NHS Funding

Tristram Hunt Excerpts

Monday 31st October 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

All NHS facilities in my hon. Friend’s constituency and across the country can be confident that the NHS has a bright future. In fact, if we are to deliver the NHS plan, more rural and remote places are precisely where we must pay most attention to keeping people healthy and well in their homes. That is why not only community hospitals, but GP surgeries and all the places upon which rural communities depend are a vital part of the NHS’s future.

[Tristram Hunt (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Lab)]

I wrote to the Secretary of State over the summer because trollies were bumper to bumper in the corridors of Royal Stoke University hospital. This was not mid-winter but high summer. Since then, there have been more hospital bed closures in cottage hospitals, so I repeat my invitation and ask the Secretary of State to come to Stoke-on-Trent and see for himself the crisis in the funding settlement, which is hitting some of those with the most chronic health conditions.

[Mr Hunt]

I am happy to visit the hon. Gentleman’s local hospital, as I have been concerned about it for some time. I know that things have been particularly challenging there in the wake of what happened in neighbouring Mid Staffs, which has created its own pressures on the hospital. I also know that its staff work extremely hard in very challenging circumstances, so, yes, I will visit that hospital.