NHS Winter Crisis

Debate between Steve Brine and Paul Farrelly

Wednesday 10th January 2018 Commons Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health (Steve Brine)]

Happy new year to you, Madam Deputy Speaker.

We have had a good debate this afternoon with some well-informed—as the hon. Member for Bristol South (Karin Smyth) put it—contributions from both sides.

The NHS is a service that we are all immensely proud of; we can agree on that. Even during the challenging winter period it continues to deliver overwhelmingly safe and effective care to thousands of our constituents, and we should never lose sight of that. We have heard examples of that today, including from my right hon. Friend the Member for Meriden (Dame Caroline Spelman), who spoke with her usual calm about the triage model she saw working well in her area when she had to go to hospital over the holiday period. My hon. Friend the Member for Stafford (Jeremy Lefroy) was among many Members who visited the NHS over the recess period and he spoke, as well he might, and as well as he usually does, about the safe care he saw being delivered.

As my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State, and before him the Prime Minister, said earlier, we have done more preparation for winter this year than ever before, planning earlier to make sure the NHS is better prepared. More than that, we have put in the money, in the form of an additional £337 million for winter pressures and an additional £1 billion for the social care system this year. As the Public Health Minister, I am proud of our flu vaccination programme, already the most comprehensive in Europe, which has been extended even further. This was planning ahead.

We have also allocated £100 million of capital funding to help hospitals set up GP streaming systems at their A&Es, reaching 91% coverage by the end of November. This, too, was planning ahead; they did not just appear overnight. And for the first time ever, people were able to access GPs nationally for urgent appointments from 8 am to 8 pm seven days a week over the holiday period.

Of course, there were additional pressures this year: very cold spells in December, a sharp uptick in flu and respiratory conditions, and higher hospitalisations from confirmed cases of flu than in the peak of winter last year.

[Paul Farrelly]

There are also questions about NHS leadership. As the Minister is aware, Staffordshire is under great pressure. The Secretary of State received reports about the closure, with lack of consultation, of community hospitals in our area on 18 October, which slated two local CCGs. Yet a week later the NHS appointed the chief operating officer of those two CCGs to oversee four more in Staffordshire. Will the Minister ask his right hon. Friend the Secretary of State to explain that decision?

[Steve Brine]

The sustainability and transformation partnerships have been established across England—I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will have engaged with the one in his area—and they take local decisions about how services are organised in local areas. I implore him to engage with his STP; indeed, I know that he is already doing so. If he wishes to talk to me about this, he can of course do so.

Let me respond to some more of our contributors. The hon. Member for Bristol South always speaks sensibly. She spoke about the public representation and involvement in STPs. I agree that we could do more in that area, and as the Minister responsible for STPs, I want to see that we do so. Her point was well made. The hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Laura Smith) spoke about her constituent, Elle, who lost her battle with cystic fibrosis. She speaks up for her constituents well, and very emotionally, and if she continues to do that, she will do extremely well in this House.

The hon. Member for Stockton South (Dr Williams) is a new Member, and I already have a lot of respect for him. In his typically sensible contribution, he made some sensible suggestions for improvement in the NHS. He went on to talk about how we could do better on prevention, and he was absolutely spot on. We all agree that prevention is part of our one NHS. He said that this was not all about money, and I agree. Money is a key part of this, however, and that is why we spend 9.9% of our GDP on healthcare, which is above the EU average.

The hon. Member for Leicester West (Liz Kendall) said that this is not what happens every year, but the NHS is under great pressure at this time every year. A headline from The Guardian newspaper on 27 October 2001 stated “NHS faces another winter of crisis”. The NHS is often under pressure at this time of year, and the important thing is how we prepare for that. As I have said, we are better prepared than ever. It is a shame that the hon. Lady is not listening to my response. [Interruption.]

Higher Education Fees

Debate between Steve Brine and Paul Farrelly

Thursday 9th December 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Steve Brine (Winchester) (Con)]

Indeed I do. I apologise for that, Madam Deputy Speaker, and I thank you for calling me.

I am a new Member in this House—obviously—but there are some things that I have learned in the short number of months that I have been here. When proposals come before us, I always ask two questions: first, can we stick with the status quo and bury our heads in the sand; and secondly, can we put off until tomorrow what needs to be done today? The conclusion that I have come to on the proposals before us is that the answer to both those questions is no. The current funding model for higher education is simply not providing enough money to support the growing number of students who want to go on to higher education. As it stands, we turned away just under 200,000 young people this year. Funding per student is now lower in real terms than it was 20 years ago. As someone once said, “We can’t go on like this.” [Interruption.] Opposition Members may want to listen.

As my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister said yesterday, we cannot allow our universities to fall behind the rest of the world. India is building new technology institutes and new universities, and in the next 15 years the number of graduates from Chinese universities is expected to grow fivefold, so what do we do? Do we turn millions more young people—people like me—away from aspiring to go to university? I do not want to send that message out from this House. If that is what the Opposition have decided, that is their decision, but it is certainly not mine. Do we just increase state funding to higher education, so that fees can either stay as they are or, as some in this House would like, be abolished altogether? We know that we cannot do that because, once again, the country faces ruin after a Labour Government.

As Mr Blair’s new Government proved, simply increasing the money from the Exchequer was not possible in ’97, when we had a fantastic economy, which was bequeathed to Labour, and it is certainly not possible with the wrecked economy that we face today.

[Paul Farrelly]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mr Brine]

No thank you.

I strongly supported setting up the Browne review. I did not sign any pledges about what it might or might not recommend—I think that was the right decision—and I welcome a new system in which no students will pay up-front fees. It is also a system in which, for the first time, part-time students will pay no fees up front. That is a real development. I welcome lifting the repayment figure from £15,000 to £21,000, and I very much welcome the repayment figure being linked to earnings.

I am new here, and I have wrestled with this decision like no other. I opposed the £1,000 fee in 1998 after the Dearing report, because I feared that it would breach the principle of free higher education. I said that there would be no turning back, and I think that I was right about that. I was not in this House then, but my party opposed top-up fees in 2003-04, because we feared that they would restrict access to higher education. I have to say that I think we were wrong, and we have been proved so, because the number wanting to go keeps going up and up.