NHS Backlog

Rachel Gilmour Excerpts

Monday 6th January 2025 Commons Chamber

[Dr Johnson]

I will not, because I have a time limit.

I was pleased to hear that the Government will continue many Conservative initiatives, such as expanding the surgical hubs programme and extending the work of community diagnostic centres, but some of the other parts were a little confusing. Patients are to have a choice of where they are treated, but they already do. They are also to receive text messages to remind them of appointment times. That is great, but it is already happening. In fact, a look back through my phone revealed that the earliest text message I could find reminding me of an appointment for my child at Peterborough city hospital was sent on 28 July 2015, so this is not a new initiative. Patients are to get results online. Well, again, they already do. If the Minister has not seen that, I urge her to visit Addenbrooke’s hospital, where, via the MyChart system, patients can already log on and read their MRI or blood results or reports. Spreading good practice is to be welcomed, but it is not a revolution. It also faces significant headwinds.

The Government are to direct activity to general practice, but GPs are already rather busy and facing financial challenges caused by national insurance contributions. How will shifting pressure improve capacity? When will GPs be able to budget? Will the funding settlement be greater than their increased costs from national insurance contributions? If resources are moved to general practice, how will that deliver more secondary care appointments? One person can only do so much work. What is the Government’s plan for the workforce, which will be so key?

Of course, it is not just GPs who are affected by the national insurance contributions. The Secretary of State talked about record investment in hospices, but before Christmas the Minister was repeatedly unable to say whether that record investment would cover the rise in national insurance contributions that those same hospices are facing. Can she update the House now?

Patients are to have the choice on whether to have follow-up appointments, which will apparently reduce a million unnecessary appointments every year. Will that be a choice for patients to have a desired follow-up appointment that is not recommended by clinical staff—in which case, that could actually increase the number of appointments required—or will it be a choice not to have an appointment that a doctor or clinician has recommended? In that case, is that wise?

It is cold outside, Madam Deputy Speaker. In fact, this morning I woke up to blizzard conditions at my window. What estimate has the Minister made of the number of extra admissions that have occurred this winter for elderly patients who have been cold due to the removal of their winter fuel allowance?

[Rachel Gilmour (Tiverton and Minehead) (LD)]

Will the hon. Lady give way? She has heard me.

[Dr Johnson]

I have heard the hon. Lady but will not give way, because the Deputy Speaker has been clear about the time constraints in the debate.

Has the Minister made an estimate of the number of extra admissions caused by elderly people who are cold due to the removal of the winter fuel allowance, what impact that is having on hospitals, and how many elective appointments that would otherwise have occurred have been cancelled as a result? We heard the hon. Member for Bury St Edmunds and Stowmarket (Peter Prinsley) talk about his cancelled ENT list from this morning.

We have had six months of a Labour Government. They have cancelled the building of 24 hospitals, they have launched a series of reviews, they have significantly increased costs on indirectly provided NHS services because of national insurance, and they have re-announced what has already been happening, in some cases for many years. I am a doctor and I am a patient, and I really want the Government to succeed in improving the NHS; we all do—we have heard too many troubling tales from our constituents and again this evening—but stating aims does not make them happen, and launching reviews and press releases is simply not enough.