Oral Answers to Questions

Baroness Berger Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd November 2011 Commons Chamber

[The Minister of State, Department of Health (Mr Simon Burns)]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend and I have heard the important point that he has made. No doubt the Joint Committee of Primary Care Trusts will also hear the point that he has made to me. I am sure that he understands that it would be totally inappropriate for me to give any view that might compromise the independence of Ministers on this independent review.

[Luciana Berger (Liverpool, Wavertree) (Lab/Co-op)]

What is the Secretary of State’s estimation of the number of NHS doctors and nurses who, in an astoundingly demoralising way, are having their pay grades downgraded?

[Mr Lansley]

I do not have a figure for that. If the hon. Lady and others want to discuss it, I would be glad to see evidence of it—and so should NHS employers, because as part of the implementation of “Agenda for Change”, staff should be banded in grades according to independent criteria.

Health and Social Care (Re-committed) Bill

Baroness Berger Excerpts

Wednesday 7th September 2011 Commons Chamber

[Nadine Dorries]

I will tell the hon. Lady exactly who funds my campaign—nobody. Neither I nor my office has received a single penny. Here, to me, is the disadvantage of the amendment. The unions can contact Members’ constituents and ask them to e-mail individual MPs, but I cannot afford to promote the amendment in that way. The press barons, whom the unions have fed with their response to the amendment, can pour what they want into the newspapers, but I cannot. What we have seen is an absolute divide.

[Luciana Berger (Liverpool, Wavertree) (Lab/Co-op)]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Nadine Dorries]

I will give way, because the hon. Lady has commented previously on the press in this regard.

[Luciana Berger]

Will the hon. Lady please tell the House exactly who funds the Right to Know e-mails that many of us have received in our constituency inboxes?

[Nadine Dorries]

I will answer that question, and after I do I hope the hon. Lady will tell me who funds Labour Friends of Israel. I have no idea who funds Right to Know, as I am sure Labour Members have no idea who funds a number of campaigns that support them.

--- Later in debate ---

[Nadine Dorries]

The hon. Gentleman makes a point that is pertinent to his own beliefs. What I believe about counselling is that no advice should be given, that there should be no direction, and that it should be completely impartial. It should be an influence-free zone—a bubble—where a woman can sit and talk through the issues with somebody who is not guiding her. That is what counselling should be.

Every single day I receive e-mails from women who do not want other women to experience what they have experienced—who do not want their daughters to go through what they have gone through. I receive e-mails from staff who are working in, or have worked in, abortion clinics. I am in dialogue with some very senior members of staff of a number of organisations and abortion clinics across the UK—

[Luciana Berger]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Nadine Dorries]

No, I will not give way again.

Those members of staff are themselves not necessarily happy with the guidelines and the way in which they are forced to operate. I speak to people at abortion clinics across the UK who would like the guidelines to change because they do not necessarily feel that women receive the counselling that they should receive because it is not offered but has to be asked for.

--- Later in debate ---

[Nadine Dorries]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Not only that, but the accounts of BPAS and Marie Stopes, which are revealed via the Charity Commission, can sometimes be three years out of date—we do not get to see them until three years later. That is amazing when one considers that the Charity Commission is paid £60 million of taxpayers’ money each year.

This, for me, is about the women who have contacted me and asked me to propose this amendment on their behalf, and I have to dedicate some of this speech to them. Every day I receive e-mails and speak to people—

[Luciana Berger]

Will the hon. Lady give way on that point?

[Nadine Dorries]

No.

I constantly speak to people at a high level across the abortion industry, and they always tell me that no woman goes through those doors wanting to be there. All women’s stories are the same; there is a theme that runs through every single one. The individual circumstances may be different, but the stories all start in the same way and with the same questions: “Will I lose my job or won’t I lose my job?”; “Will he leave me or won’t he leave me?”; “Will my parents kick me out or won’t they kick me out?” The questions are all the same; there are no surprises. Many women say that once they are referred—

Oral Answers to Questions

Baroness Berger Excerpts

Tuesday 26th April 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lansley]

My hon. Friend will know, like I do, that his GPs in Reading have already commissioned a new care pathway for people with lower back pain, which means that instead of having to go to hospital appointments, patients can be seen in their own homes by physiotherapists or occupational therapists offering practical advice and assistance in managing pain. Those are practical steps led by front-line staff, the purpose of which is to improve care for patients.

[Luciana Berger (Liverpool, Wavertree) (Lab/Co-op)]

12. What arrangements he has made for continuity of provision of existing hospital services under his proposed reforms of the NHS; and if he will make a statement.

[The Minister of State, Department of Health (Mr Simon Burns)]

Commissioners would remain responsible for securing continued provision of NHS services to meet the needs of their local populations. We are proposing to support commissioners in this by introducing a comprehensive system of regulation at national level and additional regulation for designated services.

[Luciana Berger]

The Minister told the Bill Committee that some accident and emergency services might be undercut by private providers, which could force them to close. Will the Government bring forward amendments to the Bill to safeguard existing A and E services in all areas, including Merseyside?

NHS Reform

Baroness Berger Excerpts

Monday 4th April 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lansley]

The hon. Gentleman and I know one another well enough to know that we share a commitment to the NHS and that I am determined. Perhaps I sometimes get very close to all of this because I am very close to the NHS. I spend my time thinking about this subject and I spend my time with people in the service. I spend my time trying to ensure that the Bill is a once-in-a-generation opportunity to get it right for people in the NHS—they want to be free. The British Medical Association made it clear that it wants an end to constant political interference in the NHS. We can do that only if we secure the necessary autonomy for the NHS, and if we make accountability transparent, rather than having constant interference from this place or from Richmond house.

[Luciana Berger (Liverpool, Wavertree) (Lab/Co-op)]

How many managers who have lost their jobs will be re-employed during this pause?

[Mr Lansley]

I do not have a figure for how many have been re-employed. The hon. Lady will know that under the process by which people agreed with the NHS to take resignation and, more recently, in voluntary redundancy terms, after six months there is an opportunity for people to take jobs—we are not depriving them permanently of the ability to take jobs. Indeed, one of the responsibilities of the commissioning consortia will be to find the best people, but we are doing that now. That is why we continue to make progress on the ground by the assignment of PCT staff to commissioning consortia and to local authorities, in order to ensure that they are beginning to take on their responsibilities.

Oral Answers to Questions

Baroness Berger Excerpts

Tuesday 8th March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Steve Rotheram (Liverpool, Walton) (Lab)]

1. How much funding he plans to allocate to local authorities to perform new public health duties in each of the next four years.

[Luciana Berger (Liverpool, Wavertree) (Lab/Co-op)]

6. How much funding he plans to allocate to local authorities to perform new public health duties in each of the next four years.

[Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab)]

9. How much funding he plans to allocate to local authorities to perform new public health duties in each of the next four years.

--- Later in debate ---

[Luciana Berger]

Will the Secretary of State give us more detail on how local authorities will be incentivised to innovate in public health, given that hospitals rather than councils will benefit financially from better public health?

[Mr Lansley]

In the first instance, local authorities have the direct incentive that they represent the people who elect them and so will want to use the public health resources available to them to deliver the best possible public health services to their local population. The intention of our proposals, which has been very strongly supported, not least by the British Medical Association, the Faculty of Public Health, the Local Government Association and others, is to put public health resources alongside the range of responsibilities of local authorities which will have the greatest impact on the overall determinants of health: education, employment, housing, environment, transport and the like.

Oral Answers to Questions

Baroness Berger Excerpts

Tuesday 25th January 2011 Commons Chamber

[Paul Burstow]

The hon. Gentleman makes some important points about how the new system provides the opportunity to access a range of new resources to develop the way in which commissioning is provided for people with neurological conditions. Not the least of these are the way in which the Neurological Alliance is working to provide a new structure for its way of operating at the local level to offer commissioning support and, from the Department, how the neurological commissioning support group will be able to work with early implementers of the health and well-being boards and pathfinder GP consortia to provide them with the necessary support to develop their capability in this area.

[Luciana Berger (Liverpool, Wavertree) (Lab/Co-op)]

The Minister of State referred earlier to Labour Members cherry-picking quotes, but I do not believe that Laurence Buckman, chair of the British Medical Association’s GP committee, was mincing his words when today he described the Government’s reorganisation plans as “fatally flawed”, warning that they

“would see the poor, elderly, infirm and terminally ill in large parts of the country losing out”.

Why does the Secretary of State believe that he knows better than Dr Buckman?

[Mr Lansley]

I do not recall the BMA ever agreeing with the previous Government. Let me provide one quote to the hon. Lady:

“The general aims of reform are sound—greater role for clinicians in commissioning care, more involvement of patients, less bureaucracy and greater priority on improving health outcomes—and are common ground between patients, health professions and political parties.”

The shadow Secretary of State said that last week.

Swine Flu

Baroness Berger Excerpts

Monday 10th January 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lansley]

Yes, I am. The hon. Lady will know that there have always been occasions when paediatric intensive care capacity in a particular hospital is full and when it is necessary for children to be taken a distance. On Christmas eve, I was at the intensive care unit at Alder Hey and I want to pay tribute to the tremendous work done by staff there. They acknowledge that this was not just about H1N1. One reason the committee did not recommend vaccinating all children under the age of five was that children, particularly very young children, were in intensive care because of a combination of H1N1 and/or bronchiolitis and RSV. A range of conditions was impacting at that moment on very young children.

[Luciana Berger (Liverpool, Wavertree) (Lab/Co-op)]

Several chemists and GPs’ surgeries in Merseyside have run out of the flu vaccine, leaving at-risk patients unable to obtain the jab. The Health Protection Agency has highlighted Liverpool as having significantly higher rates of swine flu than the English average. Will Liverpool therefore receive a higher proportion of the £162 million that the Secretary of State has made available to primary care trusts to help those affected?

[Mr Lansley]

The £162 million will be allocated to primary care trusts based on the social care allocation formula, which will be the same for next year. Any GP surgery, or for that matter the primary care trust in Merseyside, is free to come to us to order supplies from the national stockpile of the H1N1 vaccine to ensure that those who require vaccination can receive it.

Supporting Carers

Baroness Berger Excerpts

Thursday 1st July 2010 Westminster Hall

[Luciana Berger (Liverpool, Wavertree) (Lab/Co-op)]

This is the first time that I have served under your chairmanship, Mr Benton, or made a speech in Westminster Hall, and I am delighted to be taking part in the debate.

Two recent experiences in my constituency have led me to understand better the challenges faced by many people who care for a parent, child or other dependent. I recently spent a morning at the Liverpool carers centre, which is run by Local Solutions, a social enterprise in my constituency. I heard at first hand about the experience of many carers, who come together weekly for a couple of hours in a supported environment to do activities such as tai chi and to use the gym. Many carers told me about the numerous challenges they face, such as feeling isolated or seeing a loved one’s condition deteriorate. Those carers were the fortunate ones, however, as they were able to join a support group at which they could share their load each week.

Unfortunately, not every carer has the opportunity to have some respite and to mix with other carers and share experiences, as I saw when I spent time at a local supermarket for parent and carers day—a campaign run by the Union of Shop, Distributive and Allied Workers. Its object was to raise awareness among the staff of the help available. As my hon. Friend the Member for Hartlepool (Mr Wright) highlighted, while it was striking that most parents knew of the support available to them, carers were significantly less aware of the support that they could access, such as carer’s allowance, help at home, aids and equipment, vouchers and direct payments. I met a teenager who had left school at 16 to care for her disabled mother. She was working at the supermarket for 20 hours a week, but did not qualify for carer’s allowance as she was earning slightly more than the £97 limit. She was struggling to get by and to pay her bills.

That leads me to the focus of my speech: the plight of working carers. I support USDAW’s campaign to end barriers to work by extending the carer’s allowance to low-paid workers who earn up to £150 a week. If the allowance was tapered at the same rate as tax credits, all full-time carers earning up to £300 a week would receive some support. I also support USDAW’s call for carer’s allowance to be improved. It is £53.90 a week for anyone who cares for more then 35 hours a week, but that is one of the lowest rates in Europe, amounting to £1.54 an hour—less than a third of the national minimum wage. I would like carer’s allowance to be increased to at least the same amount as jobseeker’s allowance, as that would provide better support to the estimated 4.8 million carers of working age. Yes, that would come at a cost of about £1.1 billion at a time when cuts are being made, but considering that carers save our economy an estimated £87 billion a year, I believe that that is a small price to pay.

USDAW recently carried out a survey of its members that highlighted some of the pressures faced by people who juggle paid work with caring for a disabled, elderly or vulnerable relative or friend. Some of the comments highlight the challenges that a working carer can face, such as

“pressure and more pressure, the dreadful feeling when the phone rings and you have to ask for time off.”

Another comment states:

“My mum is regularly committed to hospital, usually at the drop of a hat. My personnel manager refuses to recognise me as a carer because my mum’s condition fluctuates.”

A further comment is:

“The pressure of looking after my elderly mum and working full-time was getting too much for me. I had no support whatsoever from my employer. I had to leave because I felt if I had a breakdown I would be no use to my mum.”

The situation for carers at work has to be improved and the enormous pressures on those with caring commitments who work must be relieved. What will the Minister and his Department do to ensure that carers know about their rights? He mentioned the right to request flexible working hours, but has he considered introducing the right to paid time off work at times of family illness or emergency?

During the week before last, we celebrated carers week in the House. Its theme was that carers deserve a life of their own. Whether we are talking about the 4.8 million working carers or the 1.2 million carers not of working age, whom many hon. Members have spoken about this afternoon, I urge the Minister to do everything to ensure that carers have a life of their own.