Oral Answers to Questions

Barbara Keeley Excerpts

Tuesday 9th February 2016 Commons Chamber

[George Freeman]

I would be concerned if that were true. The point is that we are facing extraordinary, exploding demand in our system. At the risk of sounding like a Monty Python sketch, what have the Government done, apart from launching the £3.9 billion better care fund and a £2 billion social care precept; fully funding the NHS five year forward view, with a front load of £3.5 billion; driving health devolution; and providing £4 billion for health technology? We are funding the integration of health and care in a way the last Labour Government never did.

[Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab)]

That is really not true. Ministers are presiding over the hollowing out of social care, because their funding falls far short of what is needed. Some £4.6 billion has already been cut from adult social care, and the funding gap is growing at £700 million a year. The social care precept the Minister has just been talking about will raise £400 million a year, and the better care fund does not start until next year, when it starts at £105 million. Simon Stevens has called this “unresolved business”. When will Ministers face up to the fact that the Government’s figures just do not add up?

[George Freeman]

I think that that question could be taken more seriously, first, if the Labour party had tackled this issue in office and, secondly, if it had any suggestions. Let me summarise the pressure the system is under. Over the next 10 years, there will be a 22% increase in over-65s, and the number of people aged over 75 will rise by 90% in the next 20 years. We face extraordinary challenges. That is why we have announced the better care fund increases, why we have launched the social care precept and why we are driving devolution powers for local areas, which allow local health and care leaders to integrate. If this was as easy as Labour Members say, perhaps they would have done these things during their term in office.