Health and Social Care Bill

Phillip Lee Excerpts

Tuesday 28th February 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lansley]

The Deputy Prime Minister’s letter accurately reflects the discussions that we have been having in another place—[Interruption] I do not see why that is funny; it is very simple—in anticipation of the amendments that will be debated there on Report.

[Dr Phillip Lee (Bracknell) (Con)]

The previous Labour Government, of whom the shadow Secretary of State for Health was an active member, negotiated private finance initiative contracts that are costing the NHS almost £3,000 per minute. Will the Secretary of State detail what his Department and the Treasury are doing to help to alleviate this enormous level of debt, which has risked the viability of some NHS services?

[Mr Lansley]

We are helping all trusts with PFI contracts to manage the costs of those contracts. Seven trusts were left with unsustainable PFI contracts, and we have made it clear that we are willing to help support them. Labour Members—they are not even listening—are distorting the nature of this legislation, which does not permit privatisation. Given that during their time in office they left the NHS with 102 hospital projects owned, in effect, by the private sector, with a PFI debt of £67 billion, it is outrageous for them to sit there pointing fingers at us.

NHS (Private Sector)

Phillip Lee Excerpts

Monday 16th January 2012 Commons Chamber

[Andy Burnham]

That was the policy of the previous Government, but the cap was clearly defined. It was a tight cap, and it reflected historical levels of work. What we are talking about is a liberalising measure to enable the private sector to double if not quadruple the amount of work that it is doing, which is why we are debating the motion.

I shall pose a question for the Health Secretary, who mentioned safeguards. If it is all fine to create a different NHS in which we have many more private contracts, might not the NHS risk register have something to say about the risks of creating such an NHS and the additional challenges of delivering health care through a system based on commercial contracts? Might it not lead to a diversion of spending on lawyers and consultants, away from patient care? Is there not a great irony, as we have heard the Health Secretary bemoan a lack of ability to intervene in the recent situation while, at the same time, here he is promoting a Bill that removes his ability to do so on a much wider basis? He wants to hand over his ability to intervene to the independent NHS Commissioning Board. The irony of his position will not be lost on many people listening to the debate.

[Dr Phillip Lee (Bracknell) (Con)]

I have attended this debate to try to ascertain the direction of travel of Labour policy and to try to gain an understanding of its philosophy and underlying principles. I am somewhat confused, because you seem to be all over the place. Do you believe that health care is a commodity—[Interruption.] I apologise; I meant the right hon. Gentleman. Do you believe that health care is a commodity or not? Do you believe that access to health care is a right or not? The answers to those questions underpin the policies that you will introduce, I presume, in the next couple of years.

Health and Social Care (Re-committed) Bill

Phillip Lee Excerpts

Wednesday 7th September 2011 Commons Chamber

[Nadine Dorries]

No, I want to continue for a bit longer.

The diagnosis of pregnancy happens very quickly. One can buy a pregnancy testing kit for £1. It is possible that the reason some women suffer distress following an abortion is that they can be tested before they have even missed their first period. For some women, that is fantastic and they go straight for an abortion when they find out. For others, however, it all happens so quickly that they can be aborted by the time they are seven or eight weeks pregnant, and then afterwards, when the pressure has gone and the coercion has disappeared, they realise—

[Dr Phillip Lee (Bracknell) (Con)]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Nadine Dorries]

May I just finish this point? When those women would have been 10 weeks pregnant, two or three weeks after the abortion, they realise that they could have worked it out and that they could have got there somehow. That is when the problems are beginning to kick in. That is why an increasing number of women are becoming very anxious about the fact that they do not receive pre-abortion counselling. That is why I receive so many e-mails and why other organisations receive them.

[Dr Lee]

I want to place it on the record that as somebody who wants a reduction in the time limit on abortions provided in this country; who wants independent counselling to be provided; who has seen many patients who have had mental health problems post-abortion, such as self-harming and depression over 10 years; and who has been present at a termination and watched an eye go past in a tube, with a cursory reference made to it by the consultant, unfortunately I am frustrated by the way in which the amendment has been tabled. The hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) made the point that abortion as an issue should be talked about in the round. As a consequence, I cannot support the amendment, but that does not mean that I do not support the principles and the desire to make abortion as infrequent in our society as possible.

[Nadine Dorries]

I thank my hon. Friend for his candour. However, I inform him that opportunities to debate abortion in this House do not come very often. In fact, the last time it happened was in 2008 when I had to table an amendment to another Bill, which was controversial. The same criticism was made that the amendment should not have been tabled to that Bill. The fact is that the Government do not make provision for abortion to be discussed in this House. Therefore, it either has to be attached to a Bill like this or it does not happen at all, unless one is drawn first in the ballot for private Members’ Bills.

[Dr Lee]

Yes, but my point is that this is such an emotive subject—we can tell from the responses on both sides of the House that people feel passionately about this—that the debate needs to be calm and considered and the language both here and in the media must not be inflammatory or incendiary, because if it is, it polarises the debate and those of us who want to see progress towards abortion not being so prevalent in society get terribly frustrated.

[Nadine Dorries]

Well, I hope that the unions and the left-wing media will take my hon. Friend’s comments on board.

Contaminated Blood

Phillip Lee Excerpts

Monday 10th January 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I am well aware of the strong interest of the hon. Member for Coventry North West (Mr Robinson) in this subject and his track record on the issue in the House. The reason I have not called him and was not intending to call him is that, as far as I am aware, he was not here for the start of the statement. If I am wrong, I am happy to concede I am wrong. However, if I am right, that is the way it has to be for today. The hon. Gentleman is a very experienced parliamentarian and I am sure he will find other ways to make his point when he wants to make it.

[Dr Phillip Lee (Bracknell) (Con)]

I welcome the Secretary of State’s statement. In October’s debate, I drew attention to the figure quoted of £3.5 billion that the Irish compensation scheme would cost and was concerned about its accuracy. The information was placed in the Library and, to justify it, it was indicated that there had been informal discussions. I have since found out that that was an unminuted telephone call. When I pointed that out, I was assured there would be further conversations with Republic of Ireland officials. Will he confirm that those took place and, if details are available, can they be placed in the Library?

Contaminated Blood and Blood Products

Phillip Lee Excerpts

Thursday 14th October 2010 Commons Chamber

[Dr Phillip Lee (Bracknell) (Con)]

I am the only regular practising medical doctor in this House and it is somewhat surprising that no one contacted me to lobby on behalf of any of the issues to do with this debate. I stand here as someone who has no idea whether I have any constituents affected by this dreadful scandal, but I do understand what it is like to have hepatitis C and to have HIV. On a personal level, I was once married to somebody who carried the gene for haemophilia, so I have considered the idea of bringing a haemophiliac into this world and the implications thereof. More importantly, I have spent weekends away with the Haemophilia Society in the past. I have been privy to the annoyance, upset, anger and frustration with this whole affair since it started to rear its ugly head in the late ’70s.

It is important when we are discussing this issue to try to separate emotion from fact. The fact of the matter is that before we could administer cryoprecipitate factor VIII, the life expectancy of haemophiliacs in this country was in the 20s. When we discuss compensation—perhaps this is a way of decoupling us from the compensation scheme in the Republic of Ireland—we need to discuss compensating people for loss of earnings and widows’ pensions, instead of compensating people for loss of life. It is important that we distinguish between the two issues, instead of getting emotional. It is easy to stand up and discuss distressing cases, which is an approach that can be applied to an array of conditions. Let us concentrate on fact, because there may be an appropriate solution.

I could speak all day on this issue, but I am conscious of time. Questions of morality and of cost arise in deciding appropriate compensation. To my mind, the present economic difficulties that our Government are dealing with are not a consideration. A big wrong occurred, and we need to deal with it irrespective of the timing. The former Member for Plymouth, Devonport, David Owen, who was a medically qualified person, was involved at the outset under a Labour Government. The subsequent Conservative Government continued to miss the signs and failed to implement necessary procedures to make sure that the blood was not contaminated.

I want to draw attention to the figures. I have read only the first four chapters of the Archer report, because I realised only at 12.30 pm that the matter was going to be debated. I have noticed mistakes in the first four chapters, so I am not encouraged by the report in general. The report cites a figure of £3 billion, which I think the Department of Health provided to Ministers, but the figure is actually £1 billion. There is a typo—if one divides the two figures, one does not get £850,000; one gets £350,000. Let us talk about facts first, because we may be discussing £1 billion, not £3 billion. If one relates those calculations to the price of life, we can arrive at a compensation scheme that I can support.

[Mr Robinson]

Is the hon. Gentleman saying—I heard about this matter briefly before I came into the House—that the £3 billion figure relates to a typo and that the figure should be £300 million, because that needs to be clarified?

[Dr Lee]

Yes. If one does the division, one realises that one figure must be wrong—off the top of my head, the figure is 853 as opposed to 353. I encourage the hon. Gentleman to look at that point.

If the figure is £1 billion, we spend £1 billion on the NHS every three and a half days. We can find that money. I do not know how one prices a liver, and I do not know how one prices a liver transplant that does not happen. I cannot put a price on that, and I challenge anyone else to do so. We are talking about 4,670 people, so we can behave appropriately at last and provide the appropriate compensation.

On the financial implications, HIV widows are forced through the Benefits Agency to seek work within weeks of their partner’s death, and hepatitis C widows whose partners died before 2004 receive no financial help at all. The implications for the haemophilia community are stark. I cannot say that we should trim this and that because of the comprehensive spending review; I would rather we borrowed the £500 million and did the right thing.

[Harriett Baldwin (West Worcestershire) (Con)]

Given my hon. Friend’s medical background, will he explain whether it is appropriate for someone with hepatitis C to receive incapacity benefit?

[Dr Lee]

I believe that it is, but, with respect, that is missing the point. As far as I am concerned, the Department of Health is culpable. This is not a party political matter; it is a departmental matter. It had a series of opportunities over a number of years to deal with the issue, but it missed them, and surprisingly it lost a few documents in the process. That is shocking. If the Department is worried about precedent, that makes me concerned about other conditions and treatments. Is there something else that we should know about? If this is about precedent, I should like to set one: this was wrong and we should pay out appropriately.

[Ms Abbott]

The hon. Gentleman has made a very important point about the £3 billion figure being a typographical error. I wonder whether Ministers are able to respond on that point now, as that would colour the rest of the debate.

[Dr Lee]

The hon. Lady makes a fair point. I should like to meet the Under-Secretary, my hon. Friend the Member for Guildford (Anne Milton), to discuss this. I hope that she can give me a little time because I should like to discuss a series of issues with her.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dawn Primarolo)]

Order. I am sorry, but the time limit has been reached.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Robinson]

I can assure the Minister that we will not withdraw the motion. It is not encouraging for us to put our faith in her when all she does is hide behind a technicality.

[Dr Phillip Lee]

I want to be clear about the point I made earlier. I await some clarification on the figures, but I will not support the hon. Gentleman’s motion because it states that “a principal recommendation of the…Inquiry” is that compensation is based on the Irish compensation scheme. Am I right?

[Mr Robinson]

indicated assent.

[Dr Lee]

I made it clear that I think we can decouple from that and that we should not pay out on the basis of a life expectancy that was in the 20s before a product came on the market. That is why I will not support him in the Lobby.

[Mr Robinson]

No motion of the House is ever wholly correct. I have never voted for a motion with which I totally agree—[Interruption.] I hate to say it, but we are reverting to party politics on an issue that has nothing to do with it. No motion is ever perfect. As the hon. Gentleman knows, we are debating a principle. We should recognise that there should be much more compensation—[Interruption.] If Conservative Members think that this is a laughing matter, I will leave it to them and their consciences.