Oral Answers to Questions

Matt Western Excerpts

Tuesday 19th July 2022 Commons Chamber

[Steve Barclay]

I have had quite a few meeting requests this morning, and I am always keen to meet colleagues. My hon. Friend will be well aware that part of the reason for having integrated care boards within the place-based approach is that commissioners can determine the best mix of services in the locality, including in Burton.

[Matt Western (Warwick and Leamington) (Lab)]

7. What recent estimate he has made of the average waiting time for emergency care.

[The Minister of State, Department for Health and Social Care (Maria Caulfield)]

NHS Digital publishes information on average waiting times, and the data for May shows that the median average total time spent in A&E for all patients was three hours and six minutes.

[Matt Western]

Across the west midlands, 38 people died waiting for ambulances between March and May 2022. In the same period in 2021, two people died; before 2019, in the corresponding period, there were no deaths. A week ago Sunday, 80 people were waiting in accident and emergency in my constituency. What are the causes of these problems?

[Maria Caulfield]

The west midlands is more affected than many regions of the ambulance service. There are a number of causes, the first of which is that we are living with covid, which has not disappeared. If we look at the in-patient rates, we see that they have increased significantly; last month, they were 17.9 per 100,000 and they are now up to 24.4 per 100,000 in the west midlands, which is experiencing significantly higher rates than other parts of the country. [Interruption.] If the shadow Secretary of State wants to hear this, I can tell him that we also have a significant number of staff sicknesses from covid; this time last year, it was about 4% of staff but when I spoke to some trusts this weekend I heard that it was up to 6%. That has a knock-on effect on acute and emergency services and ambulance services being able to respond.