National Health Service

Nigel Evans Excerpts

Wednesday 26th October 2011 Commons Chamber

[Rosie Cooper (West Lancashire) (Lab)]

I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Member for Leigh (Andy Burnham) on his appointment as shadow Secretary of State for Health, a brief to which he brings valuable experience. We are going to need every bit of that experience, given what the current Secretary of State is doing to bring the NHS to its knees.

I strongly disagree with my colleague on the Health Committee, the hon. Member for Kingswood (Chris Skidmore). This is not their NHS. This is not your or my NHS. It belongs to the people, all of us. We all have an incredible stake in the NHS. The Secretary of State and the Government play with it, with their reputation and with patients’ needs at their peril. I believe your policy will fundamentally damage the NHS—

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

Order. May I remind the House not to use the word “you”? Members speak through the Chair and should use the third person, please.

[Rosie Cooper]

Forgive me. I have a great propensity to do that. I believe passionately in the NHS and I take this all very personally. I apologise.

The Government’s policy will fundamentally damage the health service in terms of both the quality of care available to patients and the founding principles of the NHS. The more we debate Government health policy, the less the Secretary of State seems to be listening, whether to Opposition Members, medical professionals, patients, patient groups or constituents.

I might go further and say that I now believe the Secretary of State occupies a parallel universe—a universe where everyone wholeheartedly supports his policy and believes him when he says that there is real-terms growth in NHS spending, a universe where waiting times are not increasing, people are not being refused treatments, bed-blocking is not happening because of pressure on the social care system, a universe where he never discussed the issue of re-banding of nurses with the Royal College of Nursing.

Unfortunately, while the Secretary of State, ably supported by the Prime Minister, is off in that parallel universe, which we shall call delusional, the rest of us are left facing the terrifying reality of what the Government’s policy means to our constituents and to the national health service. We must disregard the rhetoric and the myth-making of the Conservative party as it seeks to demonstrate that it has changed when it comes to the NHS. Sadly for the health service, the Conservatives have not changed at all.

I have spoken repeatedly about the Prime Minister’s clear promises to the British people—one was that there would be no more pointless top-down reorganisation. He even said:

“When your family relies on the NHS all the time—day after day, night after night—you know how precious it is”.

How quickly those words were forgotten. Michael Portillo comments on the BBC’s “This Week” spoke volumes. He could not have made it clearer that the Government meant to misrepresent their position and mislead their voters. He said:

“They did not believe they could win if they told you what they were going to do.”

My fear is that their broken promises are leading us headlong into a broken NHS.

There is much I could say about how disgracefully the Government started to change NHS structures without the consent of the people or the House. Because of those broken promises, a failure to secure a clear mandate for the reforms from the British public, and an abject failure to secure support from the clinicians and the medical profession, we are left in the present mess. I hear time and again that the doctors, the nurses and the professionals are all behind the Government. Where are they? They are shouting loud and clear, “We’re not with you.”

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[Rosie Cooper]

I will not.

The point is that even if the Secretary of State was not aware of the re-banding, as he claims, that speaks volumes about how out of touch he is with the hard-working staff he is supposed to represent. Perhaps he would like to remove himself from his parallel universe—

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

Order. I call John Pugh.

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[Stephen Pound]

It has been said—not by me, but by some—that the NHS has almost become the national religion. They say that as Christianity has faded, as it has in some places—not in my constituency, and certainly not in my home—the NHS has become more important. The NHS is the perfect example of what Galbraith called the “gift relationship”, when we look out for one another. We should not constantly look for the bottom line, but instead look to be our brothers’ keepers. That is the principle—

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

Order.

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[Mr Barron]

On a point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker. As you know, I took part in this debate and I asked the Minister a question and requested him to answer it in his winding-up speech. Yet he will not even acknowledge that I spoke in the debate. Is there anything you can do, Mr Deputy Speaker, to help Back Benchers keep the Executive in check?

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

Absolutely nothing. I am sure, however, that the Minister will have heard the point.

[Mr Burns]

Did I hear the right hon. Gentleman’s point, Mr Deputy Speaker? I heard it about three times in Committee and I heard it on Report; I replied each time, as well as writing to the right hon. Gentleman. He does not like the answer, so there is no point in taking the intervention again.

As I was saying, in Yorkshire and the Humber the ambulance service gives PCTs—[Interruption.] I know I have already said it, but there was so much disruption and noise that Labour Members did not hear it. In Yorkshire and the Humber, the ambulance service gives PCTs a monthly list of their top 10 most frequent callers so that they can talk to them and help them in future, saving money and staff time that can be concentrated elsewhere.

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[Mr Burns]

Just as Labour Members are wrong about NHS funding, they are also wrong about the Bill. [Interruption.] The Bill focuses on the most important thing for patients—the outcome of the treatment they need either to cure them or to stabilise their long-term conditions. Doctors, nurses and other health care professionals—[Interruption.]

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

Order. I am finding it difficult to hear the Minister. [Interruption.] Order. He has made it quite clear that he is not giving way.