Health and Care Bill

Munira Wilson Excerpts

Report stage
Tuesday 23rd November 2021 Commons Chamber

[Justin Madders]

We are always looking at ways to improve productivity, but we know that on the current figures there are 100,000 staff vacancies in the NHS. No amount of productivity gains will cover for that.

[Munira Wilson (Twickenham) (LD)]

The hon. Member for North East Bedfordshire (Richard Fuller) talks about efficiency, but the figures show that in 2019-20, some £6.2 billion was spent on bank and agency staff. If we are talking about efficiency and using all the extra money the Government are saying they will put in to catch-up, we need to provide value for money for the taxpayer. Therefore, long-term planning to recruit the right skills is critical.

[Justin Madders]

I thank the hon. Member for her intervention. The point about agencies and locum spend is not a new one. It will be interesting to see the figures for the last 12 to 18 months when the Minister has finally ratified them, because I suspect they will be even higher than those we have heard recently.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jeremy Hunt]

I believe it will. I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for raising that issue, because medical training is relevant to the whole United Kingdom, not just one part of it. I hope the amendment will be beneficial to Northern Ireland as well.

If we put ourselves in the shoes of any frontline doctor, nurse or care worker, we would see that they are all completely realistic that this is not a problem that can be solved by next Monday. It takes a long time to train a doctor or nurse. All they have is one simple request: that they can be confident that we are training enough of them for the future, so that even if no immediate solution is in place, there is a long-term solution. That is the purpose of amendment 10. It simply requires the Government to publish every two years independently verified estimates of the number of people we should be training across health and care.

The Government have recognised the pressures on the NHS by giving generous amounts of extra funding. I commend the Government for doing that, but extra money without extra workforce will not solve the problems that we want to solve. At the moment, the NHS just cannot find the staff.

[Munira Wilson]

I congratulate the right hon. Gentleman on amendment 10 and on how he has built such a coalition of support. Many of the challenges facing those with mental health concerns are because, as he says, there simply is not the workforce—it has hardly grown over the past decade. There are over 16,600 full-time equivalent vacancies and a waiting list of 1.5 million. His amendment, which would require a report every two years, is so important for ministerial accountability because the targets in the five year forward view have not been met, so we have no chance with the 15-year projection.

[Jeremy Hunt]

The hon. Lady gives a good example, because mental health is an area that we have all recently come to realise can be immensely beneficial to ourselves, our families and our constituents. However, while there has been explosive growth in demand, we have not had growth in the supply of people able to look after those with mental health issues. We can only do that with the kind of long-term planning that amendment 10 will make possible.

The royal colleges say that, as of today, there are shortages of 500 obstetricians, 1,400 anaesthetists, 1,900 radiologists, 2,00 A&E consultants, 2,000 GPs, 39,000 nurses and thousands of other allied health professionals. That is why this problem has become so acute.

The Minister has engaged thoughtfully with me on the issue on a number of occasions. He and I both know that there is some concern in the Government about the cost of training additional doctors and nurses. I want to take that concern head on. Yes, the amendment would lead to more doctors, nurses and professionals being trained. Yes, that would cost extra money. Yes, it would save the NHS even more money, because every additional doctor we train is an additional locum we do not need to employ. Locums are not only more expensive for the NHS, but less good for patients. Patients prefer to see the same doctor on every visit if they possibly can, which is much harder with a high number of temporary workers.