Covid-19 Vaccine Damage Bill

Peter Bone Excerpts

Friday 10th September 2021 Commons Chamber

[Sir Christopher Chope]

Yes, but perhaps it would be more convenient if I actually read out the answer that we received from the Minister. He said:

“Data on the number of deaths reported of people who have died within one, two and three months of having received a COVID-19 vaccination since 1 January 2021 is not available in the format requested.

Public Health England (PHE) monitors the number of people who have been admitted to hospital and died from COVID-19 who have received one or two doses of the vaccine and will publish this data in due course.”

That data has not yet been published. It is very important that we are able to put this issue into context. There is a lot more damage being done to our citizens as a result of covid-19 vaccinations than in any other vaccination programme in history. That does not mean to say that it is not worth while, and I am certainly not an anti-vaxxer or anything like that, but what is important is that, if people do the right thing, they should not be denied access to compensation.

[Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is making a very strong case. Does he agree that we do not want to send a message from this House that vaccines are a bad thing? Vaccines are right and we should be vaccinated. Equally, on the rare occasion when it goes wrong, is it not right that compensation is made available—on those very rare occasions?

[Sir Christopher Chope]

That is exactly my point and I am grateful to my hon. Friend for summarising it so succinctly and accurately. That is where the Government come into this. Unfortunately, I know that the Minister will not have much time, if any, in which to expand on this issue today. I hope that he will be willing to arrange for me to be able to come along with one or two colleagues to talk to Ministers about this very important issues.

Kettering General Hospital

Peter Bone Excerpts

Friday 10th September 2021 Commons Chamber

[Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)]

It is a delight to see you in the Chair, Madam Deputy Speaker. I thank Mr Speaker for granting me this debate, and I welcome the hospitals Minister and my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone) to their places. My hon. Friend the Member for Corby (Tom Pursglove) would be here, but other engagements sadly prevent him from being here. I thank all staff at Kettering General Hospital, who always perform magnificently but have done so especially over the pandemic period, and in particular Simon Weldon, the magnificent group chief executive.

I commend and thank the Minister for his personal interest over a number of years in this important issue. He visited the hospital on 7 October 2019. He responded to an Adjournment debate that same month, when he outlined plans for a £46 million investment in the new urgent care hub. He also responded to the last Adjournment debate, on 8 June earlier this year, and met the hospital and the three local MPs in February. May I also thank the Prime Minister, who undertook a five-hour nightshift visit to the hospital in February last year?

I welcome the Government’s unprecedented investment in the NHS and their commitment to the national hospital building programme. This has resulted in promised commitments to Kettering hospital of £46 million for an on-site urgent care hub, £350 million in health infrastructure plan 2 funding for 2025 to 2030, and a write-off last year of £167 million of trust debt at the hospital. That is a total investment of a staggering £563 million in Kettering hospital, which is a record-breaking figure. However, the Minister will appreciate that promises are one thing but delivery is another. The problem that the hospital faces is that these two funding streams from the Government—£46 million for the urgent care hub and £350 million for the phased rebuild—are not being meshed together by the Health Department and Her Majesty’s Treasury.

In a way, the problem is a nice one to have. Kettering hospital has successfully won access to these separate funding streams. To explain in a bit more detail, this is £46 million of STP—sustainability and transformation partnership—wave 4 capital, to be spent by 2024, to build a new on-site urgent care hub to replace and enhance one of the most overcrowded accident and emergencies in the country, and £350 million of HIP2 funding, for the period 2025 to 2030, for a phased rebuild of the hospital on the existing site, as one of the 40 designated hospitals in the national hospital programme.

[Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)]

I am grateful for my hon. Friend’s persistence on the issue of Kettering General Hospital, which serves my constituency as well. I had to go to Kettering General Hospital A&E with my son last week, and I can only confirm exactly what my hon. Friend says. It needs to be completely—well, knocked down, really, and a new A&E built. Because we had the Corby urgent care centre, I could go there and then to Kettering hospital, which helped. He will have an urgent care centre at Kettering, and I hope in due course that we will have the same thing in Wellingborough.

[Mr Hollobone]

I am sorry to hear about my hon. Friend’s recent visit to the hospital, but I hope he is better now—he certainly looks fighting fit.

The problem that we face at the hospital is twofold. If the hospital goes ahead and builds the £46 million urgent care hub as a stand-alone project, there will not be enough room on site for the future HIP2 works and the hospital will effectively be ruling itself out of the much-heralded national hospital rebuild programme. On the other hand, if the hospital delays the £46 million urgent care hub development until the start of the HIP2 programme in 2025, it will lose the £46 million funding allocation, which expires in 2024, and the urgent care hub will not be built.

If there is a delay to the funding, the biggest headache may well be the failure of the existing, very high-risk, old steam boilers at the hospital site. This is the main thing that keeps the hospital chief executive awake at night. Part of the extra money that is being requested as part of the advance from the HIP2 funding is for a new net zero on-site power plant, so that the old boilers can be replaced and the power systems needed for the HIP2 programme installed. The value-for-money solution is to dovetail the two funding streams by advancing 15%, or £53 million, of the hospital’s already allocated £350 million funding over three years—£6 million in 2021-22, £29 million in 2022-23 and £18 million in 2023-24—and blending it with the £46 million urgent care hub funding.

I wish to make it clear to the Minister that we are not asking for more money; we are asking for an advance of just 15%—£53 million—of the £350 million of HIP2 funding already allocated to the hospital, so as to facilitate a value-for-money start to the hospital’s promised redevelopment.

I have five main asks of the Minister. First, will he confirm that the £46 million STP allocation for the urgent care hub can be combined with the new hospital programme funding scheme to create a single development scheme that can proceed to an outline business case on that basis?

Secondly, will the Minister confirm that the £46 million allocated to the hospital can be used to progress early enabling works that are essential to meeting its delivery timescales?

Thirdly, may we have an early advance of £53 million, spread over the next three years, from the £350 million HIP2 commitment, so that the urgent care hub can be built not as a stand-alone project but as the initial part of the phased hospital redevelopment?

Fourthly, will the Minister confirm that, when delays occur in other larger hospital-rebuilding programmes throughout the country, he will look to create an opportunity for Kettering to receive some of the money to move beyond enabling works before 2025?

Fifthly, will the Minister be kind enough to visit the hospital again? It is two years since his last visit. Kettering General Hospital is only 30 miles from Charnwood, straight down the A6. If he is kind enough to visit, I would be keen to show him the boilers in the power plant, which is a critical part of the required new infrastructure.

Those five asks are not about asking for extra money over and above that which has already been promised; instead, they outline a sensible, flexible, dovetailed approach to funding commitments already given so as to maximise value for money for the taxpayer and ensure that local people get to see as soon as possible the badly needed improvements to our local hospital that we have already been promised. Simply put, the problem is that building the promised urgent care hub is no longer an option on a stand-alone basis, because if it is built as stand-alone project, there will not be enough room on the site for the subsequent HIP2-funding works. The value-for-money solution is to integrate the two funding schemes.

The Minister will know, but I will repeat, that the hospital is ready to go on this work. It owns all the land, so no land deals are required and no extra public consultation is needed. It has written, confirmed support from local planners and the regional NHS. The phased approach would deliver visible and real benefits. It is shovel-ready and has far lower risks than many other hospital-build projects. In developing a whole-site plan that integrates the two funding streams, the hospital has identified the best way of delivering value for money and getting the buildings up, operating and serving local people as quickly as possible.

Kettering General Hospital is unique among the 40 designated hospital rebuilds scheduled to be completed by 2030. First, it already has the Government commitment for a new £46 million urgent care hub, so its future funding is complicated as it comes from two separate funding pipelines; secondly, it is ready to go with an innovative, phased, value-for-money rebuild on land that it already owns, with no planning or consultative hold-ups; thirdly, it serves one of the fastest-growing areas in the whole country; and fourthly, it has one of the most congested A&Es of any hospital—as my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough recently experienced—and this needs to be addressed as a matter of urgency. I do not believe that any other hospital in the whole country has such a unique set of circumstances.

Why are improvements at the hospital needed? Kettering General Hospital is a much-loved local hospital. With 500 beds, it has been on its current site, in the heart of the town of Kettering, since 1897—that is 124 years. Most of the residents in the parliamentary seats of Kettering, Corby and Wellingborough were either born there, have been repaired there or, very sadly, have passed away there. There can be few local residents who have not accessed the hospital at some point in their lives. It also has a superb, dedicated, talented and loyal workforce.

The pressure on the hospital is primarily being driven by the very fast population growth locally. The Office for National Statistics shows that we are one of the fastest growing areas in the whole country, at almost double the national average. Kettering ranks sixth for growth in the number of households and 31st for population increase, Corby has the country’s highest birth rate and Kettering Hospital expects a 21% increase in over 80s in the next five years alone.

The area has committed to at least 35,000 new houses over the next 10 years, which is a local population rise of some 84,000 to almost 400,000 people. The A&E now sees up to 300 patients every single day, in a department that is sized to see just 110 safely. Over the next 10 years, the hospital expects the number of A&E attendances to increase by 30,000, equivalent to almost 80 extra patients every day. That is why the improvements are so desperately needed.

The big problem at Kettering Hospital is that the A&E is full. It was constructed in 1994 to cope with 45,000 attendances each year. Now, it is already at about 100,000 attendances a year, which is well over 150% of its capacity. By 2045, 170,000 attendances are expected.

The solution, which everyone agrees, including the Government, is for a new urgent care hub facility, costing £46 million. It would be a two-storey, one-stop shop, with GP services, out-of-hours care, an on-site pharmacy, minor injuries unit, social services, mental healthcare, access to community care services for the frail elderly and a replacement for the A&E. All the NHS organisations locally, as well as NHS Improvement nationally, agree that this is the No. 1 clinical priority for Northamptonshire.

I am glad that the Government have recognised the hospital’s superb business case for this fit-for-purpose emergency care facility, and that it will meet local population growth for the next 30 years. All the local health and social care partners have been involved in its design, and local people need it to get the local urgent care service that meets Government guidance on good practice. When built, the facility will ensure that people who come to the hospital are seen by the right clinician at the right time, first time.

I also warmly welcome the Government’s inclusion of the hospital on the list of 40 hospitals in the national hospital rebuilding programme, and the funding kicks in from 2025. That is important for Kettering Hospital because 70% of the buildings on the main site are more than 30 years old, there is a maintenance backlog of £42 million and 60% of the hospital estate is rated as either poor or bad.

The hospital plan for the redevelopment of the site, as part of the HIP2 programme, offers a phased approach over a number of years, with the extra ward space provided by the funding to be built on top of the urgent care hub. This is in contrast to a number of other hospitals in the HIP2 programme that are seeking an all-in-one-go funding package.

Kettering Hospital is not asking for its HIP2 allocation in an up-front £350 million, all-in-one-go lump sum; instead, it is seeking a modular, annual funding requirement for what would be a phased and, crucially, value-for-money rebuild up to 2030. Out of the £3.7 billion national hospital rebuild programme, just £6 million would be needed this year for Kettering Hospital to get the project started, and just £29 million would be needed next year.

I know Her Majesty’s Treasury is currently completing a commercial strategy for all the hospital rebuilds, so as to standardise hospital redesign, to secure key commercial efficiencies in procurement and to address digital and sustainability requirements. Kettering Hospital is 100% committed to these Treasury objectives. Value for money is extremely important in delivering the hospital rebuild programme across the country, and if Kettering Hospital’s innovative and sensible approach could be matched with sufficient flexibility from the Government in applying the relevant funding streams from the Department of Health and Social Care and Her Majesty’s Treasury, it would be an exemplar hospital redevelopment that others could follow.

I urge the Government, both the Department of Health and Social Care and Her Majesty’s Treasury, to do the sensible thing and dovetail together the two presently separate funding streams for Kettering Hospital not only to optimise value for money for the taxpayer but to deliver sooner, rather than later, the urgent improvement of Kettering General Hospital that all local residents need, wish and deserve to see.

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[Edward Argar]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend. This is a challenging programme, and each of the 40 hospitals and their respective representative Members of Parliament argue their case hard, as do their chief executives. He is right to highlight the work of Natalie Forrest, the senior responsible officer for this project, in managing expectations and working collaboratively and openly with hospital trusts—including that of my hon. Friend—to try to achieve the right outcome for the taxpayer and the Exchequer, and for his constituents and others around the country.

[Mr Bone]

I know this looks like a constituency debate, but is it not actually a litmus test for the new policy? The announcement of £36 billion and a new tax to be put into the health service is great, if we get the outcomes right. As I consider how to vote on Tuesday, it would be helpful if I knew that this programme had been agreed for Kettering General Hospital.

[Edward Argar]

My hon. Friend tempts me to stray not only into the territory of my right hon. Friend the Chancellor but, possibly even more dangerously, into the territory of my right hon. Friend the Government Chief Whip. As ever, he makes his point courteously but firmly.

My hon. Friend the Member for Kettering posed two remaining questions. If there are delays in the profiling of other projects, would we be willing to consider whether there was an opportunity to move unspent money in a financial year to Kettering, or to other projects that could move ahead? I have spoken with Natalie Forrest, and we are keen to have that flexibility. He asked about a request for further money—this refers to my hon. Friend’s third question, and is the one area where I will have slightly to defer to ongoing discussions and the spending review. As he will appreciate, although £3.7 billion has already been allocated, the overall programme will be more than that across the 40 hospitals. That is subject to the spending review, and as he will appreciate, the Treasury sets annual caps on how much can be drawn down in order to manage public expenditure. To answer my hon. Friend’s fourth question, that is where, if we have an underspend against allocations in year, we will have in mind those projects that are ready and willing to go a bit faster if they are able. I take his representations in that respect as a request for his hospital to be considered in that category.

In the few minutes before you call me to order at the end of the sitting, Madam Deputy Speaker, let me return briefly to the ongoing conversation with Simon Weldon and the hospital trust. As a result of the letter we sent and the willingness to be flexible about using the money for enabling works more broadly to maximise benefits from a synergistic scheme, the urgent care hub will now be part of that first stage, obviously utilising the expertise of the hospital trust to see how the money can be spent most effectively .

In conclusion, I once again pay a fulsome tribute to my hon. Friend and his work to support the redevelopment of Kettering General Hospital. As I suspect his constituents know—certainly his election results demonstrate they do—they are extremely lucky to have such a persistent, hardworking and passionate Member of Parliament representing them in this place, as indeed are the residents of Wellingborough and Corby. At times my hon. Friends perhaps leave a few scars on the backs of Ministers on behalf of their constituents, but that is what this House and our representative democracy are here for.

I am delighted we have managed to make progress in addressing the alignment of the urgent care hub and new hospital programme funding streams. I look forward to continuing to work with my hon. Friend the Member for Kettering to ensure that this ambitious and innovative approach to building new hospitals—a common national approach—is a success, not only in Kettering but across the country. I particularly look forward to visiting my hon. Friend in Kettering, and perhaps in another two years we can hold a debate to celebrate the scheme’s significant progress on the ground.

Question put and agreed to.

Covid-19 Update

Peter Bone Excerpts

Monday 6th September 2021 Commons Chamber

[Nadhim Zahawi]

I am grateful to you, Madam Deputy Speaker, and to my hon. Friend for his question. I guess the reason for the shift by the end of September, when all 18-year-olds will have had the opportunity to get two jabs, is that testing provides a limited protective assurance and allows for the potential for self-testing fraud. The effectiveness of testing-based certification can also be undermined by a single incursion into a setting. Transmission, serious illness and hospitalisation are reduced using vaccination-based certification, even with incursions, so that is the thinking behind this. I reiterate that nobody does this lightly. We do not curtail people’s freedoms lightly; this is purely so that we can keep industries and sectors open and not have to close them down again if there is a super-spreader event.

[Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)]

I thank the excellent Minister for coming to the Dispatch Box. When are we going to get the debate and the vote on vaccine passports?

[Nadhim Zahawi]

Shortly.

NHS Update

Peter Bone Excerpts

Wednesday 21st July 2021 Commons Chamber

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

Finally, we go by video link to Peter Bone.

[Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con) [V]]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker; we much appreciate you extending this session.

Before any major change is made in the NHS, there is a full impact assessment done to see how it affects wider society. Would the Care Minister be able to say when last week, when the statutory instrument on compulsory vaccination of care staff was put before the House, she had the opportunity to read the SI, the explanatory notes and the full impact assessment? If there was no full impact assessment, why did the Government proceed in laying it before Parliament?

[Helen Whately]

I was asked about this at the time and during the debate, and I did apologise for the fact that there was an error in the explanatory notes. We have since published an impact statement, and a full impact assessment is going through the formal approval process.

Covid-19 Update

Peter Bone Excerpts

Monday 19th July 2021 Commons Chamber

[Nadhim Zahawi]

I am grateful for the hon. Lady’s question. On the PCR testing capacity, it is 600,000 per day. I looked at the data this morning for yesterday, and I think just about half of that was being utilised—300,000-odd tests. Of course, that does not include the millions of lateral flow tests that we are also capable of delivering.

[Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con) [V]]

Last Tuesday, the House passed a statutory instrument making it compulsory for care home staff to be vaccinated. The last time compulsory vaccination occurred was in the 19th century. I was slightly confused by what the excellent Minister said in his statement, so could he confirm that a full impact assessment was completed before this contentious legislation came to the Floor of the House and that he saw that assessment before signing off on the policy? After all, this was a major change in Government policy.

[Nadhim Zahawi]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his excellent question. As I mentioned in my statement, an impact statement has been published today, and a full impact assessment will be made. Just to bring it to life for him, to reassure him and the House, I can say that Barchester Healthcare, one of the providers, has about 16,000 employees, so it is quite a large sample to look at, and it has implemented this policy early. When it consulted its workforce on the duty of deployment, it managed successfully to get the workforce to be vaccinated —they were on a priority list in phase 1 of the vaccination programme—and only 78 out of the workforce of 16,000, or about 0.5%, actually chose not to and no longer work for Barchester Healthcare. I hope that gives him some reassurance that we look at this data very carefully.

Coronavirus

Peter Bone Excerpts

Wednesday 16th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Matt Hancock]

I am happy to look at other life events, although not for the regulations that are before the House today, which are not open to amendment. I am happy to discuss other life events with my hon. Friend.

Let me turn to two other points before I close. First, let us look at the motion tabled by my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House. The House has been determined to ensure that, even in the worst clutches of the pandemic, we have found a way that democracy can function and this House can perform its vital functions. Like everyone here, I miss the bustle and clamour of the Chamber when it is full. I cannot wait for the moment when we can all cram once more into our cockpit of democracy.

Just as we have extended other regulations, we propose extending the hybrid arrangements for the House until the House rises for summer recess on 22 July.

[Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)]

Will the Secretary of State give way on that point?

[Matt Hancock]

Yes, in a moment.

This will allow for proxy voting to continue along with virtual participation. Crucially, the regulations on the hybrid arrangements fall this summer recess, so when we return in September, we are confident that we can return in full, cheek by jowl once more. I do not know about you, Mr Deputy Speaker—nor, indeed, my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone)—but I cannot wait.

[Mr Bone]

I want to help my right hon. Friend. He cannot wait, so why wait? Why not make this House a pilot, to see what happens? We have the testing facilities, so let us make it a pilot. Say that now, Secretary of State.

[Matt Hancock]

I would dearly love that, and I will talk to my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House, who, as I well know, is an enthusiast. I would love it if we could make that so—let us see.

Finally, I want to tell the House about the results of our consultation on vaccination as a condition of deployment in care homes. After careful consultation, we have decided to take this proposal forward, to protect residents. The vast majority of staff in care homes are already vaccinated, but not all of them are. We know that the vaccine protects not only you, but those around you. Therefore we will be taking forward the measures to ensure the “mandation” as a condition of deployment for staff in care homes, and we will consult on the same approach in the NHS, in order to save lives and protect patients from disease.

--- Later in debate ---

[Simon Fell]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. I am making the judgment based on my local knowledge and that of my director of public health, but we all have to make that decision in this place today.

We cannot afford for schools to close again, for young people to miss any more of their lives, or for any of our businesses to close as a result of further impositions, so it has to be one more heave, to protect more people, and then we have to accept that, in the face of a virus that we are not going to get rid of, and which will continue to mutate and challenge us while we are on this Earth, we must vaccinate as many people as possible and then give people back their freedom.

There is a more fundamental issue at play here—public acceptance. We made a delicate compact with people over the last year. We restricted their liberties to keep them safe, and already we are seeing compliance with that law beginning to fray. We must accept that people expected their liberty to return as vaccinations were rolled out, but as we vaccinate more, acceptance of that compromise falls. If we cannot maintain that compact, our response to it has to change.

So I hope and expect that after this final surge of vaccinations, we will return on 19 July to a society where people are able to make their own choices. It is easy to sloganise about freedom. I, for one, am deeply uncomfortable about living in a country where we dictate to newly married couples whether they can cut their wedding cake or not.

I believe that this Government have acted honourably and with good intentions throughout this horrible pandemic, so I am giving them my support tonight for one last heave to finish the job, and then we must return all of our freedoms on 19 July.

[Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)]

On a point of order, Mr Deputy Speaker. I wonder whether you could help me in regard to social distancing. There is not a single Labour Member on the Opposition Benches. There are no SNP; there are no Liberal Democrats; there are no Plaid Cymru. Of course there are the DUP. Would it be appropriate, because the Conservative Benches are packed, for half of us to move over to the other side of the House to improve social distancing?

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

I think, Peter Bone, if you look around, even on the Conservative Benches there are a few green ticks, so please stay where you are. I call Jim Shannon.

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[Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)]

It is a great pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Bexhill and Battle (Huw Merriman). Like him, I have followed a journey of sometimes voting with the Government on these restrictions and sometimes voting against. It is unusual to be able to say that I agree with the previous speaker, because the previous speaker is nearly always from the Opposition, but, of the 51 speakers in this debate, only five are Labour Back Benchers. This is one of our most important debates. It is about the freedom and liberty of the British people.

[Sammy Wilson]

Does the hon. Gentleman find rather odd not only the absence of Opposition Members, but the fact that the Government are comfortable about getting the restrictions through only because they have the support of the Labour party, and yet most Labour Members who have spoken today have condemned the Government for their actions?

[Mr Bone]

I could not agree more with the right hon. Gentleman—may I call him my right hon. Friend from across the aisle? He has, of course, been here for the whole debate.

This debate is about the liberty of the British people. We are taking away something that is our right. For instance, I am due to go to a wedding, but I cannot have a group of friends round to my house beforehand because there would be too many of us. When I get to church, I cannot sing. I cannot sing anyway, but I am not allowed to sing. Then I cannot dance at the wedding—[Interruption.] I cannot dance, either. More importantly, as the evening drags out, I cannot then go to a nightclub to boogie the night away in celebration. The following day, I cannot go for a park run to run all these problems off, so I might need to call a doctor, but I cannot go and see a doctor because they will not do face-to-face appointments. This is withdrawing our very liberty.

I am a great fan of the Prime Minister, and I think most Conservative Members are. He came to lead the Conservative party at the end of the Bercow Parliament, when Parliament was in chaos. He took us through a general election, he won a mandate, he delivered Brexit, he dealt with the awful covid pandemic and he has led the world with the vaccine programme, yet tonight, unfortunately, I cannot support him. I think every Member has to put their country first, their constituency second and their party third. On very many—indeed, most—occasions, all those three are in line, but this time I do not think the Government have made the case for putting off unlocking.

With apologies to Mark Twain, there are lies, damned lies and covid statistics, and the Government have been using an extraordinary propaganda machine to take certain statistics to try to prove their case, but if we look at other statistics, we can see that the total number of deaths at the moment is running below the five-year average. My hon. Friend the Member for Bexhill and Battle said that he had very few cases in his area. In Northamptonshire, thankfully, our two hospitals have zero covid patients and we have not had a death due to covid for five weeks. The Government made their own original forecasts for what would happen on 17 May when we did the major unlocking, but we have done better than their best prediction of the situation, so why have we now gone into this doom and gloom?

I have no doubt that if we were in opposition, our Benches would now be packed and there would be this blond guy, fairly chubby and a bit scruffy—well, as scruffy as me—jumping up and down and making the case for getting rid of these restrictions. I know it is a balance and I know people have to make a choice, but we, as Conservatives, believe in personal responsibility and common sense. Going back to my original example, of course I would not go into a busy nightclub, and of course I would not have 100 friends round, but that would be my decision, not the decision of the state. So unfortunately, as much as I like the Prime Minister, I think he has got this wrong, and I will vote against the regulations tonight.

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[Tim Loughton (East Worthing and Shoreham) (Con)]

Happy Sussex day, Madam Deputy Speaker. Like every good, horny-handed son and daughter of Sussex, I am afraid I “wunt be druv” into the Government Lobby this evening.

The hashtag #i’mdone was the overwhelming message on social media on Monday when independence day, so tantalisingly close, was again cruelly whipped away from my constituents. Madam Deputy Speaker, I’m done with making excuses to my constituents about when their lives might get back to some degree of normality.

We are constantly told that these decisions are about data, not dates—quite right—but we have the imminent dates by which the vaccination programme will have achieved effective herd immunity, which is well ahead of what was imagined when the lockdown road map was designed. Now, 80% of adults have had their first dose. We have data showing that the Pfizer vaccine is 96% effective against the delta variant after two doses, and that the AstraZeneca vaccine is 92% effective. We have data showing an average of nine deaths a day at the moment, and 136 hospitalisations—a world away from where we were at the start of the road map. We have data from Public Health England that only 3% of the delta variant cases have received two vaccinations.

We also have dodgy data from three modelling studies by the University of Warwick, Imperial College, and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. They show widely different scenarios, with the most pessimistic warning that the UK could experience a further 203,000 deaths by next June, which is around 50,000 more than the first and second waves combined. Yet how can that be when we know the vaccine works, and the data show a likely 90% take-up rate?

Those doomsday models by largely anonymous wonks with no remit for considering the impact of further lockdown on life at large seem to trump all the other data, and the Government put them on a pedestal above all others. They are confusing modelling for scientific forecasts.

[Mr Bone]

Is my hon. Friend saying that the scientists are concentrating on one thing and ignoring everything else?

[Tim Loughton]

The trouble is that there are lots of different scientists and they do not agree with each other, yet only certain scientists seem to have an impact on the Government. Usually, it is the most doomsday of those scenarios.

Where is the data that shows that allowing six people inside a pub has increased infection rates, and by how much? Where is the data that shows how much faster an infection has spread because up to 30 people have been able to meet outside since the original journey out of lockdown? Where is the data showing that the NHS is being overwhelmed, not by covid patients, but by a huge increase in children and families suffering mental illness, including many worrying episodes that we have seen as constituency MPs, or by the surge in advanced cancer cases that could not be diagnosed and treated early? Where is the data showing how many businesses, particularly in the hospitality sector, cannot wait a further four weeks to be profitable and are likely now to fail, with the accompanying impact on people’s jobs, livelihoods and wellbeing? Where is the data showing the impact on the wellbeing of children now denied sports days for another year and school proms? Students are again being denied graduation ceremonies for a second year, having missed out on so much of their university experience. Where is the data on the impact of domestic abuse, which has risen so much, as we have seen? Where is the data showing the continued impact on babies? The problem is that the only data considered seems exclusively to be the worst-case scenarios about the spread of covid, regardless of the current single-figure average death rates.

No covid strategy is risk-free, but a further delay is by no means a victimless decision. It is time that we trusted people to live with covid just, as the Prime Minister announced in February, in the same way that we “live with flu”: we do not let flu get in the way of living our lives. The Government promised at that stage that we would move to personal responsibility. My fear is that if the Government continue to try to nanny people, they will just not take any notice and no amount of retained rules will make any difference. People are already increasingly making their own risk assessments. As somebody tweeted the other day:

“I had Covid. I have antibodies. I have had both jabs. I’ve worn a mask. I’ve sanitised to within an inch of my life… But now, #ImDone no more. It's over.”

My fear is that this will become a much more widely held view if the Government just keep delaying freedom day, without the evidence to back it up.

Covid-19 Update

Peter Bone Excerpts

Monday 14th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Matt Hancock]

I will ensure that the precise Cabinet Office guidance reaches my right hon. Friend’s mobile phone as soon as possible. I am now an hour and five minutes into this, and I am afraid I am going to have to get back to him on that one.

[Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)]

I am sure, Mr Speaker, that the Secretary of State for Health heard what you said at the beginning of this statement. May I ask the Secretary of State how we got ourselves into this position? He has been very good at coming to the House and making statements on covid, but on the biggest, most important day, the press were given an embargoed statement at 3 o’clock and the Prime Minister had a big showy press conference at 6, yet he could not be bothered to turn up until 8.30. This is a clear breach of the ministerial code. How did it happen? Who thought it was a good idea, and who actually broke the ministerial code?

[Matt Hancock]

All I can say, Mr Speaker, is that I am here now answering questions and I am happy to stay for as long as you need me.

Oral Answers to Questions

Peter Bone Excerpts

Tuesday 8th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Jo Churchill]

The positivity rates were three times higher from Pakistan than they were from India when we made that decision. As the hon. Gentleman knows, we keep these things under constant review and we would be equally lambasted if decisions were made before we had the correct information. Acting when we have the right information on variants of concern is an important thing; we will keep following the data.

[Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)]

What recent assessment he has made of the progress of the construction of new hospitals.

[The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Matt Hancock)]

In October, the Prime Minister confirmed a £3.7 billion funding allocation over the next four years to support the delivery of 40 new hospitals by 2030, and I am delighted that that includes Kettering General Hospital. We have since confirmed that there will be 48 new hospitals built by 2030, and six of those projects are under way.

[Mr Bone]

I am delighted that one of the new Boris hospitals will be built on the site of Kettering General, starting with an accident and emergency department and with the whole hospital being finished by 2027. Unfortunately, there may well be a substantial delay to that because of red tape and bureaucracy. Will the Secretary of State use his great skills, bang some heads together, and get the pen-pushers and accountants to sort out the delay so that we can get on with this? Will he be kind enough to meet the three hon. Members who represent north Northamptonshire to discuss the issue?

[Matt Hancock]

Nothing gives me greater pleasure than making stuff happen, so I would be very happy to meet my hon. Friend and the nearby colleagues who represent the people served by Kettering General Hospital to make sure we can get this project moving as soon as we can.

Kettering General Hospital

Peter Bone Excerpts

Tuesday 8th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)]

What a joy it is to see you in the Chair, Madam Deputy Speaker; thank you for staying for the Adjournment. I thank Mr Speaker for granting me this debate and welcome the Minister to his place. I also welcome my hon. Friend the Member for Corby (Tom Pursglove), who is a superb representative for his constituents, but who unfortunately, as he holds the high office of the Government Whip, is not allowed to speak in this place. I also thank all the staff at Kettering General Hospital, in particular Simon Weldon, the superb group chief executive, and Polly Grimmett, the director of strategy.

I thank the Minister for the personal interest that he has shown over a long period in Kettering General Hospital. He visited the hospital on 7 October 2019. He responded to an Adjournment debate on the hospital on 23 October 2019, when he announced £46 million of new funding for the proposed urgent care hub, and on 3 February this year he met with the hospital and my hon. Friends the Members for Wellingborough (Mr Bone) —who I welcome to his place—and for Corby. I would also like to thank the Prime Minister, who spent five hours on a night shift at Kettering General Hospital in February 2020.

I welcome the Government’s unprecedented investment in the NHS and their commitment to the hospital building programme, which has resulted in promised commitments to the hospital of £46 million for a new on-site urgent care hub, £350 million in health infrastructure plan 2 funding for 2025 to 2030, and a write-off last year of £167 million of trust debt at the hospital. However, promises are one thing and delivery is another. The problem that the hospital faces is that these two funding streams from the Government—£46 million for the urgent care hub and £350 million for the phased rebuild—are not being meshed together by the Health Department and HM Treasury. The danger is that, as a result, the promised investment in the hospital faces potentially serious delays.

The dilemma is this: if the hospital proceeds with the £46 million urgent care hub build as a stand-alone project, there will not be room on the site for the HIP2—health infrastructure plan 2—development post 2025. On the other hand, if the hospital waits for the HIP2 funding, it will lose its £46 million urgent care hub funding commitment, and the urgent replacement for the hospital’s overcrowded A&E may never happen.

I have four main asks of the Health Department and HM Treasury: first, permission for the hospital to draw down on the £46 million urgent care hub funding commitment so that work can start on the initial works required for the project; secondly, permission for the hospital to proceed with the preparation of its outline business case for the HIP2 investment expected after 2025; thirdly, an early advance of £52 million, spread over the next three years, from the £350m HIP2 commitment, so that the urgent care hub can be built not as a stand-alone project, but as the initial part of the phased hospital redevelopment; and, fourthly, that the Secretary of State for Health honours his welcome commitment made on the Floor of the House earlier today, in response to a question of my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough (Mr Bone), to meet the three hon. Members for north Northamptonshire to get the issues sorted out. The Secretary of State said: “Nothing gives me greater pleasure than making stuff happen, so I would be very happy to meet…to make sure we can get this project moving as soon as we can.”

Those four asks are not about asking for extra money over and above that which has already been promised. Instead, they outline a sensible, flexible and dovetailed approach to already given funding commitments, so as to maximise value for money for the taxpayer while also ensuring that local people get to see as soon as possible the badly needed improvements to our local hospital, which we have already been promised. Simply put, the problem is this: building the promised urgent care hub is no longer an option on a stand-alone basis. If it is built as a stand-alone project, there would not be enough room on the site for the subsequent HIP2 funding, so the value-for-money solution is to integrate the two funding streams.

Kettering General Hospital is ready to go. It owns the land, so no land deals are required, and no extra public consultation is needed. It has written support from local planners and the regional NHS. It is a phased approach that would deliver visible and real benefits. It is shovel ready and has far lower risks than other hospital build projects. In developing this whole-site plan—integrating the urgent care hub and HIP2 funding streams—the hospital has identified the best way of delivering value for money to get the buildings up and operating, serving local people.

Kettering hospital is unique among the 40 designated hospital rebuilds scheduled to be completed by 2030. First, it already has a Government commitment for a new £46 million urgent care hub. Therefore, its future funding is complicated as it comes from two separate funding pipelines. Secondly, it is ready to go, with an innovative, phased and value-for-money rebuild on land that it already owns, with no planning or consultative hold-ups. Thirdly, it serves one of the fastest growing areas in the whole country. Fourthly, it has one of the most congested A&Es of any hospital in the land, which needs addressing as a matter of urgency. I do not believe that any other hospital in the country has that unique set of circumstances.

[Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend recall that this project in effect started before my hon. Friend the Member for Corby (Tom Pursglove) was elected in 2015? It has widespread cross-party support. If this were a business, without doubt a pre-payment would be made, because it would save money in the end and get things done. Are we just caught in a silo, with the Treasury here and the health service there? They must somehow mesh together.

[Mr Hollobone]

My hon. Friend is quite right. This is not a difficult problem to solve. It requires a political solution and it requires a decision by Health and Treasury Ministers acting together.

Kettering General Hospital is a much loved local hospital. With 500 beds, it has been on its present site in the heart of the town of Kettering since 1897—that is 124 years. There cannot be many hospitals that have such a record. Most of the residents in the parliamentary constituencies of Kettering, Corby and Wellingborough were born there—as my hon. Friend the Member for Corby was—have been repaired there or, sadly, passed away there. There can be very few local residents who have not accessed the hospital at some point during their lives. It also has a fantastically dedicated, talented and loyal workforce.

The pressure on the hospital is being driven primarily by very fast local population growth. The Office for National Statistics has shown that we are one of the fastest growing areas in the whole country, at almost double the national average. The borough of Corby is the fastest growing borough outside London. In the last census, out of 348 districts across the country, Kettering was No. 6 for growth in the number of households and 31st for population increase, while Corby has the country’s highest birth rate.

Kettering General Hospital expects a 21% increase in over-80s in the next five years alone. The area is committed to at least 35,000 new houses over the next 10 years. That means a local population rise of some 84,000 to almost 400,000 people. The A&E department, which is sized to see 110 people a day safely, now sees up to 300 patients every single day. Every day, 90 patients are admitted to the in-patient wards from A&E, and the hospital expects the number of A&E attendances to increase by 30,000 over the next 10 years, which is equivalent to almost 80 extra patients every day. That is why the promised improvements are desperately needed.

The big problem at Kettering General Hospital is that the A&E department is full. It was constructed in 1994 to cope with 45,000 attendances each year. It now has around 100,000 attendances a year, which is well over 150% of the department’s capacity, and by 2045, 170,000 attendances are expected at the same site. The solution to that pressure is for an urgent care hub facility, costing £46 million, to be constructed on the site. It would be a two-storey, one-stop shop with GP services, out-of-hours care, an on-site pharmacy, a minor injuries unit, facilities for social services and mental health care, access to community care services for the frail elderly, and a replacement for our A&E department. All the NHS organisations in Northamptonshire, as well as NHS Improvement regionally, agree that that is the No. 1 clinical priority for Northamptonshire.

The A&E department at the hospital was visited five years ago by Dr Kevin Reynard of the national NHS emergency care improvement programme. He said:

“The current emergency department is the most cramped and limited emergency department I have ever come across in the UK, USA, Australia or India. I cannot see how the team, irrespective of crowding, can deliver a safe, modern emergency medicine service within the current footprint.”

I am glad that the Government have recognised the hospital’s superb business case for this fit-for-purpose emergency care facility that will meet local population growth for the next 30 years. It has been developed with all the health and social care partners across the county so that patients can get a local urgent care service that meets all the Government guidance on good practice, ensuring both that they can get the care that they need to keep them safely outside hospital if necessary, and that if they come into hospital, they are seen by the right clinician at the right time and first time.

In announcing the award of £46 million for the new urgent care hub in the debate on 23 October 2019, the Minister said:

“My officials and NHS England will be in touch with the trust to discuss further details, in order to ensure that funds are released and that work starts on the project as swiftly as possible. I am conscious of the urgency that my hon. Friend the Member for Kettering highlighted.”—[Official Report, 23 October 2019; Vol. 666, c. 31WH.]

That announcement was 20 months ago, and the hospital has still not had permission to draw down that funding. That is why my first ask of the Government is to grant permission for the funding to be drawn down so that the project can start.

I warmly welcome the Government’s inclusion of Kettering General Hospital on the list of 40 hospitals for health infrastructure plan 2—HIP2—funding from 2025. That is important for Kettering, because 70% of the buildings on the main hospital site are more than 30 years old, and there is a maintenance backlog of £42 million. Some 60% of the hospital estate is rated as either poor or bad.

The hospital plan for the redevelopment of the hospital site as part of the HIP2 programme offers a phased approach over a number of years, with the extra ward space provided by this funding to be built on top of the urgent care hub. That is in contrast with a number of other hospitals in the HIP2 programme that are seeking all-in-one-go funding packages. The hospital is not asking for its HIP2 allocation in an up-front £350 million all-in-one-go lump sum. Instead, it is seeking a modular annual funding requirement for what would be a phased and value-for-money rebuild up to 2030. Surely, out of a £3.7 billion national hospital rebuild programme, providing just £6 million to the hospital this year to get the project started and £29 million next year is not beyond the wit of man.

I know that the Treasury is currently completing a commercial strategy for all the hospital rebuilds so as to standardise hospital redesign, secure key commercial efficiencies in procurement across the country and address digital and sustainability requirements. Kettering General Hospital is fully committed to those Treasury objectives. Value for money is extremely important in delivering the hospital rebuild programme across the country, and if Kettering General Hospital’s innovative and sensible approach was matched with sufficient flexibility in applying the relevant funding streams from the Department of Health and Social Care and the Treasury, Kettering General Hospital could be an exemplar hospital redevelopment that others could follow.

I am using this debate to urge the Government—both the Department of Health and Social Care and HM Treasury—to do the sensible thing: dovetail the two presently separate funding streams for Kettering General Hospital so as to not only optimise value for money for the taxpayer but deliver sooner rather than later the urgent improvements at the hospital that all local residents need and wish to see.

Covid-19: Government Handling and Preparedness

Peter Bone Excerpts

Thursday 27th May 2021 Commons Chamber

[Matt Hancock]

No.

[Mr Peter Bone (Wellingborough) (Con)]

What do we know about the Secretary of State? We know that he is exceptionally hard-working, and that every day he woke up to try to save lives. He has been exceptionally good at coming to the House and answering questions. He has also held press conferences and answered questions from journalists. Yet yesterday, we had some outrageous claims by an unelected Spad who broke covid regulations, admitted he had leaked stuff to the BBC, and by his own admission was not fit to be in No. 10 Downing Street. Does the Secretary of State agree that the only mistake the Prime Minister made in this pandemic was that he did not fire Dominic Cummings early enough?

[Matt Hancock]

I am very grateful to my hon. Friend for that question. I will continue to compliment him while I think of how to respond. The honest truth is that, from the start, I have been totally focused on how to get out of this pandemic. It is absolutely true that the operation and functioning of Government has got easier these last six months, and I think all the public can see that. We are laser focused on getting through this, getting this country out of it and delivering the vaccine programme that we have now been working on for almost a year and a half, which is remarkable. I pay tribute to all those who have been working on this effort. The way to fight a pandemic is by bringing people together and inspiring hope.