Pennine Acute Hospitals NHS Trust

Simon Danczuk Excerpts

Tuesday 17th January 2017 Westminster Hall

[Simon Danczuk (Rochdale) (Ind)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Streeter. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Blackley and Broughton (Graham Stringer) for securing this very important debate. In many respects it is overdue, but it is also timely, not least because of the recent Manchester Evening News exposé of the trust, and particularly of the maternity units. I put on record the excellent journalism that Jennifer Williams carried out at the Manchester Evening News, which shone a light on the issue and held power to account. That is what journalism should be about.

We have all seen the crisis in the national health service and the suffering that has been caused, the lack of funding and the cuts to social care, but as colleagues have pointed out, this debate is not about funding. It is about leadership, or a lack of leadership, within the trust, which has gone on for quite some time. As others have said, it is about not the leadership of Sir David Dalton, who has just taken up some responsibilities for the trust, but the poor leadership of people such as Gillian Fairfield and indeed John Saxby, her predecessor. They failed to lead the organisation effectively and properly.

We have all read the reports of diverted ambulance services, chronic understaffing and serious incidents going unreported, but as colleagues have pointed out, as MPs, we have also seen behind the headlines. With people coming into our surgeries, we see on a regular basis the real upset and worry that is caused by the failure within the trust.

Last year, I was contacted by Mr Hall, the brother of my constituent Mrs Doreen Malone, who passed away on 22 July. Doreen had diabetes and suffered from kidney disease, and as a result was completely dependent on the local health service. When she fell ill on 20 July, the care she received from Royal Oldham hospital A&E and the North West Ambulance Service was quite simply appalling. I was told by Doreen’s brother that her ambulance was diverted and collected her only after a two or three-hour delay. I was also told that she waited for four hours in A&E, and that she returned home just before midnight without having been seen. Pennine acute’s own assessment acknowledges that

“it was approximately three hours between her arrival and a doctor being available.”

That is

“a longer time than expected for a patient with a priority 3 triage.”

Normally, such cases should be seen within one hour.

Doreen was frustrated with waiting, and had eaten only a sandwich in the space of 12 hours, which is obviously highly problematic for a diabetic. She called her brother to let him know that she was going to visit the infirmary in the morning, and she went home without having been seen. The following day, three police cars, a fire engine and a passenger ambulance turned up at Doreen’s house, because she had been found to be in a critical condition. An ambulance was called at 11 o’clock. Once again, Doreen was left waiting. At 12.15 pm, the ambulance eventually arrived, and she was taken to Fairfield hospital, where she sadly died the following day. Pennine acute attributed the delays to the high number of patients arriving at accident and emergency. This was not during the winter crisis; it was the middle of July. It is no surprise that none of what Pennine acute had to say was of any comfort to Doreen’s family. That tragedy could have been avoided, not least because lessons should have been learned much earlier.

I would appreciate it if the Minister could outline what steps are being taken to hold failing senior managers at Pennine acute to account. What assurances can he give that such people are not able to get jobs elsewhere in the national health service?