Referendum (Scotland)

Sarah Newton Excerpts

Monday 15th October 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Order. As far as I am aware, I have done nothing unbecoming or unworthy, but it is true that I have given no particular thought to this matter, and that I have no proposals to make on it.

[Sarah Newton (Truro and Falmouth) (Con)]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that home rule for Scotland is available now within the Union, as it is for any part of this country, as a result of a range of Government measures, most notably the Localism Act 2011?

[David Mundell]

First, may I say that I have always found you most becoming, Mr Speaker? I apologise for suggesting otherwise.

My hon. Friend makes an important point. Very significant additional powers are about to come to Scotland and the Scottish Parliament through the Scotland Act 2012, which will involve the most significant transfer of financial powers since the Acts of Union 300 years ago. The Scottish Government and Parliament focus should be on the implementation of those powers to the benefit of the people of Scotland.

Oral Answers to Questions

Sarah Newton Excerpts

Wednesday 11th January 2012 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I am afraid that, as with the hon. Lady’s party leader, there seems to have been an outbreak of collective amnesia on the Labour Benches, because we have kept the previous Government’s policy on the winter fuel allowance and are meeting in full all the promises that she and her party made on the winter fuel allowance. We have gone one further, because they introduced higher cold weather payments only for election year, but we have made them permanent.

[Sarah Newton (Truro and Falmouth) (Con)]

The Prime Minister will have experienced at first hand the quality of nursing at Treliske. What steps are the Government taking to ensure that patients across the country receive the highest possible standards of nursing care from the NHS?

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend is entirely right. I well remember—indeed, I will never forget—the time I spent at the Royal Cornwall hospital and the happy days I had there, and it was a great privilege to go back again last year. We have very high standards of nursing care in our country and the overwhelming majority of nurses do a fantastic job, but I do not think that we would be serving our constituents properly if we did not highlight those few cases where it goes wrong, and we have seen in the Care Quality Commission reports that there are areas where it has gone wrong. I think that it is incumbent on the Government to try to remove the bureaucracy that can get in nurses’ way, but it is also important for us to highlight best practice in the best hospitals in our country—I visited an excellent hospital in Salford last week—and say, “Let’s copy that right across the country,” so that we have high standards of care and look after the nutritional needs, indeed all the needs, of vulnerable people in our hospitals.