Underperforming NHS Trusts: Government Oversight

Debate between Graham Stuart and Caroline Johnson

Wednesday 14th October 2026 Westminster Hall

[Dr Johnson]

Before the interruption, we were talking about the importance of workforce to the health service and to any improvements that we wish to make to services. The previous Conservative Government developed a long-term workforce plan. This Government decided to develop their own, which is fair enough, but it is very delayed. Can the Minister tell us, without using the words “in due course”, “imminently” or “soon”, when it will be published, preferably giving a date?

Returning to other plans, the Government say that maternity and neonatal care is their priority, which is good, but when they came into government, they said that they had a plan to improve it. They spent the first 12 months writing their 10-year plan, which said that they would produce a maternity and neonatal plan. They did a review, which took six months longer than it was supposed to. They were then two years into a parliamentary term. That plan says that they will have a commissioner, who they have yet to appoint, and another plan for a modern service framework, which is apparently due by Christmas. Can the Minister guarantee that, two and a half years into the Parliament, they will have a delivery plan for maternity improvements?

The bottom line is that I am concerned that the Government are too busy reorganising the NHS to deliver on their promises. NHS performance is declining in many areas. There is huge variability between trusts and departments. The Government picked five for intensive treatment. What about the others? Can the Minister clarify that it works? The Government are internalising patient experience, which means that it may suddenly look much better, but how will anyone have confidence in the figures if they are produced by the Government marking their own homework? The abolition of NHS England has been badly planned. ICB cuts, mergers and paused mergers are simply a distraction. The removal of the need for governors removes another layer of accountability and scrutiny.

The Government say they are working at pace, but it is a very slow pace. The workforce plan and the maternity plan have been delayed, but so have things like the Hughes report. People suffering from valproate and mesh have been waiting and waiting. It is getting towards three years since that report was published. They have waited long enough. I urge the Minister to say when the Government intend to respond to that report.

The Government need to get a grip of who is holding the trusts to account, so that when the Health Bill comes out the other side of the Lords, there is a clear chain of command. Perhaps it will lead up to the Secretary of State, but it is clear that they will not be able to micromanage every detail. There needs to be a clear path so that people know who is accountable, who will drive improvement, who to congratulate when improvements are made and who to hold accountable when it goes wrong.

[Graham Stuart (in the Chair)]

Thanks to the discipline of the speakers so far, there are some extra minutes for the Minister to take interventions if she so chooses.

Budget Resolutions

Debate between Graham Stuart and Caroline Johnson

Wednesday 6th November 2024 Commons Chamber

[Graham Stuart]

Yes. And with respect to the hon. Gentleman’s point, I think that the former Prime Minister and Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip was true to himself, true to his heart and true in his expressions—although, like all of us, he probably had his moments. What he never did was set out on a deliberate path to mislead people. He set out his honest view of the way the world should be.

Unfortunately, 9.7 million people, including 15,000 of my constituents, believed the promises of the now Labour Government, and even 410 Members of Parliament thought that they were being honest.

[Dr Caroline Johnson]

I thank my right hon. Friend for the speech that he is making. Does he agree that many of those people will now feel betrayed?

[Graham Stuart]

I think people do feel betrayed. We need to conduct our politics as honestly as we can. The Labour Government broke their promise not to raise taxes on working people, because, as the OBR has made clear, the NICs raise will overwhelmingly fall on working people. In fact, if we go through the numbers, as I did, it turns out that there is a bigger reduction in wages than there is net receipt to the Exchequer. That is quite a remarkable achievement—probably only a Labour Government could do that.

Of course, the Government have also put up the cost of getting on the bus. If ever there was a symbol of working people, travelling from my constituency to a low-paid job in Hull, that is it. It will cost them £500 a year extra out of taxed income. I do not know why the hon. Member for Hitchin (Alistair Strathern) is grinning—I know he grins a lot, but it should not be funny to him that someone in a low-wage job who travels into Hull every day will pay £500 a year more because of the decisions his Government are making. For a couple, it is £1,000 a year. That cost is real, and it should not be glossed over.

There is just one train station in my constituency, and people who live in Withernsea have no choice but to travel 26 miles to get there. The Prime Minister’s constituents are blessed with a pick and mix of ways to get to the office: the tube, the overground, trains, Ubers, Bolts, and even Boris bikes. That is not the case in rural and coastal East Yorkshire: my constituents get the bus at 7 o’clock in the morning, and they get another bus at 6 o’clock at night. That is their lived reality, and the serious impact of this Budget should be recognised.

Another broken promise was to pensioners, who were told that they would have security in retirement—that their benefits would not be touched. Taking £300 from the very poorest pensioners is not keeping that promise. [Interruption.] The very poorest pensioners are those eligible for pension credit.