. In that interview, he confirmed that in a trade deal with the United States, the whole economy—including the NHS—would be on the table. The shadow Health Secretary described those comments as “terrifying.” He went on to say:

“The ambassador’s comments…show that a real consequence of a no-deal Brexit, followed by a trade deal with Trump, will be our NHS up for sale.”

Others such as Nigel Farage, the leader of the Brexit party, have advocated a move away from state-funded healthcare to a more Americanised model. In 2014, he told UK Independence party supporters:

“I think we are going to have to think about healthcare very, very differently. I think we are going to have to move to an insurance-based system of healthcare.”

Whatever opinions, promises or pledges are out there, it is clear that if the NHS is not for sale, it must be protected and future-proofed against the outcomes of any trade agreements with the USA and any other nation state. That, simply, is what the petition asks for.

[Paul Blomfield (Sheffield Central) (Lab)]

I support my hon. Friend’s comments about the petition. I am pleased that my constituency was in the top 10 for the highest number for signatures.

My hon. Friend is right to highlight the Government’s commitments. Indeed, the October 2017 White Paper on future trade arrangements said that the protections of EU free trade agreements would continue to apply in future trade agreements. Does he agree that we need to give some strength to those commitments and some assurance to the petitioners, along the lines of what the British Medical Association has requested, and that the Government and the Minister should thereby respond to the debate by committing to put into primary legislation a commitment that economic benefits cannot take precedence over public health policy in future trade agreements?

[Mike Hill]

My hon. Friend makes a powerful point with which I agree. The voice of the BMA and other professional bodies is most important and must be heard.

The petition asks for the provision of “concrete safeguards” to keep NHS services out of any future trade deals. That is nothing new; that fight has been ongoing for years, even within the EU. To this very day, those British Members of the European Parliament who care about our NHS are battling to keep NHS services out of the developing Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership between the EU and the USA.

The Government said in response to the petition,

“The UK’s public services are protected by specific exceptions and reservations in EU Free Trade Agreements. As we leave the EU, the UK will continue to ensure that rigorous protections are included in all trade agreements it is party to”,

but that can be only an aspiration. It is not a cast-iron guarantee that the transfer of any EU regulations into UK law will specifically protect the NHS from future trade agreements. Just as the EU found with TTIP, we will need to further regulate for the exclusion of NHS services from trade agreements. Action, not words, needs to be the order of the day. Given that the Government refused in 2016 to exclude the NHS from the TTIP negotiations, that may well turn out to be a tall order.

American healthcare providers can already compete to deliver services in the UK. However, the threat to the NHS of a US trade deal would be through clauses that lock in existing levels of privatisation and prevent future Governments from rolling them back.

[Mike Amesbury (Weaver Vale) (Lab)]

It is clear that the NHS is already for sale. Only recently, the urgent care centre in my constituency was put out to tender. It was recommended that a private, for-profit company should run that facility, which was previously an NHS service. As has been stated, a record £9 billion of contracts have been awarded to the private sector. Does my hon. Friend agree that the form of trade deal we are talking about would lead to privatisation with bells on?

[Mike Hill]

As always, my hon. Friend makes a powerful point. Let us not forget the millions spent compensating private companies that lose contracts and take the Government to court.

Trade deals are not only dangerous for the future of the NHS, as they would entrench privatisation, but undermine our democracy, as future Governments would be shackled by their binding provisions. That is why some say the only way to fully protect our NHS from trade deals is to fully exclude it from them.

[Rachael Maskell]

Does my hon. Friend agree that the riskiest point of entry for privatisation in our NHS is big pharma? Clearly, big pharma will seek to run other services in our NHS. It is essential that any trade deal takes seriously the threat big pharma poses to our NHS, given the service’s extensive drugs bill.

[Mike Hill]

Again, I agree with my hon. Friend and bow to her knowledge. We all know that pharmaceuticals is one of the major gateways to the potential privatisation of NHS services. I say again that the only way to fully protect our NHS from trade deals is to fully exclude it from them. As far as I and, I am sure, the petitioners are concerned, that is precisely what we should do.

[Matt Western (Warwick and Leamington) (Lab)]

Alex Azar, the US Health and Human Services Secretary, has said that Washington will use its muscle to push up drug prices abroad in order to lower the costs paid by patients in the United States. He said on CNBC:

“On the foreign side, we need to, through our trade negotiations and agreements, pressure them.”

Does my hon. Friend agree that we would see prices rise in our NHS?

[Mike Hill]

Undoubtedly, and we would be hostages to fortune. My hon. Friend makes a very important point right at the end of my speech. I reiterate that I believe, as I am confident the petitioners do, that we should fully exclude the NHS from trade deals.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mike Hill]

First, I thank the petitioners for raising this petition and the House of Commons Petitions Committee staff, who put so much effort into advertising the petition in advance of today. I also thank hon. Members for their contributions. I particularly thank my hon. Friend the Member for Warrington South (Faisal Rashid), the hon. Member for South Thanet (Craig Mackinlay), my hon. Friend the Member for Blaydon (Liz Twist), the Front Benchers—the hon. Member for Dundee East (Stewart Hosie) and my hon. Friend the Member for Bradford South (Judith Cummins) —and all those who made interventions.

Our NHS trusts are in deficit and creaking at the seams. NHS leaders are already in the USA, including NHS leaders from my local trust, looking at best practice over there. If the Government’s reassurances are right, the NHS will not be for sale, but as the petitioners rightly say, “Words aren’t enough”. We need the right checks and balances to protect us from trade agreements and marketisation. Ultimately, as hon. Members have said, we need to consider revoking the Health and Social Care Act 2012 in order to protect those services that thus far have not been privatised.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered e-petition 242300 relating to future trade deals and the National Health Service.