Hospital Beds and Social Care

Baroness Greengross Excerpts

Thursday 6th January 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Kamall (Con)]

My noble friend makes an important point. In the White Paper, People at the Heart of Care, we have set out our vision for adult social care and outlined our priorities. Throughout the pandemic, we made available nearly £2.9 billion in specific funding for adult social care—£1.75 billion for infection prevention and control, £523 million for testing and £583 million to support workforce capacity and recruitment, as well as all the other measures that I have previously referred to as part of the task force.

[Baroness Greengross (CB)]

What assessment have the Government made of NHS or other publicly owned land that is currently unused and could be converted into accommodation for people who are rehabilitating and no longer need to be in hospital but cannot be discharged into their own home? Does the Minister agree that rehabilitation accommodation, commonly used throughout Scandinavia and other parts of Europe, could ease the pressure on both the NHS and the social care providers?

[Lord Kamall (Con)]

I thank the noble Baroness for raising this issue previously with me in private, and for looking into it. One issue that is very clear to us is that effective use of the NHS estates is a top priority for the Government. We have not yet considered the benefits of using vacant hospital land or unused buildings, but we are committed to utilising the estates to their maximum capacity. Rehabilitation is a critical element of the health and care system, and there are a number of areas that we are looking into, including some of the suggestions made by the noble Baroness—but also best practice from other parts of the world.