Health and Social Care Bill

Pat Glass Excerpts

Tuesday 13th March 2012 Commons Chamber

[John Healey (Wentworth and Dearne) (Lab)]

It is good to follow the hon. Member for Loughborough (Nicky Morgan). Hers was an heroically loyal attempt to fill time on the Government Benches. But she is wrong. The Government have lost the confidence of the NHS to make further changes, and they have lost the trust of the British people to oversee those changes. Why no apology from Ministers? Why no apology to the 1.4 million NHS staff for the last wasted year of chaos, confusion and incompetence? Why no apology to the millions of patients who are starting to see services cut and waiting times get longer? And why no apology to the British people for breaking the promise in the coalition agreement to stop the top-down reorganisations of the NHS that have got in the way of patient care?

[Pat Glass (North West Durham) (Lab)]

I was contacted last week by a constituent of mine, Ruth Murphy, who told me that she had waited more than 40 weeks for an operation that had then been cancelled four times. She asked me if that was what we had to expect from a Tory NHS. That is the kind of thing that my right hon. Friend is referring to.

[John Healey]

Sadly, Ruth Murphy’s experience is more and more common. By the end of last year, the number of people having to wait more than 18 weeks to get into hospital for the operation they needed was up 13% since the previous year.