Oral Answers to Questions
Margaret Ferrier Excerpts(8 years, 3 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr Hunt
My hon. Friend knows about these things from his own clinical background, and he is absolutely right. We are now doing something—it is probably the most ambitious programme anywhere in the world—to identify the costs that hospitals are paying. From April, we will be collecting the costs for the 100 most used products in the NHS for every hospital. That information will be shared. We are the biggest purchaser of healthcare equipment in the world, so we should be paying the lowest prices.
Margaret Ferrier (Rutherglen and Hamilton West) (SNP)
Barts Health NHS Trust, the UK’s largest hospital trust, is set to run up a £135 million deficit this year. That would be by far the greatest ever overspend in the history of the NHS. When will the Minister accept the sheer scale of the austerity-driven crisis facing the NHS?
Mr Hunt
It is stretching things a bit to call that an austerity-driven problem when, next year, we are putting in the sixth biggest increase in funding for the NHS in its entire 70-year history. There are some severe problems at Barts, but we will tackle the deficit. We also need to ensure that we improve patient safety and patient care.