Medical Training (Prioritisation) Bill

Debate between Wes Streeting and Kieran Mullan

2nd reading
Tuesday 27th January 2026 Commons Chamber

[The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Wes Streeting)]

I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.

I begin by thanking the Leader of the House, the Chief Whip, their counterparts in the other place, colleagues in my Department and in the NHS, the Bill team and parliamentary counsel, who have moved mountains to prepare this Bill in double-quick time. I once again place on the record my sincere thanks to my counterparts in the Governments of Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland—as well as the respective Secretaries of State for those nations—for the spirit in which, regardless of party, they have helped us to bring the Bill forward. Last but by no means least, I am enormously grateful to Jackie Baillie, Labour’s deputy leader in Holyrood, for her wise counsel.

The NHS is on the road to recovery, not least because of the herculean efforts and dedication of NHS leaders and frontline staff who, even in the depths of winter, are delivering outstanding episodes of care, hour after hour and day after day. Among the encouraging signs of year-on-year improvement are waiting lists falling at their fastest rate in three years—down more than 300,000 under Labour—and quicker ambulance response times, shorter waits in A&E and speedier cancer diagnoses for more people. December was the busiest month in NHS history for 999 calls, but despite that, and regardless of industrial action and winter pressures, ambulances arrived at heart attack and stroke patients nearly 15 minutes faster compared with last year.

The progress we are seeing is a reminder that nothing positive for the people who use the NHS ever happens without the people who work in our NHS. Our investment and modernisation are starting to restore confidence and renew belief among frontline staff; with that, hope, optimism and ambition are returning too. That is why, outside of the pandemic, staff retention is at its highest in a decade and vacancies are at their lowest since records began in 2017. There is lots done, but, as we know, there is so much more to do.

I will always be honest about the state of our national health service—what is going well and where we need to improve. There is no sugar coating the fact that staff morale is still too low, and the way that some of our NHS workforce is still treated and the conditions in which too many of them still work are nothing short of a national disgrace. Not only is it a stain on our NHS, but it shames us as a country when those who care for us in our hour of need suffer bullying, harassment and racist abuse; have nowhere to rest, go to the toilet or get changed; cannot get a hot meal on a night shift; have limited flexible working options; must book holiday a year in advance; need to log in seven times just to use a PC; spend time form-filling rather than looking after patients; and face basic errors with pay and contracts. Before Christmas, I had a doctor in my constituency advice surgery in tears as she described the way she had been treated by a previous employer. This is no way to treat the people who kept us going when everything else stopped, so we are taking action.

Trusts are now implementing the 10-point plan for resident doctors and my Department, together with NHS England, is developing new staff standards to create better working practices and better conditions.

We have awarded above-inflation pay rises to everyone working in the NHS for this year and last year, which is beginning to recover the pay erosions seen under the last Government. We have begun 2026 with constructive talks with the British Medical Association’s resident doctors committee, as we seek to broker industrial peace. I have also told NHS leaders that they need to step up when it comes to the conditions that their staff face. They cannot expect the Secretary of State to micromanage availability of hot food in their canteen, for example.

However, there are workforce problems that only Government can solve. We have known for years that the treatment of resident doctors is often totally unacceptable and that the very real fears about their futures are wholly justified. Every time I have met a resident doctor, either formally or informally, they have told me without fail how their careers are blocked because there are far too many applicants for training places. Not only do I think that they have a legitimate grievance, but I agree with them.

[Dr Kieran Mullan (Bexhill and Battle) (Con)]

The Secretary of State is essentially talking about postgraduate training. I wonder what thought he has given to new clause 2 in the name of my hon. Friend the Member for Runnymede and Weybridge (Dr Spencer). I have spoken to students who worked really hard all the way through medical school to get the best exam results and perform highly but then ended up in an allocation system that pays no attention whatsoever to that. Merit has been entirely removed from the system. I think it was wrong for us to make that change. Does he have any sympathy for returning to a merit-based system?

[Wes Streeting]

I certainly do have sympathy with that argument. We have begun to move the system in the right direction in terms of giving applicants greater preference in placements, but it is not lost on me that the system of rotations, placements and jobs means doctors are moved around the country and families are uprooted. The frictional cost of relocating from one place to another is a challenge that resident doctors in particular face. I do not think that an amendment to the Bill is the right vehicle in which to address that issue, but I am sympathetic to the arguments that the hon. Member makes, and I am sure he will make them again during this afternoon’s proceedings. We will take his arguments seriously and look to work together with the BMA and others to act to improve the experience of training, rotations and jobs.

UK graduates used to compete among themselves for foundation and specialty roles. Now they are competing against the world, because of the visa and immigration changes made by the Conservative Government post Brexit. The situation is compounded by the previous Administration’s total lack of workforce planning, which saw more students going to medical school without the number of specialty training places being increased. That is why we see the training bottlenecks that resident doctors face today.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Wes Streeting and Kieran Mullan

Tuesday 25th November 2025 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Can’t be possible—we have not had the Budget yet!

[Dr Kieran Mullan (Bexhill and Battle) (Con)]

There are a number of exciting opportunities for extended GP premises in my constituency—in places like Martins Oak in Battle, Little Common and Old Town, and Oldwood in Robertsbridge. One major challenge is the rates that the NHS district valuer is willing to offer for construction sites; they have just not kept up with the inflation we have seen across all sectors of construction. I did have a meeting with the Minister for Care and it was helpful to start those discussions, but we have not made the progress that we need to. Can we have a further meeting, and will the Secretary of State outline what he will do to ensure that district valuers are offering rates that can allow construction to go ahead?

[Wes Streeting]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for raising some of the practical challenges that stand in our way to improving and expanding the primary care estate. We are looking into the issues that he raises. We want to ensure that we can modernise the estate as effectively and quickly as possible. When there is progress to report, I have no doubt that the Minister for Care will be in touch.

NHS: Independent Investigation

Debate between Wes Streeting and Kieran Mullan

Thursday 12th September 2024 Commons Chamber

[Wes Streeting]

My hon. Friend has done a lot of work in this area and I would be delighted to meet her. Let me give the Conservative party a lesson in humility. However proud I am of the last Labour Government—and I am incredibly proud of what they did to our health estate, the investment they brought in, through a range of different types of private financing, and the impact that had; I can see the benefits in my own constituency— I have never shied away from what we did not get right. At the same time as celebrating what we got right in government, we must reflect on what we did not get right and genuinely learn those lessons, which is what we did in opposition. It took us too long to get back into government—we will learn from that for the future—but it has been really interesting to listen to Conservative Members over the past nine weeks. They have not learned anything, they have not got the message and they are not going to change.

[Dr Kieran Mullan (Bexhill and Battle) (Con)]

As Labour embarks on a reform programme, may I ask whether the Secretary of State has read the report of the Mid Staffordshire public inquiry, which looked at the shocking patient neglect last time Labour was in charge? Reading it might temper the hubris that he is showing in the Chamber today, in the face of the challenges that his colleagues in Wales have certainly not managed to overcome.

[Wes Streeting]

I gently point the hon. Gentleman to the bold claims made by the now shadow Chancellor, the right hon. Member for Godalming and Ash (Jeremy Hunt), about patient safety. He might like to reflect on every subsequent patient safety scandal. In fact, he might want to walk into maternity services across the country and ask himself whether the Conservatives bothered to learn lessons on patient safety.