Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust

Stephen Dorrell Excerpts

Tuesday 19th November 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

We have to wait and see, but we have put in place a radical, tough new Ofsted-style inspection regime. The point of that regime is not just to identify hospitals where care is unsafe, but to identify outstanding hospitals, so that hospitals in difficulty have hospitals from which they can learn, and we create a culture, just as we have in schools, where failing schools learn from outstanding schools and have a pathway to improvement. That will make a big difference. As the right hon. Gentleman knows, we now have 13 hospitals in special measures, and I am sure there will be more as the inspection process gets under way. But we will also have the great hospitals that we can learn from, which will mean that this can be a positive process for the NHS.

[Mr Stephen Dorrell (Charnwood) (Con)]

I commend my right hon. Friend for the thoughtful and thorough way in which he has conducted the reaction to the publication of the Francis inquiry. Does he agree that the most chilling finding of Francis was that professional people whose focus should have been on the needs of their patients found themselves, in Francis’s words, “doing the system’s business”? Is not the central driver of my right hon. Friend’s recommendations to ensure that never again shall we have closed institutions in a closed system where that is possible, and that the key way forward is to throw sunlight into institutions that have too often been unchallenged?

[Mr Hunt]

My right hon. Friend, as so often, speaks wisely. This is probably the boldest step towards transparency taken by any health care system anywhere in the world. We will see if he is right, but I think that he is, because sunlight is the best disinfectant. It means that problems are sorted out much more quickly, but it is sometimes an uncomfortable process. It is really important that we as a country understand that exposing poor care in one place does not mean that there is poor care everywhere and that, in fact, exposing it is the quickest way to sort it out.