East Midlands Ambulance Service
Steve Barclay Excerpts(6 years, 10 months ago)
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The Minister for Health (Stephen Barclay)
It is a pleasure, as always, to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Davies. I am very keen to allow a little time for the hon. Member for High Peak (Ruth George) to speak at the end, should she wish to do so.
I begin by congratulating the hon. Lady on securing this debate and welcoming the opportunity to discuss the performance of the East Midlands ambulance service. My hon. Friend the Member for Boston and Skegness (Matt Warman) mentioned that six out of the seven Lincolnshire Members of Parliament were present; this issue generates considerable interest both among Members and the constituents that they serve. I assure the hon. Lady that we are taking her concerns seriously. We recognise that the trust’s performance needs to improve. A range of local and national actions are under way to support it in doing so, and I will set out more details about that.
Key measures include the implementation of a new urgent care transport service, to take pressure off emergency ambulance responses; action to address handover delays at hospitals across the east midlands area; and a demand and capacity review of the trust, to ensure that it has the right levels of resource.
Geraint Davies (in the Chair)
Order. Minister, over to you; if you would like, you could allow a couple of minutes at the end for the mover.
Stephen Barclay
I will be happy to, Mr Davies. As I was setting out before the votes, a number of key measures have been announced. I will elaborate on those further, but, before I do, I will address some of the points raised by colleagues across the House in this constructive and well-supported debate.
The hon. Member for High Peak very reasonably opened her remarks by putting some of the challenges in the context of the good work being done. She cited in particular the case of her constituents, Vinnie and Jo, which illustrates the fantastic work done alongside some of the challenges that we will come on to. She also mentioned specific issues faced in terms of geography and low population density.
The hon. Lady mentioned empowerment of 999 call staff as a specific issue. My understanding is that revalidation can be done by call handlers where they are clinically trained, but not where they are not. Even where they are clinically trained, it cannot be done if the initial 111 call is either a life-and-death call—a category 1 or category 2 call—or where the initial assessment has been done by someone from 111 who is clinically trained. There is a framework there, but I am happy to have a further conversation with the hon. Lady if she has areas of specific concern about how that guidance is operated. She will be aware that, in any event, only 12% of NHS 111 calls are referred to ambulance trusts, so the 12% is a subset initially; within that, there is a subset of those who are clinically assessed and what power there is. I am, however, very happy to have a further conversation.
The hon. Lady also mentioned funding, which I will come on to specifically. The trust has had additional funding, but on the challenges set out by colleagues from across the House, the trust is undertaking a demand and capacity review that will determine the level of additional resourcing required. That will inform the commissioning for 2018-19. Of course, it will have taken note of the concerns raised.
The hon. Member for Great Grimsby (Melanie Onn), who is no longer in her place, raised a point about whether there are peaks of demand linked to drug and alcohol-related calls. I am happy to pick that up as a specific action and investigate that further.
As so often when we debate matters of health, my hon. Friend the Member for Sleaford and North Hykeham (Dr Johnson) brought a much-valued practical experience to the debate. I was particularly struck with her comparison between the one-to-one staffing rate in intensive care and her concern about the number of crews, and how that interplays with the handover at hospital. As she will be aware, a lot of work is happening on hospital ambulance liaison officers and how hospitals deal with ambulances. NHS Improvement and NHS England are looking at that issue specifically in relation to this trust, but again she made a helpful contribution. I know she mentioned that she had spoken to the Secretary of State about the issue.
Mr Hayes
I, my wife and our 17 and 13-year-olds have all been at A&E at Pilgrim Hospital, on two occasions by ambulance in an emergency, so I speak with that knowledge. The Minister will appreciate the problems in rural Lincolnshire; he knows it very well, as he represents a seat just on the border of my own. Will he apply the work he has just described specifically to Lincolnshire and ask for his officials to look at the circumstances in Lincolnshire? It might well apply to other rural places, by the way. We feel particular pressure, as he has acknowledged, and that kind of reappraisal would be welcome in the county.
Stephen Barclay
My right hon. Friend makes a pertinent point. As he mentioned, he is my constituency neighbour and I am very aware of the specific challenges posed by the geography and the road network in Lincolnshire. I am happy to take that specific point forward. It will not surprise him that I have already zeroed in on some of the challenges in Lincolnshire, particularly around United Lincolnshire and Northern Lincolnshire and Goole, how that interplays across the spectrum of primary care, how the patient pathway goes through, the various blockages in the system and how we look at that in a more systemic way.
That issue interplays with a much wider debate, outside the scope of this one, but to give my right hon. Friend one statistic, 43% of beds are occupied by 5% of patients. If we take the average length of stay from 40 to 35, that is the equivalent of 5,000 hospital beds, each at £100,000 per year. We can see how there is an interplay between what we are debating with the ambulance services and the wider Lincolnshire health economy, which is a specific point. I am happy to have further discussions with him on that.
The hon. Member for Bassetlaw (John Mann) raised three points about the report on the disproportionate calls, which were pertinent to a conversation I had just this morning about spikes in care homes and what action might be taken. For example, to what extent can we improve GP access into specific care homes in Lincolnshire through Skype, as one of the mitigations of ambulance demand? We are looking at how we assess the return on investment between the cost of ambulances and emergency admissions and what that investment might do if it were put into a more preventative role—care homes, for example.
On the specific matter of Sports Direct, which I was not aware of, the hon. Gentleman makes a valid point, which I will be keen to look at with officials—where there are peaks of demand, what is driving those peaks and how to mitigate them. He also mentioned the issue of privatisation from 2009. We are looking at how we take a more holistic view across a landscape and how mutual support from different parts of the system can provide assistance to that. It will not surprise the hon. Gentleman, knowing my views on Brexit, that for all the talk of some of the challenges of Brexit, the opportunities of Brexit should not be missed. I share his desire on that.
There is also the geography point—whether it is the way services elsewhere have been reconfigured or the extent to which there are, for example, centres of excellence to which his constituents are being taken. Is the issue the formal geography or how the operating protocols within that geography have evolved? That, again, is a perfectly valid point and one we can look at on a case-by-case basis.
I know my hon. Friend the Member for Boston and Skegness has championed a number of these issues over a period of time. He raised how we can get the ambulance service working together with the other emergency services. I know that is an issue that many police and crime commissioners have also identified, and many within the fire service are keen to ensure that we have a better join-up between the blue-light services.
The hon. Member for Lincoln (Karen Lee) raised the issue of hospital handovers. I assure her that daily reviews are currently being undertaken by NHS England and NHS Improvement. Greater transparency and targeted assistance are being provided, and there are also specific initiatives linked to individual hospitals, particularly including the hospital-ambulance liaison officers.
The hon. Lady also mentioned pay. It is worth reminding the House that the pay band that applies to paramedic staff has been increased from band 5 to band 6, so there has been a recognition in the system of the importance of paramedics, alongside an increase—around 30% since 2010—in the number of paramedics. However, we recognise that there is also an increasing demand, and that this service has been under considerable pressure.
Nigel Mills (Amber Valley) (Con)
The Minister has skirted around the issue of breaking up EMAS, which I think some areas might quite like. Does he agree that our priority should be having more paramedics and ambulances, not more chief executives and office buildings?
Stephen Barclay
I think most people who observed my questioning during my four years on the Public Accounts Committee will know that organograms and looking at where investment is and how streamlined structures are is extremely important to me.
At the same time, it is important that one does not make a false saving in driving down some of the management costs, so that procurement, IT investment and consultancy spend, for example—some of the big ticket expenditure—is not effectively managed and escalates. There is a balance to be struck between having good leadership of trusts and, as my hon. Friend alludes to, not drifting into areas where additional hires are created in the back office as opposed to services on the frontline, where I think Members from across the House want to see them.
In terms of the service nationally, a number of actions have been taken. Under Sir Bruce Keogh’s review of the NHS urgent and emergency care system, ambulance services are being transformed into mobile treatment centres, making much greater use of “hear and treat”, which is treating patients over the phone, and “see and treat”, which is treating and discharging patients on the scene. While we have heard of some of the challenges faced by the trust, it is also worth placing on the record that it is one of the best-performing trusts for “hear and treat”, and treats and discharges more than three in 10 patients either on the phone or on scene. There are areas of good practice that, for balance, it is only fair to recognise.
I will conclude, to allow the hon. Member for High Peak time to speak. We recognise that the trust has challenges, and I am very happy to work with the hon. Lady and other colleagues as we move forward to address those. In addition to the increase in pay bands and the increase in numbers, an active plan is under way to tackle some of the challenges we have heard about today, which I hope gives some comfort to the hon. Lady.
Fixed Recoverable Costs in Lower-value Clinical Negligence Claims
Steve Barclay Excerpts(6 years, 10 months ago)
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The Minister for Health (Stephen Barclay)
My hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State for Health (Lord O’Shaughnessy) has made the following statement:
Today I am publishing a document summarising the responses we received to our consultation ‘Introducing fixed recoverable costs in lower value clinical negligence claims’.
Following the end of the consultation in May 2017, the right hon. Lord Justice Jackson published a report “Review of Civil Litigation Costs: Supplemental Report Fixed Recoverable Costs”, which included a recommendation that The Civil Justice Council should, in conjunction with the Department of Health and Social Care, set up a working party with both claimant and defendant representatives to develop a bespoke process for clinical negligence claims initially up to £25,000 together with a grid of fixed recoverable costs for such cases.
Ministers at the Department of Health and Social Care and the Ministry of Justice have accepted this recommendation and I would like to inform Parliament that work has commenced in setting up the working party with both claimant and defendant representatives.
The document I am publishing today sets out a summary of what we heard in our consultation, and points to The Civil Justice Council working group as the next step in developing the fixed recoverable costs policy and the report into fixed cost proposals by Professor Paul Fenn.
It is also available online at: http://www.parliament.uk/writtenstatements.
[HCWS472]
Acute and Community Health
Steve Barclay Excerpts(6 years, 10 months ago)
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The Minister of State, Department of Health and Social Care (Stephen Barclay)
With permission, Mr Speaker, I wish to make a statement on the independent review of Liverpool Community Health NHS Trust, which was conducted for NHS Improvement by Dr Bill Kirkup and published today.
What happened to patients of Liverpool Community Health NHS Trust is, before anything else, a terrible personal tragedy for all families involved, and the report also makes clear the devastating impact on many frontline staff. On behalf of the Government I apologise to them, and I know that the whole House will want to extend our sympathies to every one of them.
As Mr Speaker correctly identified, I wish to pay tribute to the hon. Member for West Lancashire (Rosie Cooper). The people of Merseyside know only too well the cost of attempting to silence the victims and campaigners for those seeking justice. As the report makes clear, her personal commitment to get to the truth on behalf of the victims of Liverpool Community Health NHS Trust, her personal courage in asking difficult questions of those in senior positions within the NHS, and the persistence and precision of her search for accountability, are all vindicated today. We in this House, and across the wider health and social care services, owe her a debt. I also thank Dr Kirkup and his team for this excellent report. As with his report on Morecambe Bay NHS Foundation Trust, it is a clear, forensic, and at times devastating account of failures in the care of Liverpool Community Trust by its management, its board, and its regulators.
The report covers the period from the trust’s formation in November 2010 to December 2014, and it describes an organisation that was, “dysfunctional from the outset”. The consequences of that for patient care were in some cases appalling, and the report details a number of incidents of patient harm including pressure sores, falls leading to fractured hips, and five “never events” in the dental service—an incredibly high number for one organisation.
The failings of the organisation were perhaps most starkly apparent in the services provided at Liverpool prison, where the trust failed to properly risk-assess patients, including for nutrition and hydration, and it did not effectively manage patients at high risk of suicide. The review also identified serious failings in medicine management at the prison. There are many more examples of poor care and its impact on both patients and staff in the report, but what compounds the shock is the lack of insight into those failings displayed by the organisation at the time. This was the very opposite of a culture of learning, with incidents under-reported or played down, warning signals ignored, and other priorities allowed to take the place of patient safety and care for the vulnerable.
We have seen this sort of moral drift before, most obviously at Mid Staffordshire and Morecambe Bay. As with Mid Staffordshire, the management at Liverpool Community Health NHS Trust put far too much emphasis on achieving foundation trust status. The review states that,
“the trust undertook an aggressive cost improvement plan, targeting a £30 million reduction over five years. This represented a cut in resources of approximately 22%. We were surprised that such an ambitious financial reduction was not scrutinised more closely—by both commissioners and regulators.”
There is a direct line from the decision to pursue foundation trust status in that reckless manner to the harm experienced by patients. Indeed, an earlier report by solicitors Capsticks reported in March 2016 that the interim chief executive who took over from Bernie Cuthel found in her first week that
“there was an underspending by £3 million on district nursing. These teams were devastated because they weren’t allowed to recruit, some of them down to 50%”.
This is a district nursing service in which Dr Kirkup reports that patients were experiencing severe pressure sores, up to what is clinically called grade 3. That was accompanied by many of the hallmarks of an organisation that has lost sight of its purpose. As Dr Kirkup states,
“the evidence that we heard and saw amply confirmed the existence of a bullying culture within the Trust, focused almost entirely on achieving Foundation Trust status. Inadequate staffing levels, poor staff morale and appalling HR practice went unheeded. This was the end result of inexperienced leadership that was not capable of rising to the challenges presented by the Trust.”
Following the Mid Staffordshire report, Dr Kirkup recognises that steps have been taken to introduce independent, clinically-led inspection by the Care Quality Commission. The Government have also introduced the special measures regime within NHS Improvement. Alongside this, we have put in place a number of measures to create a wider culture of learning and improvement. The Secretary of State has offered a great deal of personal leadership in helping to create this culture, including the establishment of an independent chief inspector for hospitals, whom I met yesterday and spoke with again this morning, and the recent introduction of measures to support trusts to learn from deaths and to improve patient safety.
I am sure I am not alone in finding it astonishing that Dr Kirkup found there was a
“small minority of individuals who refused to co-operate”
with the review. I wholeheartedly agree with his view that
“it remains the duty of all NHS staff to assist as fully as they are able with investigations and reviews that are directed toward improving future services”.
All but one of the board of the Liverpool trust shirked their legal and moral responsibility to be candid about the organisation they governed. In large, complex organisations, responsibility and accountability are always distributed to some degree. It is the case that the higher up in an organisation someone is, the greater their degree of responsibility. In this case those individuals were Bernie Cuthel as chief executive and Frances Molloy as chair. It is clear from reading the report that they each must take a significant share of the responsibility for these failures.
Hon. Members will, I am sure, have noted the conclusion to the clinical governance section of the report, which highlights the responsibility of the former chief executive of the trust for the system of clinical governance and its failures. It would appear from the report that while the former chief executive, Ms Cuthel, is now able to see that there were failures in clinical governance, she does not have as strong a sense of her own responsibility as one might expect. I understand that she is no longer employed in the NHS in England, but she does continue to hold a role working with the NHS in Wales.
In response to this report, the Government intend to take a number of actions. First, the Government accept the recommendations in full. While this was a report commissioned by NHS Improvement, I will write to all the organisations named in the recommendations set out at section six of the report, asking them to confirm what steps they will take to implement the recommendations, or to set out their reasons for not doing so. I will ensure copies of that response are shared with the Health Committee.
Secondly, one recommendation is specifically for the Department of Health and Social Care, as set out in paragraph 6.5 on page 64. This relates to a review of CQC’s fit and proper person test. I intend to discuss the terms of that review with the hon. Member for West Lancashire and will appoint someone to undertake that review within the coming days. I believe that review will need to address the operation and purpose of the fit and proper test, including but not limited to: where an individual moves to the NHS in another part of the United Kingdom; where they leave but subsequently provide healthcare services to the NHS from another healthcare role, such as with a charity or a healthcare company; where differing levels of professional regulation apply, such as a chief executive who is a clinician compared to one who is a non-clinician; where there is a failure to co-operate with a review of this nature and what the consequences of that should be; and reviewing the effectiveness of such investigations themselves when they are conducted. I will be pleased to hear the views of the hon. Member for West Lancashire, and those of the Health Committee, on these issues.
Thirdly, I have asked the Department to review the effectiveness of sanctions where records go missing in a trust, or where records appear to have been destroyed.
Fourthly, I have asked the Department for advice on what disciplinary action could be taken against individuals in relation to the findings of this report. Clearly due process needs to be followed, but it is important that we address a revolving door culture that has existed in parts of the NHS, where individuals move to other NHS bodies, often facilitated by those who are tasked with regulating them.
Fifthly, I will ask NHS Improvement and NHS England to clarify the circumstances under which roles were found or facilitated for individuals identified in the report as bearing some responsibility for the issues at the trust.
Finally, I have spoken with colleagues at the Ministry of Justice and confirm to the House that they intend to investigate the issues arising from this report in respect of HMP Liverpool specifically and the prison estate more generally.
All organisations and individuals make mistakes. Where this is used as an opportunity to learn and improve, we will do all we can to provide support. Where, however, there is any kind of cover-up or a blinkered denial of what has happened, Members of this House and the victims of that wrongdoing have a right to expect accountability. The hon. Member for West Lancashire has done the NHS a great service. I will place a copy of the Kirkup review in the House of Commons Library. The Government are acting in full on the findings of the report.
Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)
May I start by adding my appreciation for the tenacity my hon. Friend the Member for West Lancashire (Rosie Cooper) has shown in pursuing this matter over a number of years? She has led the way in tackling this injustice fearlessly and relentlessly. In that respect, she is an example to all right hon. and hon. Members in this place. I agree with the Minister that the report is a vindication of her courage, but is it not shameful that this scandal only came to light because a Member of Parliament was prepared to give a voice to those who were afraid to speak out?
Today’s independent report on the Liverpool Community Health Trust lays bare a catalogue of failure that caused harm to patients across Merseyside between 2010 and 2014. It is a grim example of a repeat of the regulatory pressures and board management failures at Mid Staffs. What is of huge concern is that some of the failures came after the final publication of the Francis report. As we have heard, incidents identified in the report include the deaths of inmates at HMP Liverpool, patients having the wrong tooth extracted by trust dentists, and patients on intermediate care wards suffering repeated falls and broken bones or ending up with pressure ulcers. We have to make sure that the pain experienced by so many patients and their families is properly detailed and recognised. We must make sure the NHS is able to learn from these events and that systems are put in place to ensure they never happen again.
I put on record our thanks from the Labour Benches to Dr Bill Kirkup and his team for the work they have done in carrying out this investigation and helping us to understand what has gone wrong. Today’s report says that patients of community services suffered unnecessary harm because the senior leadership team was “out of its depth”. Let us be clear what lies at the heart of this: unrealistic cost-cutting by the trust without regard to the consequences that led directly to patients being harmed. The report exposes serious problems around the scale of cost-cutting being imposed on NHS trusts. In the case of Liverpool Community Health, the motivation was the drive to achieve foundation trust status. The trust disciplined and suspended staff who blew the whistle about poor care and its controversial plans to slash staff to save money. What guarantee can the Minister offer that trusts are no longer being allowed to prioritise financial savings over patient care? What protections have been put in place for staff who raise concerns about cost-cutting?
Today’s report notes the irony of staff reductions being agreed at the same board meeting that had earlier considered the implications of the Francis report. That alone should have raised alarm bells about the capacity of board members to challenge the trust. The NHS still faces huge workforce shortages, so what update can the Minister give us on how the 10-year workforce strategy has been received? What additional measures will the strategy include to guarantee safe levels of staffing in all areas of the country, in community as well as acute services?
I am pleased that the Minister recognises concerns that managers responsible for these extreme failures can often go into leadership roles in other parts of the health service, or indeed for private providers to the NHS in another capacity. Will he advise the House how many people who refused to co-operate with the investigation are still employed in some part of the NHS? Is there anything in the existing terms and conditions or structures that can be used to require future co-operation? Is there any redress in existing policies and procedures that we can use against these people?
The report said that regulators were distracted by higher-profile services such as acute care. The Health Service Journal said today that oversight failures were partly attributable to organisational changes that were taking place under the Health and Social Care Act 2012, so what will the Government do to ensure that national priorities are not allowed to interfere with local oversight?
Finally, the report raises serious concerns about the quality of healthcare in prisons. HMP Liverpool still has significant challenges, and the new provider of the prison’s health service—the Lancashire Care NHS Foundation Trust—has just said that it cannot continue with the contract on the level of funding currently available. The Ministry of Justice will investigate these matters more generally, but will the Minister assure us that prison healthcare is properly supported and resourced in Merseyside and elsewhere across the country?
Paragraph 1 of the review’s findings sums up the devastating impact of these multiple failings:
“Staff were overstretched, demoralised and—in some instances—bullied. Significant unnecessary harm occurred to patients.”
In the unprecedented financial squeeze that the NHS currently faces, we need assurances from the Minister that patients and staff will come before finance and that today will be the last time we hear such a damning message about what is going on in our NHS.
Stephen Barclay
I thank the shadow Minister for his questions and the manner in which he put them before the House. His first key question was to what extent measures are in place to address this sort of issue, should it arise again. Post Francis, and following Sir Bruce Keogh’s review of 14 trusts with high mortality rates, a new regime has been put in place. There is a new chief inspector of hospitals, Professor Ted Baker, and a specific regime involving NHS Improvement, which commissioned this report. NHS Improvement has a new chair, Dido Harding, a very senior figure from the business community.
That regime has put 37 hospitals into special measures so far. The methodology that is used to alert regulators to areas of concern has also been revised. For example, far more importance is now placed on staff and patient surveys. However, it remains to be explained why a trust could pay so many compromise agreements, for example, in response to so many staff disciplinary issues. I assume that many concerns were raised by trade unions locally, as no doubt the hon. Gentleman is aware. We must also consider the extent to which earlier reports, such as the Capsticks report, raised concerns that should have been addressed. That is why, in my statement, I signalled my desire to look at those issues and ensure that they are addressed by the fit and proper person test in particular. As he will be aware, though, that test pertains only to board-level appointments in the NHS, not to all roles. We will need to look at that scope, at the effectiveness of the investigation and particularly at the revolving door element of the problem, which he recognised.
Turning to the other issues that the shadow Minister raised, we clearly need to ensure that due process is followed. I do not need to remind the House of the difficulties of any enforcement against for instance, Fred Goodwin in financial services or Sharon Shoesmith in child services. People rightly expect due process, and all hon. Members would ask for that. The victims will rightly ask, “How can the chief executive, with this catalogue of issues, move within the NHS rather than be fired?” I know that the hon. Member for West Lancashire (Rosie Cooper) has many concerns about that, as do the Health Committee and many other Members.
I look forward to working with the hon. Member for Ellesmere Port and Neston (Justin Madders) in the spirit in which he raised these issues. We share concerns, and I know the House as a whole wants us to get to the heart of them.
Dr Sarah Wollaston (Totnes) (Con)
I pay tribute to my colleague on the Health Committee, the hon. Member for West Lancashire (Rosie Cooper). She is a remarkable parliamentarian and advocate for patient safety. All of us on the Committee look forward to working alongside her to examine in full the Kirkup report’s recommendations, and I welcome the Minister’s commitment to a review of the fit and proper person test.
On the wider issues that the report raises, it is clear that when staff and funding continue to be cut from community services, there are terrible consequences for patient care. Will the Minister assure the House that he will work closely alongside the Care Quality Commission to identify other trusts in which issues such as this are likely to arise because of the workforce and funding pressures that are now being faced?
Stephen Barclay
I am very happy to work with my hon. Friend on this. As she will be aware from reading the report, it is explicit that the finances were there for the existing service. That is stated at the outset of the report. What drove the problems was a wholly unrealistic attempt to seek foundation trust status, with a cost improvement plan that was simply undeliverable. There was a massive reduction, without any attempt to reconcile that with serious issues on staff levels and vacancies. As the report explicitly sets out, when staff raised those concerns, they were bullied, harassed and on occasion suspended without due cause. The culture has changed significantly, and measures have been put in place for how the regime involving NHS Improvement would address such issues and look at cost improvement plans.
On the extent to which the culture was driving the problems, I refer to the remarks I made in my statement. According to the report, the interim chief executive went in and found a significant underspend—£3 million—in the district nursing budget, at the same time as there were significant vacancies and patient harm. That culture was driving the issue, and that culture is what we need to put an end to.
Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)
I thank the Minister for early sight of his statement. I certainly echo his comments about our sympathy for the families and staff members who have been involved over the years. I pay tribute to the hon. Member for West Lancashire (Rosie Cooper), although the tenacity required from her perhaps sums up what is wrong with the present system.
On Dr Kirkup’s observations and recommendations, as the Minister has acknowledged, some individuals did not co-operate with the investigation. Is there therefore a case for a law change to prevent that from recurring in the future, or at the very least for employment and registration sanctions ultimately to be applied to such personnel?
On the fit and proper person test that the Government have pledged to undertake, will any agreed new standards be applied retrospectively to board members who are currently in place? Again, the Government have acknowledged the revolving door culture, so it is important that the test is done properly. Will they review executive pay for chief executives and senior staff? After Mid Staffordshire and this, what will be done to properly protect whistleblowers in future to allow them to come forward?
Funding and resources are clearly really important. Dr Kirkup’s report lays bare the fact that the defining strategic objectives were foundation status and a £30 million saving, or a 22% reduction in resources, rather than the true goal of clinical quality. What will be done to ensure that regulators pick up on such contrasts in future, and what responsibility do the Government take for funding and the drive for efficiency savings?
Lastly, does the Minister agree that this situation confirms the failings of the trust system, and that any privatisation of the NHS and profit before care cannot be allowed under future free trade deals?
Stephen Barclay
The hon. Gentleman raises a number of important points, but particularly regarding whistleblowers. That was one warning signal that clearly failed here. The regulations have been changed, as he will be aware. In the past, there was a culture in which compromise agreements were applied with gagging clauses attached. That prevented visibility of the compromise agreements. That is why I asked, on receipt of the report, why the compromise agreements that were paid were not escalated to the board, and indeed what sight, if any, regulators had of those compromise agreements. Clearly financial payments will have been made, so there should be an audit trail.
The hon. Gentleman asked what changes had been made. An area on which my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has placed a huge amount of importance, and in which he has given a huge amount of leadership, is patient safety guardians and ensuring that there are people in trusts tasked specifically with giving voice to patients. One of the many sensible pieces of advice that my predecessor, my hon. Friend the Member for Ludlow (Mr Dunne), gave me was that when visiting a trust, I should have a one-on-one meeting with that individual, not only because of their status within the trust but to gather information from them. He did so assiduously on all his visits.
The wider point is how, from a regulatory structure point of view, we can ensure that there are safeguards when there are cost improvement programmes and ask what visibility there is of them. NHS Improvement has set out a series of measures to ensure that trusts learn the lessons of Francis. Obviously the period covered by the report goes back as far as 2010, but it is important that the NHS learns from the issues that Dr Kirkup sets out.
Dame Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham) (Con)
May I add my tribute to the hon. Member for West Lancashire (Rosie Cooper)? She is a formidable parliamentarian and has done some very good work on this. The report is shocking. Back in March 2015, following other incidents, the Public Administration Committee produced a report investigating clinical incidents in the NHS, in which it recommended the setting up of the health service’s safety investigation branch. The Government have now published the draft Bill for that. When will it enter pre-legislative scrutiny, so that we can change the culture and have the open learning culture that we should have in our NHS, very much as is seen in the airline industry?
Stephen Barclay
My right hon. Friend raises an important point on the draft Bill and the consultation. I am not in a position to announce a date; that will be announced by business managers in the usual way.
My right hon. Friend is right to allude to that Bill as one of a suite of measures following Sir Bruce Keogh’s review and the Francis report, which are all part of changing the culture. I acknowledge the importance of those measures, but I want to signal to the House today that Dr Kirkup’s report identifies remaining issues that need to be tackled. He has done us that service, and that is where I am keen that we focus as a Government.
Rosie Cooper (West Lancashire) (Lab)
Thank you for your indulgence, Mr Speaker. I do not intend to test your patience today by dealing with the details of these matters; I will do that through Adjournment debates, questions, the Health Committee and other mechanisms available to me.
I thank the Minister for his kind words and his comprehensive statement in response to the excellent work of Bill Kirkup and his team. I pay tribute to Dr Kirkup for his thoroughness and independence, and I thank him most sincerely, on behalf of the staff and patients in Liverpool who suffered really badly at the hands of what I want to call a dictatorship—the regime. Whatever it was, what was done was done in our name and the name of the NHS, and those people deserve justice.
After the ACAS review, the Capsticks report and now the Kirkup report, with a National Audit Office report on the way and Nursing and Midwifery Council hearings due soon, it really is important that the NHS ensures that justice is not only done but seen to be done. Under Governments of all parties, the higher echelons of the NHS have closed ranks to protect themselves. That has got to stop. That senior people were able to inflict such harm on staff and patients and then just walk into other senior NHS jobs with six-figure salaries, and that in this case it could be arranged by the north regional managing director of NHSI, Lyn Simpson, is simply staggering.
I still cannot answer the question that the Minister posed—why were the chief executive and the board not fired? Why were they not sacked? It is incomprehensible. Nothing has been learnt over the past four years. As of only a few weeks ago, NHSI is presiding over another potential LCH, over in the Wirral’s hospitals trust.
I will obviously continue to pursue these matters with vigour on behalf of the staff and the patients, and I want to place it on the record for everyone who is affected that I do not see the Kirkup report as the end—far from it. The Minister has a legal and forensic background. How will he assure the House that these matters will be dealt with properly, and that cover-ups and backdoor deals have ended once and for all? The Secretary of State has said so many times, “This will stop. We are not going to keep moving failed executives around,” yet it continues to happen.
I will say quite honestly that I asked a question of a Minister last year and he answered me in good faith. He said, “NHSI doesn’t participate in moving staff around.” Not only can we now prove that it is true that it does, but it nearly happened in the Wirral a few weeks ago. The message has got to go out: “If you do this kind of stuff, you are responsible. You will not escape.” The NHS must be accountable, and those in it held responsible.
Stephen Barclay
I thank the hon. Lady for those comments. As I said, I have asked NHS Improvement and NHS England to clarify the circumstances under which roles were found or facilitated for individuals identified in the report as bearing some responsibility for the issues at the trust. I await the answer to that central question, which the hon. Lady posed.
On the sense of cover-up, the Secretary of State has provided leadership in bringing about the culture change on patient safety. Following the awful situation in Mid Staffordshire, it was recognised across the House that changes needed to be made on patient safety, and I think the NHS itself has recognised that. NHS Improvement has new leadership, who commissioned the Kirkup report themselves.
On the changes that have been put in place, I alluded to the CQC regime and the chief inspector and the methodology. I spoke to the chief inspector yesterday. Every hospital has now been visited, using that new methodology, and obviously that programme will start to accelerate and target as further work visits are done. The methodology used for that has also evolved to include staff surveys, for example. So a number of measures have been taken, and the special measures regime is also very much at the heart of that.
A number of steps are being taken, but the approach that underpins those is that although we must create a duty of candour, enabling people to learn from the mistakes that will happen in an organisation employing more than 5 million people, there should not be the sense that people can escape their responsibility by moving within the system. I have discussed that with people in the NHS, and I believe there is a wide recognition that the culture has changed significantly. But clearly, as we consider the issues that emerge from the Kirkup report, the House will need to see further reassurance.
The hon. Lady asked how I and the Government will ensure that these issues are addressed, not covered up. First, no one doubts that the hon. Lady will use all the parliamentary tools to pursue this matter, including in her role as a senior member of the Health Committee. I am aware that other members of the Committee, such as the hon. Member for Liverpool, Wavertree (Luciana Berger), a former shadow Health Minister, will take a significant interest in this issue. I know that the Chair of the Health Committee will do so. I have regular discussions with her, and as we address the “fit and proper” test and other issues, I look forward to benefiting from the expertise on that Committee.
It is clear that measures have been taken, and it is right that we recognise that much work has been done in the NHS to change the culture, to ensure that the warning signs are seen, and to ensure that something like this never happens again, but it is also clear that there are specific issues in the report to be responded to, and I very much share the desire of the hon. Member for West Lancashire that we do that.
Several hon. Members rose—
Sir Oliver Heald (North East Hertfordshire) (Con)
My hon. Friend will be aware, and indeed has said, how bad the situation was at Liverpool prison, where the trust had no understanding of what was required of it in its role as health provider. That put healthcare staff in a very difficult position. Does he feel that there is a need for better liaison between health and justice in relation to prison health facilities? Is the CQC really in a position to inspect them, or should there be joint inspections by Her Majesty’s inspectorate of prisons and the chief inspector of hospitals?
Stephen Barclay
I spoke to colleagues in the MOJ yesterday about the issue that my right hon. and learned Friend raised in the first part of his question. I agree with him that the standards of care for those in prison should be the same as those in the NHS more widely. As he will know, NHS England took over commissioning for healthcare services in prisons in 2013; that is one of the changes that have been made. He will also know that Dr Kirkup’s report drew attention to local factors, including a personal conflict of interests that goes to the heart of the relationship between the trust and the prison. However, he is absolutely right to allude to some wider issues from which we need to learn.
Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab)
How many members of the board failed to co-operate with this scathing review, and can the Minister name them?
Stephen Barclay
Only one member of the board co-operated with the review, from which we can deduce that all the rest did not. Given that I am relatively new to the Department, it would probably be wise for me to seek clarification on the extent to which individuals should be named, but I am happy to confirm that the chair of the board did not co-operate.
Victoria Prentis (Banbury) (Con)
Does the Minister agree that the report shows that leadership really matters in our local NHS? What further steps can he take to ensure that hospital trusts fully understand the importance of transparency to clinical quality and patient safety?
Stephen Barclay
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. That is why we are increasing the number of doctors we train by 25%. We are also looking into how we can increase the number of clinicians in leadership positions in trusts, and how we can reduce variance. That is one of the key issues. The NHS has some brilliant leaders, but the variance between trusts is far too wide.
Jamie Stone (Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross) (LD)
Given that health is devolved to the Scottish Government, Mr Speaker, you may wonder why I am asking this question. Will the Minister reassure me first that the report will be shared with NHS Scotland and the Scottish Government, and secondly that, as and when senior appointments are made, there will be an ongoing, constructive and informed dialogue across the border? Now you will see why I asked the question, Mr Speaker.
Stephen Barclay
I am happy to reassure the hon. Gentleman, but he has raised an important point. The question of people moving within the United Kingdom is not the only issue; another potential issue is the question of people moving to a charity or a private company that is providing services for the NHS, or taking up other roles in the healthcare landscape.
Martin Vickers (Cleethorpes) (Con)
May I press the Minister a little further on his worrying suggestion that revolving doors are often facilitated by those who are tasked with regulating them? Will he also look at democratic accountability not just in the appointments of officials, but more widely in the NHS?
Stephen Barclay
I referred earlier to my desire to work on these issues with members of the Health Committee, who include my hon. Friend, and I shall be happy to look into the points that he has raised. The previous statement was about the culture in the House of Commons. I think that what goes to the heart of my hon. Friend’s question and the matters that we are discussing is that issue of culture, and the need for the culture in pockets of the NHS to change. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has done a great deal to bring about such change, particularly in respect of patient safety, but I shall be happy to work with my hon. Friend to take that further.
Fiona Bruce (Congleton) (Con)
What lessons can be learnt by Liverpool Community Trust—and, indeed, by other underperforming trusts—from the successful turnaround of some 20 trusts under the Government’s new special measures scheme?
Stephen Barclay
My hon. Friend is right: although 37 trusts have gone into special measures, a significant number have not just moved out of special measures, but moved from “room for improvement” to “good”. That is relevant to a much wider challenge in the NHS, whether it involves procurement, workforce planning, or mentoring for junior doctors. I met the family of a junior doctor last week to discuss mentoring and support, particularly for those in their first year out of medical college. Trusts have shown leadership on a number of issues, and I think that the special measures regime has shown the scope to spread that best practice much more widely across the system.
Michelle Donelan (Chippenham) (Con)
I agree with the Minister that it is vital for us to expose and tackle failings in the NHS, especially when they put people at risk of harm. Does he agree with me that this case highlights the fact that money is not always the only answer? Effective leadership and responsible management are also important.
Stephen Barclay
My hon. Friend is right. I think that at the heart of Dr Kirkup’s findings was the conclusion that what drove these events was not money—and he made that point specifically in relation to the finance for the initial services—but the desire to seek foundation trust status, which led to a wholly unrealistic cost improvement plan and an unwillingness to address the issues that arose as a consequence.
Damien Moore (Southport) (Con)
I thank my constituency neighbour, the hon. Member for West Lancashire (Rosie Cooper), for all the work that she has done on this issue.
As has already been said, it is important for the right culture to exist in our NHS. However, it is also important for those who compromise patient safety to be brought to book and punished, and for us to know what action was taken, because otherwise the same thing will keep happening.
Stephen Barclay
My hon. Friend is right. Professor Ted Baker, the chief inspector of hospitals, has drawn attention one of Dr Kirkup’s findings, which is that the CQC is now in a much better position to challenge and fine those responsible for unsafe care and poor standards. That also reflects the excellent work that Professor Baker and his team have been doing to ensure that inspections become much more rigorous in identifying issues such as those that we have been discussing today.
John Howell (Henley) (Con)
I am a member of the Justice Committee, which has taken a particular interest in Liverpool prison. Will my hon. Friend assure me that there will be a review of the suicidal potential of prisoners to ensure that the systems are right?
Stephen Barclay
My hon. Friend is right to allude to the importance of learning lessons, especially given that there are many vulnerable people in prisons, and given the risks that accrue as a result. Yesterday I spoke to the Under-Secretary of State for Justice, my hon. Friend the Member for Bracknell (Dr Lee), who is responsible for offender management issues, and the Prisons Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Penrith and The Border (Rory Stewart), visited Liverpool prison last week. I know that they have both taken a great interest in the report, and that they will take any further action that is needed.
Tom Pursglove (Corby) (Con)
Does my hon. Friend envisage an ongoing oversight role for Dr Kirkup that would enable him to help to put these failures right?
Stephen Barclay
I should be happy to discuss any such future opportunities with Dr Kirkup. His excellent report builds on the work that he did at Morecambe, and I think there is a huge amount for us to take forward from its findings.
Oral Answers to Questions
Steve Barclay Excerpts(6 years, 10 months ago)
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Melanie Onn (Great Grimsby) (Lab)
The Minister of State, Department of Health and Social Care (Stephen Barclay)
In the past 12 months, the average waiting time for patients to start consultant-led treatment at hospitals in northern Lincolnshire and Goole was about nine weeks. We recognise that some trusts face particular challenges with their waiting lists due to rising demand. That is why a package of support, including a system-wide improvement board, has been established within the trust.
Melanie Onn
The statistics that the Minister has given are very interesting. The Library has said that there is an average wait of 32 weeks—far longer than the nine weeks that he mentioned—and that it is six weeks longer in 2017 than it was in 2016. This is happening on his watch. What is he going to do? My constituents do not accept that it is good enough.
Stephen Barclay
I think the hon. Lady prepared her follow-up before hearing the answer. There is an improvement board established within the trust, chaired by NHS Improvement, that is tasked with reducing waiting times and ensuring that the standard is improved. Currently, the average time waited is 11 weeks for out-patients and seven weeks for in-patients.
Martin Vickers (Cleethorpes) (Con)
Will the Minister give an assurance that the support that NHS Improvement is giving to the trust will continue? He will know that this is the second time that the trust has been in special measures, and clearly we need continuing support. Will he also assure us that he will visit the trust—a promise that was made by his predecessor?
Stephen Barclay
My hon. Friend is right to point out the need to give support to this trust. That is why a wider package of £1.6 billion of funding has been given to the NHS to improve accident and emergency and elective care performance. Alongside that, we have specific work through NHS Improvement to address some of the particular issues that he alluded to in his trust.
Karin Smyth (Bristol South) (Lab)
The Minister of State, Department of Health and Social Care (Stephen Barclay)
There are no plans to hold discussions with the Chancellor of the Exchequer on the VAT status of NHS trusts.
Karin Smyth
I am grateful for that reply, although I suggest it ought to be reconsidered. NHS trusts desperate to avoid financial difficulties appear to have found a new magic money tree: setting up wholly owned subsidiaries to avoid paying substantial amounts of tax to the Treasury. Rather than encouraging this tax dodging and further fragmenting the NHS, why do the Secretary of State and his friend the Chancellor not either ban this practice or agree to let them all have the VAT exemptions?
Stephen Barclay
The Department wrote to all NHS and foundation trusts in September 2017 to remind them that tax avoidance schemes should not be entered into in any circumstances, but the hon. Lady makes a slightly strange point. She seems to be arguing that NHS hospitals are, in essence, paying too much tax to the Treasury, rather than having that money within the NHS. These subsidiaries are 100% owned by trusts themselves.
Sir Christopher Chope (Christchurch) (Con)
The Government have already legislated for but not implemented a proposal to introduce a £95,000 limit on exit payments for public servants in the NHS. Would it not be sensible, in the meantime, to charge NHS trusts VAT on any exit payments in excess of £95,000 to deter this waste of public resources?
Stephen Barclay
I admire how the VAT element of the original question was brought into a discussion of exit payments. As my hon. Friend will be well aware, I visited the issue of exit payments frequently as a member of the Public Accounts Committee, and I am happy to discuss it further with him.
Neil Parish (Tiverton and Honiton) (Con)
Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab)
The Minister of State, Department of Health and Social Care (Stephen Barclay)
It is interesting, looking at the comparisons, to see that the NHS in Wales appears to have changed a number of them, to make it more difficult to compare performance between England and Wales. The more scrutiny there is of the performance in Wales—where clinicians say that the best performance often equates to the worst performance in England—the more we will see the need for serious changes in the way in which the NHS delivers its services in Wales.
Paul Scully (Sutton and Cheam) (Con)
In Sutton, we have hugely exciting plans for a London cancer hub, working with the Royal Marsden Hospital and the Institute of Cancer Research, on a single campus to provide a global centre for cancer innovation that will in turn provide a huge boost for our local economy, including 13,000 new jobs. Will the Minister join me in Sutton to see the opportunity at first hand? Will he also tell us how such a project can help to deliver on our Government’s life sciences strategy?
Joan Ryan (Enfield North) (Lab)
Stephen Barclay
The King’s Fund has said that STPs offer the best hope for the NHS and its partners to sustain and transform the delivery of healthcare, so the King’s Fund endorses this recommendation. As the right hon. Lady will know, we announced an additional £325 million of capital funding in the spring Budget to invest in local areas, and in the autumn Budget we committed an additional £10 billion package of capital investment over this Parliament.
George Freeman (Mid Norfolk) (Con)
Last week, our former colleague Tessa, now Baroness, Jowell gave an inspiring speech about her battle with brain cancer. At this first Health questions after that speech, I am sure that colleagues will join me in paying tribute to her work and will agree that she spoke with courage, grace and the desire to make her suffering prevent others from having to go through the same. Will the Secretary of State assure me that last week’s report from the brain cancer research taskforce, which I set up as a Minister, will be taken seriously in the Department and that everything will be done to ensure that brain cancer, which has been something of a Cinderella for years, receives the support and funding that it deserves so that Tessa’s words were not in vain?
Rosie Cooper (West Lancashire) (Lab)
Stephen Barclay
The hon. Lady highlights an important point about the variance in performance between trusts and how we look at some of the lessons from, for example, Lords Carter’s work on efficiency, rotas and how to maximise the value of funding. I am happy to consider her specific point, but she is right that how we manage the patient pathway, in particular the 43% of hospital beds occupied by 5% of patients, is a key challenge.
Mr Gary Streeter (South West Devon) (Con)
For the first time ever in Devon and Plymouth, GP practices are struggling to recruit new doctors and new partners in particular and are spending a fortune on locums as a result. The Government have a plan to fix the situation by 2020, but what more can be done in the meantime to ensure that my constituents can access primary care services?
Tom Pursglove (Corby) (Con)
It is very positive that Corby clinical commissioning group has announced that core urgent care services will be protected in Corby, along with the announced new GP access and new primary care facilities, but will the Minister join me in keeping a close eye on the CCG as it designs the new access arrangements? People need to be able to access those urgent care services at the right place, at the right time and without delay.
Stephen Barclay
My hon. Friend is right to draw attention to the funding going into Corby, and it is a tribute to his campaigning as a constituency MP that there is such progress on that measure. I am happy to look at the specific issue. It is important that the CCG continues to consult both Members of Parliament and the public as it takes that work forward.
Stephen Morgan (Portsmouth South) (Lab)
Stephen Barclay
I am very happy to confirm my hon. Friend’s observation. It is absolutely about improving services. This proposal for a new hyper-acute stroke unit in Basildon will ensure there are specialist nurses and doctors available to manage patients at all times, which very much draws on the lessons from London, where we consolidated stroke services and where health outcomes were improved and lives were saved.
Laura Pidcock (North West Durham) (Lab)
Lucy Allan (Telford) (Con)
In Shropshire, we have had four years of confusion on the future of our two hospitals. Will the Secretary of State tell the people of Shropshire whether there is Government funding for the proposed reconfiguration of the county’s hospitals?
Stephen Barclay
As my hon. Friend will be aware, we announced further funding in the Budget and the autumn statement. On the specifics of Telford, which she has raised on a number of occasions, I am very happy to have further discussions with her.
Helen Goodman (Bishop Auckland) (Lab)
Stephen Barclay
I am not aware of the specific case the hon. Lady highlights, but I am happy to look at it and to understand why she feels the rents are disproportionately high. This relates to the point I made earlier in response to the hon. Member for West Lancashire (Rosie Cooper), which was about the variance in the system and how we ensure that we obtain best value for money. The reality of the debate on health is that the Labour party simply sees it in terms of how much is put in, whereas Conservative Members recognise that we need to both invest more in the NHS and make sure we get the best outcomes. That is the key dividing line between the parties.
Rachel Maclean (Redditch) (Con)
For six years, the people of Redditch have endured a painful consultation on their hospital, the Alex, which has dragged on and on. As a result, they have lost maternity and children’s emergency services, even though nobody wanted that when they were consulted. People have taken the pain, but when will they get the gain? When will they see the urgent care centre? When will the £29 million be spent on the Alex?
Stephen Barclay
There are good plans in place for getting Worcestershire Acute Hospitals NHS Trust and the Alex, specifically, out of special measures. A package of support is in place to enable the trust to improve its quality of care. Delivery of the acute service redesign plan is a key driver to sustaining services in the medium term and £29.6 million of STP funding has been agreed to support that.
Stephen Timms (East Ham) (Lab)
At the weekend, NHS England, as my colleagues have pointed out, gave up on the key A&E waiting time target. Does the Minister agree that it is very important that when people go to A&E they do not have to wait longer than four hours, as more than 2.5 million did last year? Whose responsibility is this delivery failure?
Mr Philip Dunne (Ludlow) (Con)
I congratulate the Secretary of State on securing the £10 billion capital commitment in the Budget at the end of the last year to spend on the NHS. May I take advantage of my position on these Benches to urge him for the next allocation of STP funding to adopt the advice of my hon. Friend the Member for Telford (Lucy Allan) and ensure that the Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust gets the Future Fit funding it needs?
Stephen Barclay
May I first pay tribute to my hon. Friend for the work he did in the Department and the high esteem in which he was held by those working in the NHS? On Shrewsbury and Telford, I very much appreciate the importance of the reconfiguration of the trust. We expect a decision shortly on that, although I am not in a position to announce it today.
Lucy Powell (Manchester Central) (Lab/Co-op)
The Secretary of State will be aware of the huge disruption at the Manchester hospitals this week because of problems with water supplies and a big water leak. He might also be aware that Emmeline Pankhurst’s home is on the site of the Manchester hospitals. What conversations has he had with United Utilities and other water companies to ensure that we have safe, constant supplies of water to our hospitals, so that these disruptions do not happen?
NHS Winter Crisis
Steve Barclay Excerpts(6 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Urgent Questions are proposed each morning by backbench MPs, and up to two may be selected each day by the Speaker. Chosen Urgent Questions are announced 30 minutes before Parliament sits each day.
Each Urgent Question requires a Government Minister to give a response on the debate topic.
This information is provided by Parallel Parliament and does not comprise part of the offical record
Jonathan Ashworth (Leicester South) (Lab/Co-op)
(Urgent Question): To ask the Secretary of State for Health if he will make a statement on the Government’s response to the resolution of the House of 10 January on the NHS winter crisis.
The Minister of State, Department of Health and Social Care (Stephen Barclay)
Winter is challenging for health services worldwide. With a high number of flu cases this year, we have seen an increase of about 35% in accident and emergency attendances for flu—triple what it was last year—with about 3,000 hospital beds occupied as a result of flu and a further 700 because of norovirus. The NHS saw 1,200 more patients at A&E compared with this time last year. The guidance issued by the national emergency pressures panel sought to free up capacity for emergencies given the high number of flu cases, including from two dominant strains of flu co-circulating this year.
It is important to remind the House that the deferment of operations referred to in that guidance applies to about 13% of hospital beds dealing with elective patients, of which about half were protected within the guidance in respect of cancer and other urgent elective treatments. The guidance was updated on 26 January to confirm that further deferment of hospital operations is no longer needed. In terms of the impact that the guidance has had on operations, we will not know that until mid-March, when that data will be published and placed in the Library for the benefit of those on both sides of the House.
Jonathan Ashworth
I welcome the new Minister to his place. However, the Secretary of State should have been here giving an oral statement, because those were the terms of the motion endorsed by the whole House.
The reason that motion was endorsed is that this winter, in recent weeks, over 95% of hospital beds have been full, we have seen the highest-ever number of A&E diverts, 50,000 elective operations have been cancelled, and urgent operations have been cancelled too. The crisis that our NHS is now in is so deep, and the underfunding so severe, that on Friday NHS England was forced to announce that the target of seeing 95% of A&E patients within four hours is now effectively abandoned until March 2019. If the Secretary of State had come to the House last Thursday, he could have been questioned on the NHS guidance.
Last year, more than 2.5 million patients waited longer than they should have done in A&E. Does the Minister expect that number to rise or fall this year? The 18-week target has already been abandoned. Is it not unprecedented that patients will have to accept, even before the financial year starts, that the NHS will not deliver on key constitutional standards of care? The waiting time standards are legal duties contained in the NHS constitution. What legal advice have Ministers received, or will they be seeking to amend the NHS constitution?
On Saturday, thousands of us took to the streets to demand a fully-funded, universal public national health service—and by the way, we will take no lessons from Donald Trump, who wants to deny healthcare to millions with a system that checks your purse before it checks your pulse. The NHS model is not broke but it does need funding. If this Government will not give it the funding it needs, then the next Labour Government will.
Stephen Barclay
A party preparing for a run on the pound will be in no place to give funding to the NHS. It is the agreed convention of the House that responses to Opposition day debates are provided by the Department within 12 weeks. The Secretary of State will of course do that within that period, and there is a good reason for that. As I set out in my opening remarks, the data will not be available until mid-March, so the hon. Member for Leicester South (Jonathan Ashworth) is premature in asking this urgent question.
The facts are that the NHS was better prepared for winter this year. The number of 111 calls dealt with by a clinician has doubled compared with last year. Over 1 million more people have been vaccinated for the flu virus, 99% of A&Es have GP streaming and over 3,000 more beds have been made available since November, reflecting the extent of the plan.
Stephen Barclay
If the hon. Gentleman would like to compare with the performance of the NHS in Wales, we will undertake a comparison. The reality is that this year, we have had pressure on the NHS as a result of flu. The difference is that in 2009, the Conservative party did not play politics with the flu pressures. This year, the hon. Member for Leicester South has done so. He should compare it with the pressure in Wales and see the excellent performance we have had in comparison.
Dr Sarah Wollaston (Totnes) (Con)
The Minister will know that pressures in the NHS cannot be viewed in isolation from pressures in the community. It is great to see that he is now part of a Department of Health and Social Care. Will he say what is being done about making beds available in the community, to free up pressures in the NHS?
Stephen Barclay
My hon. Friend, the Chair of the Health Select Committee, makes a valid point about the need for much more integration in our approach to the NHS. That is reflected in the appointment of my hon. Friend the Member for Gosport (Caroline Dinenage) as the Minister for Care, to look at that exact point.
Part of it is also looking at how we address other areas to deliver better outcomes. For example, 43% of bed occupancy at present is from just 5% of patients—those staying over 21 days. One key issue is how we bring down the current average stay from 40 days to, say, 35 days. That alone would unlock around 5,000 beds. We are looking at a more integrated model to address the pathways that I know my hon. Friend has highlighted in the Health Committee as a key priority.
David Linden (Glasgow East) (SNP)
Scottish National party Members want, first and foremost, to put on record our thanks to NHS staff. A number of members of my family work for the NHS. I spent time with them at the weekend, and we got that time because they were working over the Christmas period. We know that Christmas and the winter period has been profoundly challenging due to flu, but it is important that resources follow that. That is why we have record funding support for the NHS in Scotland and NHS Scotland A&E departments are the best performing in the UK.
Last week, the Scottish Parliament voted to abolish the public sector pay cap and to look at bringing in a 3% pay increase for our public sector workers. That is action, rather than warm words. Far too often we hear warm words from this Government, but in the national health service we need to see action, particularly on the public sector pay cap. What steps is the Minister taking to tackle wage stagnation within the national health service?
Stephen Barclay
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his more mature approach, in recognising the huge amount of work performed by NHS staff. Indeed, as I pointed out, 1,200 more people a day are being treated in A&E, which reflects how much more is being done in our NHS with more resource, more money, more doctors, more nurses and more paramedics.
In terms of the specifics on money, the Government have given £1.6 billion to support performance improvements, which will be used to treat a quarter of a million more patients in 2018-19. The NHS planning guidance also shows that it expects performance to improve in the face of growing demand. That shows how more is being done, and more needs to be done.
Michelle Donelan (Chippenham) (Con)
All over the world, every winter sees a spike in illness and pressures on healthcare. Does the Minister agree that this Government have been proactive? In fact, for the first time ever, care home staff can receive vaccinations for free.
Stephen Barclay
My hon. Friend is right to highlight the importance of vaccinations. This year we have seen 1 million more vaccinations than last year, which is part of addressing the demand on A&E. The number of 111 calls dealt with by clinicians has more than doubled, which has mitigated much of the demand from the flu virus.
Sir Vince Cable (Twickenham) (LD)
In the light of the funding problems exposed by the winter crisis, what is the Government’s response to the recommendation of the last chief executive of the NHS, the heads of the Royal College of Nursing and the Royal College of General Practitioners and the retiring head of the Treasury that there has to be a form of earmarked taxation to provide stable, sustainable funding?
Stephen Barclay
Addressing the challenge of funding was reflected in the Budget, with the additional money set aside by my right hon. Friend the Chancellor. On the comments of Simon Stevens, it is important to note what he said about the connection between a strong economy and delivering the finance that the NHS needs. Simon Stevens said:
“It has been true for the 68 years of the NHS’s history that when the British economy sneezes the NHS catches a cold.”
The reality is that if we are to fund the NHS as all of us want it to be funded, we need to ensure that there is a strong economy and only one party will ensure that that happens.
Sir Desmond Swayne (New Forest West) (Con)
If we restore the beds to Milford-on-Sea lost under Labour, it will reduce the pressure on Southampton General, will it not?
Stephen Barclay
My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. The other issue that puts pressure on beds and hospital finances is many of the legacy private finance initiative deals. We also inherited those deals from the Opposition, which they very rarely seem to want to talk about.
Luciana Berger (Liverpool, Wavertree) (Lab/Co-op)
Will the Minister tell the House why, on Friday, NHS England suspended the requirement for A&E patients to be seen within four hours until 2019, contrary to the NHS constitution, and will he amend the NHS constitution to reflect this advice?
Stephen Barclay
I thought the hon. Lady was going to stand up to reflect on the fact that her trust got £2.9 million of additional funding from what the Chancellor set about doing. The reality is that this Government are putting more money into the NHS and addressing the demands on the system.
Simon Hoare (North Dorset) (Con)
May I ask my hon. Friend what scope there is as we go forward for conversations between his Department, NHS England and NHS trusts about maximising staff numbers in acute settings in our hospitals during the winter months?
Stephen Barclay
We are in discussion with Health Education England on workforce planning and ensuring that we address concerns about retention and training, part of which is the fact that the Chancellor has lifted the 1% cap as it applies within the health service, and we are of course in active discussions with the trade unions on that point.
Heidi Alexander (Lewisham East) (Lab)
It has been reported to me that out of the 17 cubicles at Lewisham A&E one morning last November, five people were awaiting section with severe mental health problems. One person was there for over 72 hours, another for over 26 hours and another for over 21 hours, and all were there for over four hours. When will the Minister acknowledge that the reason why A&Es cannot cope is that the entire system—from social care and GPs through to mental health—is buckling under the enormous pressure of increasing demand, and when is the NHS going to get the funding it needs?
Stephen Barclay
I have already said that I recognise there is increasing demand, and set out many of the measures we are taking through the 111 service and other areas. The hon. Lady’s own trust has received an additional £3.2 million to address many of those pressures, and the key question is how that will be deployed by the trust to address many of the blockages in the pathways at the moment.
Mr Marcus Jones (Nuneaton) (Con)
Despite the challenges this winter, does my hon. Friend not agree that we can be extremely proud in this country that we have an NHS free at the point of delivery to all of our citizens? Will he confirm that that will continue to be the policy of this Government, and does he agree with me that we should not listen to the voices from across the Atlantic saying we should adopt a different system?
Stephen Barclay
I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend that the NHS will remain free at the point of delivery. The reality is that for the majority of the NHS’s existence, it has been run by the Conservative party. We know the value of retaining healthcare free at the point of delivery, and the Secretary of State has repeatedly reaffirmed his absolute commitment to that.
Tracy Brabin (Batley and Spen) (Lab/Co-op)
In my constituency surgery, two sisters came to speak to me about their father, who went to hospital last month. Because the staff were so overstretched, he was placed in the wrong ward, so he did not get seen by a doctor for four days. Will the Minister reassure the sisters, and will he will pause the downgrade of Huddersfield Royal Infirmary and rethink this so that the winter crisis does not become a daily crisis in the NHS?
Stephen Barclay
As the hon. Lady knows, local commissioning decisions are for the clinical commissioning group and local commissioners, but again, not one Opposition Member has recognised the additional funding that has gone in. Her own trust received an additional £3.4 million—[Interruption.] Well, it never is enough for the hon. Lady. The question is, how, with the economic mismanagement under their party, Labour Members are ever going to deliver what they want? Her trust received an additional £3.4 million to address the pressures.
Matt Warman (Boston and Skegness) (Con)
Not only are this Government increasing the funding available to the NHS; crucially, they are also training more doctors, with 1,500 more medical school places. Does my hon. Friend agree that that is not only a crucial factor that will address areas such as Lincolnshire, which are under-doctored, but another reason to put a medical school in Lincolnshire?
Stephen Barclay
I very much note my hon. Friend’s bid for further training places, and he is absolutely right: there has been a 25% increase in the number of places. That is part of ensuring that we have more doctors, nurses and paramedics, which this Government have put in, to address the increasing demand that the NHS faces.
Jenny Chapman (Darlington) (Lab)
Given that, according to Age UK, one in three older people admitted to hospital is suffering from malnutrition, will the Minister now accept that cuts to adult social care are putting an avoidable and increasing strain on the NHS?
Stephen Barclay
What the hon. Lady’s question points to is how we better integrate care as between hospitals and the care sector. That is exactly the issue that the Minister of State, my hon. Friend the Member for Gosport (Caroline Dinenage), who has responsibility for care, is looking at in the Department, to ensure better outcomes from the money being put into the system.
Andrew Selous (South West Bedfordshire) (Con)
Will the Minister join me in praising the foresight, dedication and hard work of the staff and management of Luton and Dunstable, which was the first hospital to bring in A&E streaming and now regularly and comfortably achieves the 95% target? Does he agree that we need to be better at moving best practice in the NHS around the whole system more quickly?
Stephen Barclay
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. What he points to is the variance in performance between some of the best trusts, such as Luton and Dunstable, and other trusts. One of the key challenges is how we ensure that that best practice is better socialised across the NHS, because unlike Labour we recognise that it is not just about how much money we put into the NHS; it is what we get out for that money. Luton and Dunstable illustrates that point, and more trusts need to follow suit.
Alex Cunningham (Stockton North) (Lab)
North Tees Hospital staff are doing a great job of dealing with the winter crisis, but even they have been struggling this year. The trust says it is going to record its first ever deficit, because it cannot make the £18 million cuts demanded by the Government. Is the answer really to deprive it of more money or to have it set up a wholly owned subsidiary company to cut the terms and conditions of future staff?
Stephen Barclay
The hon. Gentleman’s trust has received an additional £1.6 million, so it is simply factually incorrect to say that its budget has been cut.
Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)
May I thank my hon. Friend the hospitals Minister for the extra £2.6 million given to Kettering General Hospital to help it to cope with winter pressures this year; and, through him, my I congratulate the NHS on this year undertaking the most comprehensive flu vaccination programme in Europe and the largest in this country’s history?
Stephen Barclay
My hon. Friend is an assiduous campaigner for his constituency, and he is absolutely right to highlight both the progress made and the importance of the prevention offered through the increased number of vaccinations. I hope many more people next year will continue to take up the vaccination, including Members of this House.
Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)
Does the Minister not realise that 14,000 beds have been taken out of the national health service on this Government’s watch? People are now being treated in ambulances, which is a disgrace. Is he not taking us back to the Major Government of the 1990s, when people were sleeping on trolleys?
Stephen Barclay
Again, the hon. Gentleman is ignoring the increase in the number of doctors. There are now 14,900 more doctors and 14,200 more nurses in the system. As I alluded to earlier, it is not just the number of beds; it is also how we manage those beds. It is how we manage the fact that 5% of the patient population is occupying 43% of beds that will best address bed occupancy rates.
Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)
I strongly welcome the extra investment in Essex and Harlow in terms of the winter crisis in the national health service, and I very much hope we get a 10-year plan, as suggested by the Secretary of State. Is my hon. Friend aware of the difficulties that Harlow Hospital faces, in that we have among the highest A&E figures per head in England and a hospital that is literally falling down and not fit for purpose, as recognised by the Department? Will he visit the hospital to see what can be done to help us in our campaign for a brand-new hospital for Harlow?
Stephen Barclay
As my right hon. Friend knows, the challenge at Harlow is recognised by the Department. That is why, from memory, its outline business case has been approved and it is now going through the next phase in terms of getting the final business case approved. I am very happy, as always, to discuss the progress of Harlow with my right hon. Friend.
Gareth Snell (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Lab/Co-op)
Before the Minister seeks to deflect my question by telling me how much extra my trust has got—his Parliamentary Private Secretary is diligently looking that up at this moment—let me tell him that I am aware of how much we received: £1.1 million. However, I can also tell him that winter cost us £11 million, so there is still a £10 million cost to our trust budget.
However, there is a double hit, because my hospital will be hit by fines as a result of missing A&E targets and handling targets for ambulances, with £120 per missed four-hour target, £1,000 per missed 12-hour target and £200 for each ambulance affected. Will the Minister make sure that those fines are not levied by clinical commissioning groups, and that that money stays where it is needed, which is in frontline care?
Stephen Barclay
Again, the hon. Gentleman is ignoring the huge number of measures that have been put in place. As Sir Bruce Keogh himself recognised, there was much more planning this year at a much earlier stage. We have had better integration between NHS England and NHS Improvement. We have had a much more comprehensive planning cycle. We have had better access to primary care, reducing pressure on the front door. We have had stronger action on delayed discharges, addressing issues at the back door. We have had changes to the way ambulance services respond to calls, so there is better prioritisation. We have also had financial incentives focused on A&E performance, so there is a huge range of measures, in addition, as I said earlier, to 1 million more people being vaccinated against flu. Those are all part of the actions taken by this Government to prepare and plan for the pressure of the flu issue we have had to manage.
Kevin Foster (Torbay) (Con)
While my constituents will welcome the £1.1 million of extra winter funding, they do not want to believe that this issue is decided purely by knockabout in the House of Commons, which is what some others wish to focus on. Will the Minister reassure me that he will look for independent clinical advice on how to deal with pressures in the NHS and then base his response on that advice?
Stephen Barclay
My hon. Friend is right. There is a desire among Labour Members to avoid the reality of what is happening in Wales, where clinicians said that their best performance is often akin to the worst performance in England. However, we recognise that there needs to be much more integration in the system. That is why the Minister of State, my hon. Friend the Member for Gosport, is looking at how we have better integration in the NHS and the community in terms of domiciliary care, and at how we address some of the issues in the pipeline—the pathways—in hospitals to get a better flow, so that the discharging of patients is not delayed. Much progress has been made, but we recognise that more needs to be done.
Diana Johnson (Kingston upon Hull North) (Lab)
We all knew this was going to be a difficult winter for the NHS, but I just wondered whether the Minister felt that his Department had helped the situation by delaying the announcement of additional funds until the November Budget, with most trusts not receiving that money until December. That meant that my trust, for example, had to make plans without knowing whether it would get additional funding and that it was taking a risk.
Stephen Barclay
The Labour party seems to have moved from complaining about the amount of money to complaining that it was not delivered early enough. The hon. Lady’s trust received £3.4 million of additional money, but, as Sir Bruce Keogh has made clear, the point is that preparation for winter this year began much earlier than normal and was far better advanced than has been the case before. That is what the medical director of the NHS has said about how we prepared for winter this year.
Bill Grant (Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock) (Con)
Could I reflect on the rather rosy picture that my colleague from the Scottish National party, the hon. Member for Glasgow East (David Linden), painted of the NHS in Scotland? We have poor waiting times at A&Es, we are closing a paediatric ward in Paisley, and the chemotherapy unit at Station 15 in Ayr is under threat. Does the Minister think that having the highest tax base in the United Kingdom is a threat to recruitment in NHS Scotland, and that higher taxes in Scotland might play to the advantage of NHS England?
Stephen Barclay
My hon. Friend points to a key point that I have made throughout this session. It is not just about how much money is put into the NHS, but about the outcomes that are delivered as a result. He is right to allude to the fact that in Scotland the SNP has not delivered the improvements it promised on the NHS. That is why there is so much dissatisfaction in Scotland with what is happening in the NHS there.
Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)
It is not just integration that will solve the problems in the social care sector. In Trafford, social care providers are being promised £14.61 an hour from this April—well short of what we need to sustain the home care market. What will the Minister do to ensure that there is adequate funding for home care providers?
Stephen Barclay
The hon. Lady raises a very valid point. It is exactly why we will have a Green Paper this summer looking at what steps need to be taken to address this issue. On both sides of the House, we recognise that more needs to be done on how we address these concerns, and that is what the Green Paper will tackle.
Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)
I am sure that the Minister did not mean to mislead the House regarding the impact of the flu epidemic on our A&Es, so will he confirm that the delays to people being treated in A&E, and the fact that people have been waiting on trollies in corridors and that ambulances have been queueing at the doors of A&E, predated the flu epidemic?
Stephen Barclay
The hon. Gentleman makes quite a serious allegation of my misleading the House. What I was very clear about is that there has been a 35% increase in attendances at A&E as a result of flu this year compared with last year, and that around 3,000 beds are currently occupied by patients with flu and around 700 beds are occupied by those with norovirus. Clearly, that has resulted in significant seasonal pressures this year, which have placed strain on the system. That was recognised by the Government in the additional funding that was put in place. It was recognised by the NHS, as Sir Bruce Keogh set out in the early planning that was undertaken, and it is simply wrong for the hon. Gentleman to ignore the impact of flu this year, given the way that in 2009 the then Opposition were very responsible in recognising its impact.
Margaret Greenwood (Wirral West) (Lab)
Can the Minister confirm that accountable care organisations, accountable care services and place-based care are being rebranded as integrated care services? Will he explain whether there is actually any difference between those terms, and will he do all he can to ensure that Members in this House are given the opportunity to scrutinise them, as I believe that they are here to act as a Trojan horse to bring in the break-up and privatisation of the national health service?
Stephen Barclay
We continually hear this myth about privatisation. The reality is that this Government appointed to run NHS England, first, Sir David Nicholson, who had previously been appointed by the Labour party, and then Sir Simon Stevens, who has worked for both sides of the House. Numbers show that the level of private healthcare provision has not changed this year compared with last year. I understand that the Health Committee is due to look into ACOs and integration within a matter of weeks as part of its deliberations, and I very much look forward to reading the conclusions in that Committee’s report.
Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab)
The programme to reduce acute hospital services and close blue-light A&Es, like that at Charing Cross Hospital, is about to undergo its fourth change of name in five years—“Shaping a healthier future,” “sustainability and transformation,” “accountable care,” and “integrated care”. Would it not be better to reconsider that policy, which is being driven not by local clinicians, but by his Department?
Stephen Barclay
The impression given by the hon. Gentleman is that he always seems to oppose reconfiguration of any sort. The reality is that most clinicians will say, “We do need to reconfigure. We do need to look at how services are operated.” The evidence of that can be seen within London in terms of the reconfiguration of stroke, which from memory, he opposed—
Stephen Barclay
If the hon. Gentleman did not oppose it, I will happily correct that, but he will recognise that the reconfiguration of stroke in London to fewer sites significantly improved outcomes for patients. There is always a discussion to be had about how reconfiguration operates, but clinicians and the royal colleges recognise that the benefits of reconfiguration are better outcomes for patients as well as better outcomes for the NHS.
East of England Ambulance Service NHS Trust
Steve Barclay Excerpts(6 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Minister of State, Department of Health and Social Care (Stephen Barclay)
First, I wish to thank the right hon. Member for North Norfolk (Norman Lamb) for securing this debate. I recognise the concerns raised about the East of England Ambulance Service, including questions about whether delays to ambulance responses have caused additional harm to patients over the Christmas period, and his concerns about the leadership of the trust and the role of the CQC. I assure him that I am taking these allegations seriously, both as a Minister and, as he knows, as a constituency Member of Parliament in the East of England. I have put in place a number of actions to immediately ensure improvements to services are put in place by the trust.
As the right hon. Gentleman will be aware, a risk summit was held this week, on Tuesday 30 January, which examined whether the service is operating effectively now and sought to put in place any required actions to improve it going forward. I have spoken personally to the chief executives of NHS England and NHS Improvement, and to the chair of the risk summit. I will expand on the findings further, but I wish to emphasise that a wide-ranging plan of immediate actions has been put in place to address the issues that were identified. Details of the action plan have been published today and a progress meeting in two weeks will be led by NHS Improvement and NHS England. I agree with the right hon. Gentleman about the accessibility of the trust leadership in respect of the chief executive and the chair making themselves available for media bids. I have communicated that to the trust.
I recognise that the right hon. Gentleman is concerned about the overall approach of the trust’s senior management and about the level of external assurance from the CQC. In addition to the action plan identified at the risk summit, which was attended by other external parties including NHS England and NHS Improvement, I have gone further by asking NHS Improvement’s executive medical director, Kathy McLean, to provide her own assurance to Ministers in the coming week. That will assess the immediate steps taken to address the concerns expressed in the House and whether actions suggested in the earlier external reports have been implemented. Alongside that, I am happy to have further discussions with the right hon. Gentleman about his specific point about the Association of Ambulance Chief Executives.
I am assured that, where there were serious delays in response times, the trust has identified all potential causes. Following an initial investigation, it is examining 22 such cases through the serious incident procedure. That will ensure that individual cases are properly investigated. The hon. Member for Peterborough (Fiona Onasanya) mentioned a specific case and we are determined to ensure that that is addressed. I am happy to discuss that with her further.
In terms of the report mentioned by the right hon. Member for North Norfolk, which was previously commissioned for the trust, I am happy to update the House and say that the report should be published as soon as possible. Again, that is an issue I will follow up.
Let me turn to the specific actions arising from the risk summit. I am advised that actions to deliver immediate service improvements are being taken forward under the following themes: ensuring that the trust has sufficient capacity for the rest of winter; the effective implementation of handover delay policy with hospitals; the proper execution of REAP level measures; staff access to executive leadership; sound escalation procedures; bringing in independent assurance around the serious incident investigation procedures; working with CCGs and other stakeholders to manage demand for ambulance services; and the full exploitation of emergency service collaboration with police and fire. As a result of those actions, to help to manage winter demand the trust will put eight additional vehicles on the road each day until Easter, with immediate effect.
Improvements will also be made to the trust’s adherence to the national REAP guidelines, and actions will be taken to moderate service pressures, which will allow the trust to de-escalate to REAP level 2. The trust is also working with hospitals to ensure adherence to the national guidance on handover delays, particularly where ambulances waiting to hand patients over receive a new 999 call, which was a specific point that the right hon. Gentleman raised. I also assure him that we will work closely to monitor the outcomes of the work to ensure that safe, high-quality ambulance services continue to be provided to his constituents.
The right hon. Gentleman has also raised concerns that the trust has underspent on its funding while putting in place a hiring freeze. The trust has worked to grow its frontline workforce, fielding 700 more staff since 2014-15, and has achieved a low rate of staff turnover. However, like the right hon. Gentleman, I want further assurance that the trust’s staff plans are sufficient to meet the demands facing the city. I will raise that in my discussions with NHS Improvement.
Substantial local initiatives are under way to improve the trust’s performance. Importantly, more money is being invested in the service: its funding was increased by £90 million this year—an increase of 10%—and it will further increase by £27 million over the next two years. Other significant actions include the deployment of hospital ambulance liaison officers in emergency departments to help reduce the incidence of handover delays, and an independent review of the trust to ensure that it has the appropriate resources and processes to deliver against its performance standards. I will expand on these measures further, but it is worth considering them in the context of wider national initiatives to improve ambulance performance more generally.
As I stated in the House on 22 January, the NHS is busier than ever and the ambulance service is experiencing unprecedented demand, dealing with more than 11 million calls every year. There were almost 7 million face-to-face responses from the ambulance service in 2016-17, which is a 14% increase over the past five years. Under Sir Bruce Keogh’s review of the NHS urgent and emergency care system, ambulance services are being transferred into mobile treatment centres, making much greater use of “hear and treat”, which is treating patients over the phone, and “see and treat”, which is treating and discharging patients on the scene. In December, the East of England Ambulance Service NHS Trust resolved three out of 10 incidents on the scene without transporting a patient to A&E, freeing up resources to respond quickly to the patients with the most urgent needs.
Additionally, in July last year the Secretary of State approved a revision of operational and performance standards for ambulances following the ambulance response programme. These improvements have now been rolled out to all mainland ambulance trusts in England. The evidence behind this new framework is extensive, covering data collected from more than 14 million emergency 999 calls. The evaluation considered a number of key issues for the east of England, including prioritising responses to the sickest patients while helping to reduce long waits for ambulance responses, and ensuring that patients receive the most appropriate response for their condition. That being said, I do recognise that the trust’s performance against these standards needs to improve.
As I mentioned earlier, NHS England and NHS Improvement are working with the trust to help it to adapt to the new performance framework, and have also undertaken an independent service review of its operations. This review covers the trust’s demand and capacity modelling, staff recruitment and training, and its approach to pricing and contracting in order to enable it to meet the new ambulance response standards. The detail of this work is being finalised and will be presented to the trust board meeting in March.
With respect to the ambulance workforce, we are taking significant steps across the country to support staff. Compared to 2010, there are over 3,000 more paramedics in England. We agreed in December 2016 that NHS paramedics will be re-banded from band 5 to band 6 on the NHS pay scale. This moves paramedics significantly up the NHS salary structure, and helps to ensure that we are better able to recruit and retain staff in the future.
We are also working to support the trust in addressing issues with patient handovers to hospital trusts, which have been an issue in parts of the east of England. We are clear that handovers must take place within agreed timeframes, and we are supporting hospitals to ensure that improvements are made. As I noted earlier, the trust is working with hospitals to ensure adherence to the national guidance on handover delays. It has also deployed patient safety intervention teams to hospitals to undertake patient cohorting where significant hospital delays arise, as well as placing hospital ambulance liaison officers in emergency departments to help ambulance crews to respond more quickly to incoming calls.
Norman Lamb
I am conscious that the Minister is coming to the end of his contribution and that he is not able to respond, here and now, to all the issues I mentioned. Will he undertake to write to me on each and every one of the specific concerns that I raised, including the call for an independent governance review, so that we can get to the bottom of exactly what is happening?
Stephen Barclay
I am very happy to give the right hon. Gentleman that commitment. Like me, the right hon. Gentleman wants to get a grip of this issue to ensure that it is addressed. I very much hear the concerns that he and other Members have raised. I hope that he can take some comfort from the series of actions that have already been put in place, including the risk assurance and the commission to Ministers, that signal the seriousness with which this issue is being addressed.
I would like to restate that we are taking the right hon. Gentleman’s concerns seriously. I have outlined the measures already taken as a result of the risk summit, and I will closely monitor the situation to ensure that these actions are delivered on. We have also discussed the wider initiatives that we are undertaking to improve ambulance services nationally, as well as specific local actions to ensure that patients receive the highest quality of care.
Again, I thank the right hon. Gentleman for introducing this debate. I hope that he, and indeed other Members who have serious concerns about this issue, will continue to work with me on a cross-party basis to ensure that all our constituents get the service that they rightly expect.
Question put and agreed to.
Hospital Car Parking Charges
Steve Barclay Excerpts(6 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Minister of State, Department of Health and Social Care (Stephen Barclay)
May I begin by commending my right hon. Friend the Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon) for securing the debate? Members across the House recognise that he has campaigned assiduously on this issue for some time, as he has on many campaigns, and he has already had some success, as reflected in the Government guidelines issued in 2014. However, it is right, in the light of the concerns raised across the House, that the issue is revisited. This has been a very constructive debate, granted by the Backbench Business Committee, and I commend all Members who have contributed and informed the House of what is happening in their constituencies.
I do not think anyone in the House has any issue with the desirability of scrapping car parking charges. As English Members of Parliament—it is different for our Scottish National party colleagues—we all pay these charges, as the hon. Member for Great Grimsby (Melanie Onn) said in a constructive way. We all know that they are unpopular with our constituents and are a concern for staff working hard within the NHS.
As my right hon. Friend the Member for Hemel Hempstead (Sir Mike Penning) highlighted, the charges predate this Government. This issue has long been debated in the House, by parties on both sides. The issue is not the desirability of what is sought by my right hon. Friend the Member for Harlow. The issue is the execution and how it would be done in a way that does not have unintended consequences, and how those might be mitigated. I think we got a flavour of some of those unintended consequences in the constructive contributions made by Members on both sides of the House.
Implicit in the motion is the suggestion that car parking charges apply in all NHS hospitals. It is not in the specific wording, but the impression from the debate has been that they apply across the NHS as a whole. However, as hon. Members will be well aware, 67% of NHS sites do not charge at all at present. We are talking about a subset of the NHS where charges apply, albeit that the subset is particularly concentrated in the acute sector, from which many of the examples we have heard come. For example, mental health patients, who are often among the most vulnerable of our constituents seeking the support of the NHS, do not on the whole face charges because those parking facilities are not charged for. This tends to be an issue in the acute sector.
Robert Halfon
I thank my hon. Friend for his kind words, but I must say that I disagree with what he has said. Hospital car parking charges in England are widespread, and we just have to go from one hospital to another to see that. As I said, nearly 50% of hospitals are charging the disabled, for example.
Stephen Barclay
With respect to my right hon. Friend, it is a statement of fact, as confirmed by my officials—I am very happy to correspond with him further about it—that 67% of NHS sites do not charge. If one wants to get into the definition of a hospital, it actually covers more than acute services. I do not want to get distracted by that point. The one I was seeking to make is to recognise that this issue is particularly concentrated on acute hospitals, and that is the issue before us.
The hon. Member for Great Grimsby recognised that there is considerable room for flexibility within trusts. One of the key issues in this debate is the distinction between charges covering the maintenance of car parks, and how a reduction in charges may lead to a reduction in the number of spaces and the quality of the facilities—we heard, for example, about the state of the car parks in north Manchester—and those involving profiteering, with charges going beyond of the cost of maintenance. The hon. Lady is concerned about that, and the interplay with the current guidance. The hon. Member for Colne Valley (Thelma Walker) also mentioned that when she highlighted the distinction between the charges at her hospital and those of the local authority, and raised the issue of transparency.
The right hon. Member for Kingston and Surbiton (Sir Edward Davey) expressed concerns about transparency in relation to blue badge holders. They are not means-tested, so an affluent blue badge holder could be spared a charge while a less affluent visitor to a hospital is charged. Transparency about how the guidance is applied is therefore a factor, as has been recognised.
Sir Mike Penning
May I push the Minister a little bit on blue badge holders? Quite rightly, blue badge holders are not means-tested. The key is their ability to access services. It does not matter how much they have in the bank. If they need to go to a hospital and they have a blue badge, surely spaces should be free and as close to the point of entry as possible.
Stephen Barclay
Absolutely. As my right hon. Friend will be aware, the guidance speaks to that. My hon. Friend the Member for Cleethorpes (Martin Vickers) mentioned the 64 pages of guidance. I am very happy to take away and look at why there are 64 pages of it. Blue badges are part of the conversation that my right hon. Friend the Member for Harlow began in 2014.
Robert Halfon
I have huge respect for my hon. Friend, but the fact is that the guidelines in relation to blue badges are not working. According to the FOI request—this is backed by charities such as CLIC Sargent—up to 50% of hospitals are still charging disabled people to park. There is no point talking about the guidelines if people with disabilities are still being forced to pay to park at hospitals in England.
Stephen Barclay
I am very happy to look at such cases and to speak to those trusts to understand this better, but I was making a point about the complexity of the issue and how to manage reducing the charges. For example, as the hon. Member for East Kilbride, Strathaven and Lesmahagow (Dr Cameron) will no doubt be aware, there were local media reports over the summer about a hospital car park in Inverness being used by those going to the airport; there was displacement there. We do not want a solution that constrains capacity for those using the hospital and makes access more difficult.
Some of these issues have a very local flavour. That was recognised in the debate: the hon. Member for Heywood and Middleton (Liz McInnes) said that shoppers do not seek to use the car park at the north Manchester site, whereas my hon. Friend the Member for Solihull (Julian Knight) was concerned that simply removing charges would cause displacement at his hospital. The point is that there are local factors, just as there are with legacy PFI contracts, including in Scotland and Wales, where charges are still made under contracts going back to 2008.
Julie Cooper
Would the Minister accept, though, that people being ill and suffering distress at hospitals is not a local issue? It is a national issue. The burden of hospital car parking charges, wherever they occur, ought to be a concern of the Government.
Stephen Barclay
Of course, but equally the hon. Lady must recognise that the fact that charges are still being applied under PFI agreements put in place by a previous Government in 2008 signals that there are often complexities, in terms of what can be done when different factors apply. As my hon. Friend the Member for Solihull highlighted, there are factors relating to displacement. That is why trusts have local discretion, but as the House has discussed today, we need to understand the transparency around that and how it is applied.
Stephen Barclay
I will, but then I will press on, because I want to give my right hon. Friend the Member for Harlow some time.
Sir Mike Penning
I am sure we have time, on this important issue. The Minister raised the issue of complexity. Clearly, as has been shown by Members across the House today, some cases would be easier to address than others. I fully accept, as I said in my speech, that some ludicrous PFIs were put in place, both before the present Administration came to power and since. Do the easy ones first; that is the answer. That is what Scotland did. Then come to the more difficult ones. Ruling out any change at all because there are some difficult issues is surely not the way forward.
Stephen Barclay
A point was raised about whether free parking could be addressed through tokens and barriers, but colleagues in the NHS raised concerns about how that would apply, in terms of any burden on staff. We heard examples of frequent users of a hospital being able to access concessionary schemes, but staff have raised concerns about the impact on them, and how they might be expected to assist in the administration of the scheme in regard to those visiting hospitals as a one-off.
The pertinent point about the impact on staff was raised by Members from across the Chamber. Many Members have been visited recently by representatives from the Royal College of Nursing, regarding the wider discussions between NHS employers and the RCN on pay. It was helpful to hear in the debate contributions about the RCN’s understanding of the benefits, pressures and issues.
Across the House, there is no question, as was reflected by my right hon. Friend the Member for Harlow, about the desirability of addressing iniquities and variance, and about the scope to ensure compliance with the guidance, but we need to be mindful of unintended consequences, and particularly about constraining the car parking available for those who need it. I am happy to continue my discussions with my right hon. Friend on this policy. I commend him and colleagues on a very constructive debate.
Naylor Review of NHS Property and Estates
Steve Barclay Excerpts(6 years, 10 months ago)
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The Minister of State, Department of Health and Social Care (Stephen Barclay)
My hon. Friend the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health (Lord O’Shaughnessy) has made the following statement:
I am today announcing the publication of the Government response to the Naylor review.
In March 2017, Sir Robert Naylor published his independent review, “NHS Property and Estates: Why the estate matters for patients”. It highlighted not just the scale of the challenge we face in ensuring that the NHS has both the buildings and equipment that it needs, but also the scale of the opportunity open to us. It set out how, by taking a more strategic approach, the NHS can generate money to reinvest in new or updated premises and in better patient care. Unused land can be released for much-needed housing, driving regeneration and creating jobs. Using healthcare buildings more efficiently can reduce running costs and deliver more integrated care.
The Government welcome the review and its recommendations, which we will implement in conjunction with national partners and the NHS.
Sir Robert set out the progress needed on three key themes to transform the NHS estate, and we are taking action in response. The themes highlighted by the review are leadership and capability, national planning and funding, and incentivising action locally. We are taking action on each of these themes.
First, we have created a new NHS property board, of which I am the chair. This brings together all the key national players and will act as a single point of leadership for the system on estate matters. We are improving capability at a local level by creating a new national strategic estates planning and advisory service, to help the NHS move from planning to delivery. This team has evolved over the last year as we have brought together all the local strategic estates advisers into a single team to provide expert advice to the NHS.
Second, we are taking steps to improve national planning and funding. Sir Robert gave a clear estimate of the level of funding required to enable the transformation of the estate to meet the vision of the five year forward view. It recommended this could be found through Government capital, private finance and proceeds from the disposal of surplus NHS land.
The Chancellor, in his autumn Budget, announced an additional £10 billion package of capital investment over the course of this Parliament. The Government have committed over £3.9 billion of capital for the NHS. This will support the NHS to increase the proceeds from the sale of surplus land to £3.3 billion. We expect it to be supplemented by private investment, where this provides good value for money. It is likely some of this will come from the types of schemes that already fund primary care facilities. With this £10 billion package of capital investment, we will develop a pipeline of transformational STP projects over the next five years so that the NHS can deliver on the vision of the five year forward view.
The first group of schemes to benefit from this new combined STP funding have already been announced and patients will see the benefits from this investment across a wide range of care settings.
Finally, we are taking action to incentivise local NHS organisations to take a more strategic approach to estates planning and management. I can reassure NHS organisations that they will be able to retain receipts from land sales, so these can be reinvested in the NHS estate, to renew and replace outdated facilities and to address backlog maintenance, in line with local priorities and STP strategies. Where surplus land is developed for housing, NHS staff will be given the right of first refusal on any affordable homes built. We have an ambition that this will allow up to 3,000 NHS workers and their families living in areas where accessing affordable housing can be challenging to own their home.
The Government have delivered their share of the funding needed; the NHS must also play its part. It cannot be right for NHS properties to remain unused and empty when their disposal could generate funds for reinvestment and thus improve facilities and services for patients. As Sir Robert recommended, in order to access capital funding STPs will need to develop robust estates plans with stretching disposal strategies and that reduce running costs and address backlog maintenance. The local NHS needs to act quickly to develop these plans and will be supported by advisors from the local strategic estates planning team.
I would like to again express my gratitude to Sir Robert, his advisory board and review team for their time, expertise and commitment.
The statement is available online at: http://www.parliament. uk/writtenstatements.
[HCWS433]
NHS Negligence Cases
Steve Barclay Excerpts(6 years, 10 months ago)
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The Minister of State, Department of Health and Social Care (Stephen Barclay)
As always, it is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Rosindell.
I begin by commending the hon. Member for Denton and Reddish (Andrew Gwynne) for securing this debate. Although he opened it by saying that it is perhaps unusual for a member of the shadow Cabinet to secure a debate such as this one, it is absolutely right that he is doing so on behalf of his constituent and bringing these matters before the House. I am very sorry to hear about Mr Hawkins’s experiences, which have clearly caused him distress.
As you are well aware, Mr Rosindell, the NHS complaints process operates independently of Government, to prevent political bias in the handling of individual complaints. However, a number of points arise from the hon. Gentleman’s remarks, in respect of his contention that Mr Hawkins was let down by a number of individuals and organisations within the NHS. Specifically, it is alleged by Mr Hawkins that the hospital failed him by prioritising then Government targets, which delayed his operation; that the clinician failed him through clinical error; that the duty surgeon failed him by falsely reporting that his wound had healed; that the hospital failed him by not correcting the alleged mistake and by instructing lawyers; that Hempsons solicitors failed to disclose full records; that his own solicitors failed him by not obtaining his records; that his own clinical medical expert failed him; that the hospital failed him, regarding his report; that the ombudsman failed him; and that the NHS Litigation Authority failed him.
Although the Department of Health does not comment on individual cases, and it is not for me to adjudicate whether all of those claims by Mr Hawkins are valid, it is worth noting that a very wide range of both individuals and organisations are alleged by Mr Hawkins either to have conspired against him or, indeed, to have failed him in this matter.
It is also worth placing on the record that NHS Resolution, which was formerly the NHS Litigation Authority, informs me that in January 2016 it first became aware of an independent medical report commissioned by Thompsons, Mr Hawkins’s own solicitors, which had not been previously disclosed to NHS Resolution in the course of Mr Hawkins making his claim. That medical report concluded that there was nothing to suggest that the operation in question had been performed anything but competently. Although I very much recognise that the hon. Gentleman’s constituent is of a different view, and he is perfectly entitled to be of a different view, it is worth placing on the record that his own medical expert, who reviewed this case, did not feel that the operation had been performed in the way that Mr Hawkins has claimed.
I note that Mr Hawkins referred this matter to the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman, which is independent of both the NHS and Government, but the ombudsman ruled that the claim was out of time. Ombudsman decisions are final and there is no automatic right for them to be reviewed. However, the law provides for the ombudsman to consider whether to review a decision if it was demonstrated that the ombudsman made their decision based on inaccurate facts, or that there was new and relevant information that was not previously available, or that they had overlooked or misunderstood parts of the complaint or relevant information.
If a complainant believes that there has been maladministration in the handling of their complaint, they can apply to the courts for a judicial review. However, that must be done within three months of the conclusion of the complaints process.
Andrew Gwynne
The Minister hits the nail on the head there, and it is where the system has let Mr Hawkins down; Mr Hawkins will have been listening very attentively to the case that I set out. Mr Hawkins was denied that ability to apply for a judicial review because of the way that the hospital itself had delayed the process by not informing him that the case had been formally closed, so that by the time he was advised that the case was closed, the time limit by which he was able to take a legal route had passed.
Stephen Barclay
I very much recognise the point that the hon. Gentleman is making. Obviously, I do not want to get drawn into the specifics of this individual case, for the reasons that I have already set out, but within this case and within the claim made by Mr Hawkins a number of factors have been outlined, and I recognise that the hon. Gentleman’s point is one limb of the claim that Mr Hawkins has made.
What brings the various issues together is a question that I think applies to all of us, from all parties in the House: in the future, how do we collectively avoid cases such as Mr Hawkins’s case, and how do we improve the complaints process? That is an area where the Government have been particularly active, not least following “Hard Truths”, the report into Mid Staffordshire and the issues that arose there. The Department of Health has established the complaints improvement board to take forward a series of projects to improve the complaints process. So I hope that—irrespective of the specifics that we are discussing today—as part of the “closure” that the hon. Gentleman referred to, the improvements in the complaints process in the future will be a source of some comfort to Mr Hawkins.
As part of that process, the complaints improvement partnership was established by the Department and system partners, including NHS England, NHS Improvement, the Care Quality Commission, the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman, and NHS Resolution. That partnership is currently examining options for delivering a more effective complaints management system, and better use of all forms of feedback to improve NHS services. That includes expanding the role of the “freedom to speak up” guardians, to give them powers to initiate whistleblower complaints processes where possible. My predecessor, the hon. Member for Ludlow (Mr Dunne), particularly championed that when he was a Minister, and he did a huge amount to progress it.
The complaints improvement partnership also engages with non-executive directors to explore options for them to have responsibility for monitoring the progress of complaints and serious incidents within trusts, and with Healthwatch England, to empower local healthwatch organisations. As constituency Members, I think we all work with and see the value of that body. Working with the ombudsman, the partnership also promotes best practice in the handling of complaints by providing information, advice and training. In addition, NHS Resolution has recently launched a service to increase the use of mediation in the NHS, to resolve issues at an earlier stage without the need for protracted litigation. My hon. Friend the Member for Central Suffolk and North Ipswich (Dr Poulter) has previously championed reducing the impact of lawyers when disputes arise.
It is important that patients receive the safest care possible from the NHS and that when things go wrong clinicians are open and honest, and able to learn from their mistakes. It is equally important that patients and their families are listened to and their concerns taken seriously and addressed.
Andrew Gwynne
That brings us back to the point made by the hon. Member for Central Suffolk and North Ipswich (Dr Poulter). When Mr Hawkins complained that his Achilles tendon had adhered to the back of his foot again, it surely would have been better for Tameside General Hospital’s old management—the hospital has come a long way since it was in special measures—to investigate and put it right at that point, rather than immediately going down the legal route.
Stephen Barclay
The hon. Gentleman will appreciate that the events took place more than 11 years ago and that it is, therefore, not for me to comment on what the trust knew at that time or their actions accordingly. I think we all, across the House, recognise that resolving issues without recourse to litigation is preferable, where possible, to lawyers being involved at an early stage—and I say that as a former lawyer. That is why the Government seek to improve how complaints are handled, including improving the regulation. The Care Quality Commission now rigorously inspects all trusts and primary and adult care providers, and a duty of candour—a new protection for whistleblowers—encourages staff to speak up for safety and hence fosters greater transparency. There is also the development of a culture of learning, through patient safety collaboratives and the national Sign up to Safety campaign, and last April the healthcare safety investigation branch became a fully operational and independent branch of NHS Improvement, to investigate serious incidents in the NHS with a strong focus on system-wide learning.
Dr Poulter
I do not wish to distract from the main purpose of the debate, but my hon. Friend makes an important point about a culture of openness and transparency in dealing with complaints. How does he feel that the recent High Court judgment about a doctor being struck off by the General Medical Council might play into doctors’ and other healthcare professionals’ willingness to engage with such a culture? Might it be inhibitory, in that they would be concerned about the impact on their future careers of being open and willing to own up to mistakes?
Stephen Barclay
As a former Minister, my hon. Friend knows that there are conventions regarding Ministers of the Crown commenting on court judgments. The Secretary of State has already made clear his position on that matter, and this debate on a specific constituency issue is not the forum for moving beyond that scope.
It is important for us all that we improve the handling of complaints. In a system as large as the NHS, we all recognise that, with the best will in the world, things will go wrong and mistakes will be made. The latest Care Quality Commission annual “State of Care” report, published in October 2017, recognises that the vast majority of patients get good care and that many parts of the NHS have improved thanks to the hard work of the staff. The key issue that the hon. Member for Denton and Reddish has rightly brought before us today is how we learn from things going wrong and how, when a patient thinks something has gone wrong, the issues are aired and resolved.
I commend the hon. Gentleman for securing the debate, notwithstanding his elevated position in the shadow Cabinet, and for ensuring that his constituent’s issues have been aired before the House. The Government are committed to building a learning culture within the NHS that listens to patients and relatives and learns from mistakes, so that patients do not suffer avoidable harm. The Secretary of State deserves great credit for his championing of patient safety as a specific issue within his portfolio. We are also working to improve the complaints handling system so that it is more responsive and joined-up between organisations. I hope that the improvements that are in place will help Mr Hawkins to get some closure on the matters we have debated today.
North West Ambulance Service
Steve Barclay Excerpts(6 years, 11 months ago)
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The Minister of State, Department of Health and Social Care (Stephen Barclay)
I congratulate the hon. Member for Rochdale (Tony Lloyd) on securing this debate. I know that he visited the North West Ambulance Service Trust in 2017 and has a long-standing interest in this area. He comes to the House as one of its most senior and experienced Members and a former chair of the parliamentary Labour party. I am happy to meet him to discuss his remarks in more detail in order to work collaboratively to take this forward, given the concerns he has set out, particularly concerning the delays that Ron and Pat experienced, and how we can address them.
I absolutely agree with the sentiment expressed by the hon. Member for West Lancashire (Rosie Cooper) about the need for an open culture, and I am happy to work with her, as I have done in the past, in fostering such a culture.
Norman Lamb
The Secretary of State has been very good, post Francis, at being very clear that there has to be an open culture and that staff must feel free to speak out when there are patient safety risks that concern them. Will the Minister use this opportunity to re-enforce the message to the management of trusts, including ambulance trusts, across the country that they must allow their staff to speak out when they have genuine and legitimate concerns of this sort?
Stephen Barclay
I certainly will take this opportunity to do exactly that. As the right hon. Gentleman will be aware, like him, I myself, during my time in the House, have frequently spoken out on behalf of whistleblowers, particularly in my former role as a member of the Public Accounts Committee. I know he has other concerns that, with the leave of the House, I might touch on at the end of my remarks, but, as I am sure he will appreciate, I want to address the issues of the North West Ambulance Service in particular.
As Members on both sides of the House will know, the NHS is busier than ever. The ambulance service is dealing with unprecedented demand, with 11 million calls each year and almost 7 million face-to-face responses in 2016-17, which was a 14% increase on the previous five years. Overall, it is worth noting, on the concerns about workforce that the hon. Member for Rochdale set out, that the North West Ambulance Service has a strong record on recruitment, having recruited an extra 167 paramedics in 2017. As a result, its vacancy rate, at just 2.4%, is now one of the lowest in the country.
The hon. Gentleman is right, however, that on performance there is an issue and that the service does need to improve. As I will set out in my remarks, that is why work is under way with NHS England and NHS Improvement, working with the commissioners and the trust, to address that, as part of the wider national initiatives. It also needs to be set in the context of the pressures within the health service. About 3,000 patients are currently in hospital beds with flu and about 700 with the norovirus, so there are clearly winter pressures affecting handovers, but he is absolutely right that how we address the delays in handovers is a key area, and certainly a key ministerial focus of mine, as I will come on to in due course.
The hon. Gentleman set out several concerns about the trust’s performance. It is worth drawing the House’s attention to the fact that six ambulance liaison officers are now in place at A&Es across Greater Manchester to support handovers and address delays. The Treasury is investing £100,000 in the trust in February and March to boost operational capacity, and procedural solutions are being introduced to improve the efficiency of call handling. Under Sir Bruce Keogh’s review of the NHS urgent and emergency care system, ambulance services are being transformed to increase the use of “hear and treat” and “see and treat” and ensure the better prioritisation of patients so that those with the highest need are seen most urgently. The aim is to avoid what we all recognise was an issue in the past—where, in order to meet targets, often two, three or four ambulances were being sent in response to the same call. People had concerns about that across the House, but that is one of the improvements that has been brought in.
In 2016-17, the North West Ambulance Service treated and discharged over one quarter more patients at the scene and 92% more patients over the telephone compared with 2011-12, so although I recognise that there are challenges and areas that require improvement, it is important, in the interests of balance, also to recognise the progress the trust has made in recruiting more paramedics—as part of the 3,000 more paramedics nationally—its low vacancy rate and the steps it has taken to treat more patients at the scene.
Additionally, in July last year, the Secretary of State approved a revision of the operational performance standards for ambulances. Those improvements have been rolled out to all mainland ambulance trusts, which will mean better prioritisation of calls. The framework brings all patients under a national response standard for the first time and improves the efficiency and resilience of the ambulance service in the face of rising demand.
We recognise that the performance of the North West Ambulance Service against those standards is not good enough, and that is why NHS Improvement, NHS England and commissioners are closely engaged with the trust to ensure that it adapts successfully to the new performance framework. If the hon. Gentleman has specific concerns about the openness of the trust, I will be very happy to discuss those points and take them forward with him in a collaborative spirit.
I understand that the hon. Gentleman has raised concerns about workforce directly with the trust. As I said earlier, 3,000 more paramedics have been recruited nationally compared with 2010—an increase of more than 30%—so there are more paramedics than there were.
Tony Lloyd
I know that the Minister is trying to be helpful, but one thing is bound to concern constituents. At the time of the A&E closure in Rochdale, a commitment was made that there would be paramedic cover as routine, but that is being breached regularly. Even if there has been some increase in the number of paramedics, and I concede that there has been, it has not kept pace. Nor has the North West Ambulance Service even tried to honour the commitment that was made—perhaps it should not have been made—in order to deliver the closure of the A&E. The phrase “sleight of hand” comes to mind, and we have to do better.
Stephen Barclay
I take that concern seriously, and I discussed it with officials earlier today. Compared with 2010-11, when the local “Healthy Futures” reconfiguration took place, there has been a 33% increase in vehicle hours assigned to the Rochdale and Bury area, with an associated staff resource increase of 43 full-time equivalent. So there has been improvement.
The North West Ambulance Service also aims to include a paramedic on board every ambulance. Although there are seven paramedic vacancies in the Rochdale area, nine paramedics are due to be assigned over the next 10 weeks and the trust is confident that the area will have a full complement of paramedic staff by April this year. I hope that that brings some comfort to the hon. Gentleman’s constituents about the direction of travel.
It is worth bearing in mind that, alongside those paramedics, the North West Ambulance Trust has recruited 24 graduates to operate as emergency medical technicians, and they are awaiting registration as paramedics. That will further improve the position. The trust has made it easier for emergency medical technicians to embark on paramedic training courses and worked with local universities to increase the rate of paramedic qualification. Where emergency medical technicians crew ambulances and respond to calls, they are heavily supported to do so safely, with direct access to advice from advanced paramedics and the trust’s clinical hub.
Handover delays were mentioned in several interventions. We recognise the challenge of delayed patient handovers to emergency departments. Delayed handovers tie up ambulance resources and adversely affect the trust’s capability to respond quickly to new calls. We are clear that handovers must take place within the agreed timeframes, and NHS England and NHS Improvement are supporting hospitals to ensure that improvements are made. Such work includes improved monitoring and daily review by national and regional winter operations teams, targeted assistance to challenged hospital trusts to improve their performance and the issuing of revised handover guidelines that focus responsibility on the wider system to address handover delays, including a clear escalation process. Locally, there are initiatives in place such as the placement of hospital ambulance liaison officers within emergency departments.
The trust is implementing a number of procedural solutions to improve the efficiency of the call-taking staff, including the use of post-dispatch scripts, which inform callers of the expected arrival time of a resource. In other trusts, that has minimised duplicate calls and reduced ambulance attendances by 4.6%.
To conclude on the comments of the hon. Member for Rochdale—with the leave of the House, I will then address the concerns of the right hon. Member for North Norfolk (Norman Lamb)—his concerns about performance are pertinent, and there is work ongoing to address that issue as part of the wider initiative. However, it is also important to recognise the progress that has been made, which has seen the recruitment of additional paramedics and the training of staff, with the progression of which the hon. Gentleman spoke, which allows people to progress their career into the role of paramedics. There are also further measures in terms of prioritisation, which will address a number of the concerns he set out.
On whistleblowers, that is an issue on which I, as a constituency Member of Parliament, have long campaigned. I hope my record on that speaks for itself, and the issue is something the right hon. Gentleman and I have previously discussed.
The right hon. Gentleman has also raised concerns, as has the hon. Member for Norwich South (Clive Lewis), regarding the East of England Ambulance Service. On receipt of the right hon. Gentleman’s letter, I instructed officials in my Department to share copies with the Care Quality Commission—the independent regulator of all health and social care services in England—to ensure that it is fully aware of the issues being raised. I discussed these concerning allegations directly with the chief executive of NHS England and the chief executive of NHS Improvement this morning, and asked them to confirm to me the actions they will be taking. They have subsequently confirmed that they will be holding a joint risk summit regarding the trust in the next week. The CQC will be in attendance.
Norman Lamb
First, I am really grateful to the Minister for addressing these issues this evening, given that this is a debate about the North West Ambulance Service. Would he be willing to meet me, given the level of concerns in the east of England?
Stephen Barclay
I would be very happy to meet the right hon. Gentleman. As a fellow east of England Member of Parliament, but also as a former Health Minister, he brings great experience to these issues, so of course I will.
In conclusion, I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Rochdale for raising this issue this evening. I am happy to work with him in our common interest to address the areas of performance that need to improve. However, at the same time, it is important that we recognise the progress that has been made on recruitment and reducing the vacancy level by the North West Ambulance Service, which gives a positive sign of the progress that is being made as we address the challenges being faced across the NHS.
Question put and agreed to.