Junior Doctors Contract

Meg Hillier Excerpts

Friday 20th November 2015 Commons Chamber

[Alistair Burt]

My hon. Friend is right. One difficulty with this is getting through what has built up during the course of the dispute, and getting to the heart of this issue, which is shared by everyone. There is no doctor in the land who does not want to work in safe conditions or for their patients to be treated safely. There is no Member of Parliament who does not want safety to be at the heart of this, and no one from the royal colleges or in senior executive positions in the NHS wants to compromise on safety. That is why we need to cut the number of legal hours, and ensure that doctors cannot work the number of consecutive nights or long days that they can work currently. The contract was outdated and it needs to change, and that is why people should sit down together.

[Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

Members of the Public Accounts Committee hear repeated reports about the challenges of recruiting some of the very junior doctors who will go on strike. Not only is the Government’s game of brinkmanship causing problems with morale and patient safety, it could lead to a longer term crisis in the NHS as doctors choose not to work here. Will the Health Secretary just get on with it and get around the table? It is within his gift to get talks started again and avert this strike.

[Alistair Burt]

The hon. Lady speaks with great background knowledge on this issue. She is right to say that we should all just get on with it, but she is not right to say that it is within the Secretary of State’s gift—if it was, we would not be where we are. The Secretary of State wants a negotiation based on independent recommendations and on three and a half years of work, which is not an unreasonable position. The hon. Lady’s view that this issue should be settled in a way that means negotiations continue and the strike does not happen is correct.

Oral Answers to Questions

Meg Hillier Excerpts

Tuesday 13th October 2015 Commons Chamber

[Alistair Burt]

The work I am doing on developing the new strategy involves other Departments, and it will look at not only the economics, but what is happening internationally and where we can take the whole concept of caring for a different society in the future. The economics is certainly important; we could not do without the contribution that carers make, but it would be impossible to replace it with total Government finance.

[Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

Yesterday, the Public Accounts Committee heard from officials at the Department of Health about the implementation of the Care Act, which is a bold piece of legislation. They admitted that they were very concerned about the unidentified carers, who need to be found in order to be supported. What is the Minister planning to do to make sure that they are identified and supported?

[Alistair Burt]

In a way, the self-definition states its own problem: these are unidentified carers. I hope that the new responsibilities in the Care Act will encourage more people to come forward and that the greater work of carer support organisations, such as the one I preside over in Bedfordshire, Carers in Bedfordshire, will be able to identify more carers. We want more young people to come forward because, as the hon. Lady says, people are caring and they do not realise they are. We need a concerted effort all round to try to reveal them, so that more can be done.

Barts Health NHS Trust

Meg Hillier Excerpts

Thursday 19th March 2015 Commons Chamber

[Jane Ellison]

I thank my hon. Friend for that question. He illustrates the fact that these problems can be addressed through this regime of extra support. I pay tribute to the staff at his local hospital, who have worked so hard to address the failings and to provide much safer care for their patients. He illustrates exactly why this regime of being transparent about issues and ensuring additional support can be given to trusts to address their problems can be successful and can benefit patients.

[Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

I am shocked by the Minister’s tone, as there are genuine concerns about the services that my constituents and those of colleagues are receiving. Barts is the largest trust in England, and when it was formed many concerns were raised. It dilutes accountability and direct line management. Does she agree now that it was too big and that consideration needs to be given to making a number of trusts out of this large trust that are more manageable and directly accountable?

[Jane Ellison]

As the hon. Lady knows, the site in question in this report is Whipps Cross. The priority for its management is to address the issues that the CQC has identified.

Oral Answers to Questions

Meg Hillier Excerpts

Tuesday 24th February 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Order. May I gently remind the House that the question is not about staff per se in the NHS? The question is about people made redundant and subsequently re-employed. Attention to detail tends to profit a Member.

[Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

Those of us on the Public Accounts Committee have heard about the industrial scale of this revolving door of people going out of one job and into another with a fat redundancy payment. Does this not show that the Government have lost their grip on what is truly important in the NHS, which is paying front-line clinicians to serve patients?

[Dr Poulter]

That is extraordinary. The Public Accounts Committee will be aware that these redundancy terms were introduced by the previous Labour Government in 2006. We are committed to changing them and I hope that the hon. Lady’s party will support us in exerting pressure on the unions to support the pay deals on the table that will introduce an £80,000 redundancy cap.

Oral Answers to Questions

Meg Hillier Excerpts

Tuesday 13th January 2015 Commons Chamber

[Norman Lamb]

I pay enormous tribute to the paramedics, who are working under a lot of pressure. The survey results, which showed that about 27% of people who have used 111 say that they would have gone to A and E had it not been available, are a considerable reassurance. However, we need constantly to seek to improve the service, and the urgent and emergency care review pointed to refining the 111 service so that, ultimately, people could get access through to a GP, doctor or nurse, to ensure that they receive the right guidance at the right time.

[Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

The Public Accounts Committee examined this service in Devon and Cornwall and discovered, as it has in other inquiries, a lot of issues associated with cost shunting, because it does not cost 111 when it tells someone they need to go to hospital in an ambulance. So there have been “impressive figures” on the number of people who did not go to A and E as a result of their call, but is the Department monitoring the number of people who are sent to A and E by 111 but should not have been?

[Norman Lamb]

As I said in response to the previous question, there is a real case for constantly seeking to refine the way the service works. The urgent and emergency care review pointed to ways in which we could do that to ensure that, in appropriate cases, people could get through to a doctor or a nurse to give them the right advice. That, in turn, would reduce the number of people turning up at A and E.

A and E (Major Incidents)

Meg Hillier Excerpts

Wednesday 7th January 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

There are two things. First, as I am sure the hon. Lady does, I take every opportunity to praise the work being done by staff through a very difficult and challenging period. Secondly, the practical way in which we can most help them is to try to recruit more staff where we possibly can, and to make sure that resources are not a barrier to recruiting more staff. We have about 5,000 more nurses in hospitals compared with 12 months ago, and that has made a difference.

[Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

The Secretary of State stood up and said that he takes personal responsibility for everything that happens in the NHS. Given that his Government undertook a costly and time-consuming reorganisation, does he now regret that people took their eye off the ball in relation to the highly predictable population shifts that have led to the pressure on A and E?

[Mr Hunt]

I am afraid that that is an example of the politicisation of the NHS that people find so distressing. Those reforms were not enacted in Wales, which is run by the hon. Lady’s party, and A and E performance there is significantly worse. It does not make any logical sense to blame A and E performance on those reforms.

A and E and Ambulance Services

Meg Hillier Excerpts

Thursday 18th December 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

My hon. Friend is right. The NHS wants to know that it has a Government who have a long-term plan for the NHS, who are prepared to fund that plan and who have thought about the long-term solutions. Better access to GPs is one of the key things, as is access to a GP who actually knows about the patient and their condition. Sadly, we lost named GPs following the changes to the GP contract in 2004, but I am proud to say that, from next April, we will be bringing them back.

[Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

The Secretary of State has accused Opposition Members of political scaremongering. Perhaps I should refer him to the Public Accounts Committee’s report on out-of-hours services, which showed cost-shunting to the ambulance service by out-of-hours providers, and to our recent hearing on A and E, which revealed an incredible waste of public money and a lack of joined-up thinking. That is not scaremongering; those are facts from the National Audit Office being interpreted by Members from all parties.

[Mr Hunt]

Yes, and those are the facts that we are acting on with our winter plans. We are trying to reduce the amount of money spent on locum staff and to increase flow going into and out of A and E departments. There is a huge amount of practical things that can be done. I have absolutely no problem with dealing with constructive suggestions from both sides of the House on how we can help A and E departments to get through a difficult winter. It is unacceptable, however, constantly to turn this issue into a political football, when everyone knows that the pressures of an ageing population are making life very difficult for NHS staff and that those staff have a Government who are doing everything they can to support them.

Oral Answers to Questions

Meg Hillier Excerpts

Tuesday 21st October 2014 Commons Chamber

[Jane Ellison]

My hon. Friend takes a great interest in this matter and led the Back-Bench business debate on 1 September. I will certainly ask the HFEA and the expert panel to look at the study to which she refers, but I can provide the reassurance I have given before—that the wide body of expertise and information out there about mitochondrial disease is regularly reviewed over a long period of time.

[Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

The Secretary of State makes great play of protecting the NHS budget, but NHS England, the Nuffield Trust and his hon. Friend the Chair of the Health Committee all agree that it needs another £30 billion investment, so how can he tell people that the NHS is safe under his watch?

[Mr Jeremy Hunt]

We have not just protected the NHS budget, but increased it in real terms, which I think is a huge achievement given the state of the economy we inherited. [Interruption.] I simply say to the hon. Lady that the way to protect and secure NHS funding for the future is by making sure that there is a strong economy to pay for it. That is the single most important thing of all.

Oral Answers to Questions

Meg Hillier Excerpts

Tuesday 10th June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Dr Poulter]

My hon. Friend is right to highlight the fact that as much money as possible always needs to be put into front-line patient care. Under the previous Government, spending on managers and administrators more than doubled from £3 billion to £7 billion, and we have seen the number of administrators fall by 20,000. There is clearly work to do in his area, because as much money needs to go on front-line patient care as possible, and I hope that local commissioners will be looking to share back-office services as much as possible with other commissioning groups to reduce costs and put money into front-line patient care.

[Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

Earlier the Secretary of State and his Minister said that the minimum practice income guarantee was unfair. What is unfair is that so many practices in Hackney and east London are set to close, in an area where there is great deprivation. What are they going to do to make sure that patients still have practices to go to?

[Dr Poulter]

We have had this discussion. A payments system that is almost 20 years out of date and is not funding patients according to clinical need or is not per head of population will not deliver good care. The payments system needs to be changed and NHS England is working with practices that are facing challenges to address those challenges and ensure that high-quality patient care can still be delivered locally.

Oral Answers to Questions

Meg Hillier Excerpts

Tuesday 14th January 2014 Commons Chamber

[Dr Poulter]

Yes. My hon. Friend will be aware that I have a particular knowledge of his local trust. I pay tribute to the dedication of the many high-quality front-line staff working there, and to those who put in extra hours to work as locums, usually from within the existing trust work force, who often have to cover maternity leave and other periods of staff sickness.

[Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

17. The Minister talks complacently about improvements in A and E consultants, but in Queen’s hospital in Romford only seven of the 19 posts have permanent A and E medical doctors in post. Surely he is fiddling while Rome is burning. People are not getting the service they need, while he is spending a fortune on locums.

[Dr Poulter]

The important point the hon. Lady has to remember is that it takes six years to train an A and E consultant, so it would be much better to put the question about advanced work force planning to the former Secretary of State, the right hon. Member for Leigh (Andy Burnham), rather than to members of this Government. Since we have taken charge of medical education and training, the number of those entering acute common training—those who may go on to become A and E consultants—has increased. We are now seeing a complete fill rate for those entering that training—something that the previous Government were not able to achieve.