Barts Health NHS Trust

Stephen Metcalfe Excerpts

Thursday 19th March 2015 Commons Chamber

[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.

[Stephen Metcalfe (South Basildon and East Thurrock) (Con)]

As my hon. Friend knows, Basildon hospital was one of 14 to go into special measures and one of the first out. I believe that the reason for that is the Government’s openness to accept there are problems and not duck them, the hard work of hospital staff and the open and transparent attitude adopted by the management team to accept the problem and make it their own. Is my hon. Friend confident that the leadership of Barts is willing to accept the problems unreservedly and has the ability to face up to the challenges?

Francis Report: Update and Response

Stephen Metcalfe Excerpts

Wednesday 11th February 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

I do not think we should seek scapegoats, but I do think we need to understand where policies have inadvertently led to the wrong outcomes. Sir Robert talks clearly about the dangers of an excessive focus on targets, which is one of the things that have driven the wrong culture. On that, I hope to get cross-party agreement.

[Stephen Metcalfe (South Basildon and East Thurrock) (Con)]

As my right hon. Friend will be aware, one reason why Basildon hospital came out of special measures so quickly is that under the new chief executive, openness and transparency are is encouraged at every level. Does he therefore agree that it should be incumbent on all of us to be open, transparent and honest? Why does he think the Opposition are tweeting that the numbers of doctors and nurses at Basildon hospital are down, when I have just checked with the chief executive and found that the reality is that the numbers are up?

[Mr Hunt]

It is very important that everyone uses the right figures. What has happened at Basildon hospital is an inspiration to other trusts in special measures. In just a few months, it moved from being in special measures to being rated “good” by the CQC. The trust has an inspiring new chief executive, Clare Panniker, who really does listen to staff. I have been there and been told by staff how they feel that they are being listened to. We all have an obligation to make sure that the right information goes out to local communities, so that they understand where things really are getting better.

Special Measures Regime

Stephen Metcalfe Excerpts

Wednesday 16th July 2014 Commons Chamber

[Stephen Metcalfe (South Basildon and East Thurrock) (Con)]

I congratulate my right hon. Friend on his statement. I, too, congratulate Clare Panniker on her inspirational leadership at Basildon hospital. She informs me that rather than cutting 345 nurses between 2010 and 2013, there were 1,908 in 2010, 2,000 in 2013 and that that number is now up by 241. Does he agree that to tackle problems in the NHS we need honesty and accuracy when discussing these issues?

[Mr Hunt]

We do. I think it is time that those on the Opposition Front Bench, in particular, recognised that they were wrong to oppose so bitterly the move to get rid of 19,000 administrators in the NHS, so that we can afford 7,000 more doctors and 4,000 more nurses across the whole NHS. That has made a huge difference to the statement we are making today.

Oral Answers to Questions

Stephen Metcalfe Excerpts

Tuesday 15th July 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

I do not know the details of the individual case, and it would not be right for me to comment. However, what I will say is that we have changed the rules to prevent people who are responsible for poor care from popping up in another part of the system. From now on, when trusts appoint people to boards, they can check their prior records on a central database administered by the CQC. Let me tell the hon. Lady that we are absolutely determined to change the culture in the NHS so that we stamp out the bullying and intimidation that were such a factor for so many doctors and nurses for many years.

[Stephen Metcalfe (South Basildon and East Thurrock) (Con)]

23. Will the Secretary of State join me in congratulating the management and staff of Basildon hospital who have worked hard to turn the hospital around so that it is now rated as good? Will he confirm that his Department will continue to support it so that the hospital can carry on making progress?

[Mr Hunt]

I am delighted with the progress that has been made under Clare Panniker’s leadership. The hospital now has 241 more nurses, and the first maternity unit in the country to be rated as outstanding. My hon. Friend will want to know why it is that when there was a CQC report under the previous Government, it was sat on for six months and nothing was done.

Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust

Stephen Metcalfe Excerpts

Tuesday 19th November 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

We have had a very bipartisan discussion this afternoon, so I am slightly disappointed that the hon. Lady is twisting my words. I did not say that cruelty became the norm everywhere in the NHS; I said that in places such as Mid Staffs cruelty became normal. If she reads the Francis report, she will find that that is the case.

Trying to duck or run away from that fact is what got us into a great deal of trouble, because we did not deal with the issues in Mid Staffs nearly as quickly as we should have done. On staffing levels, we are doing something that did not happen before. When her Government were in power, we did not know where staffing was unsafe, but now we will know and can do something about it.

[Stephen Metcalfe (South Basildon and East Thurrock) (Con)]

Will my right hon. Friend confirm that never again will Ministers duck their responsibility to be open and transparent in the reporting of failures, as they perhaps were in relation to Mid Staffs and potentially were in relation to Basildon hospital before 2010?

[Mr Hunt]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. It is incredibly important that Ministers never, whether deliberately or inadvertently, give a signal to the system that they do not want poor care to be highlighted as quickly as possible. I am afraid that there is evidence that, whether or not former Ministers intended this, it was interpreted that the emergence of bad news stories would be met with a great deal of ministerial disapproval, and that did enormous damage.

Oral Answers to Questions

Stephen Metcalfe Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd October 2013 Commons Chamber

[Stephen Metcalfe (South Basildon and East Thurrock) (Con)]

12. What recent progress he has made on improving the performance of hospital trusts placed in special measures.

[The Secretary of State for Health (Mr Jeremy Hunt)]

Significant progress has been made at all 11 trusts placed in special measures in July, including changing the chair or chief executive officer and recruiting more nurses in every single one them and partnering each of them with a high-performing hospital so that they can make rapid progress in turning things around.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Hunt]

I can give my hon. Friend both assurances because Northumbria has been doing a huge amount to help North Cumbria turn itself around, including installing its patient experience systems to ensure that patients are treated with the dignity and respect that they deserve. The problems have been around since 2007 and he can tell his constituents that we are finally turning them around.

[Stephen Metcalfe]

As my right hon. Friend will be aware, Basildon university hospital in my constituency is one of the 11 hospitals that were placed in special measures following the failure of the previous Government to act on the information that they had. Will he tell the House what support the new management team, in whom I have great confidence, are receiving and when my constituents can expect to see sustained, long-term improvements?

[Mr Hunt]

I reassure my hon. Friend that the trust has hired 257 more nurses since the problems emerged this year, has better A and E processes, and has been partnered with the Royal Free in London to help it make even more progress. He will be as shocked as I am that when the Care Quality Commission identified problems at that hospital the last Government sat on the report for six months. That cannot be acceptable.

Hospital Mortality Rates

Stephen Metcalfe Excerpts

Tuesday 16th July 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

I will be delighted to visit my hon. Friend’s hospital, as well as those of many colleagues. I am sure I will learn a great deal when I do so.

[Stephen Metcalfe (South Basildon and East Thurrock) (Con)]

I congratulate my right hon. Friend on having put patients first in the whole process. As we move forward, we should approach the failures of the past more in sorrow than in anger, but we have to accept that that is a hard ask for my constituents who potentially have lost loved ones because of the catastrophic failures of the past inspection regime. That is why my constituents are impatient for change. If hospitals do not make the changes necessary in the required time, what sanctions will be imposed?

[Mr Hunt]

The entire system will be accountable for making sure that change is delivered. That is part of the change that we are making through the statement this afternoon. My hon. Friend’s hospital will be inspected again within the next 12 months and we will be able to see what progress has been made. There will be further independent inspections after that, so his constituents will have confidence that an independent expert is casting an eye over the health care that they are receiving and telling them the unvarnished truth about whether they can trust it or not.

Oral Answers to Questions

Stephen Metcalfe Excerpts

Tuesday 16th July 2013 Commons Chamber

[Dr Poulter]

The hon. Lady is right to highlight the fact that when we have scientific and clinical data, they must be used responsibly, as the MMR scandal also indicated. Of course I would be delighted to meet her to talk through this matter further.

[Stephen Metcalfe (South Basildon and East Thurrock) (Con)]

T8. In advance of the publication of the Keogh report later today, and following the revelations that Basildon hospital had one of the highest standard mortality rates following catastrophic failures, will my right hon. Friend assure the House and my constituents that he will support the new management regime in its attempts to improve the quality of care? Will he also tell the House if he found any evidence of a systematic attempt by the previous Prime Minister and the previous Government to cover up figures—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. The hon. Gentleman should not abuse topical questions to ask two questions, and he should be asking not about the policies of the previous Government, but about the policies of the present Government, on which I know the Secretary of State will briefly reply. We are grateful.

Backbench business

Stephen Metcalfe Excerpts

Thursday 14th February 2013 Westminster Hall

[Caroline Nokes (Romsey and Southampton North) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Osborne. I pay tribute to the Backbench Business Committee for granting this three-hour debate. I know that the Committee had to negotiate with the Liaison Committee so that we could hold the debate during eating disorders awareness week. This debate is therefore timely as well as important. Others in the House clearly agree, as can be seen by the number of hon. Members present. I know how difficult it is to commit to this slot on a Thursday afternoon, particularly when serious issues such as violence against women are being debated in the main Chamber. I am conscious that several Members are trying to perform the parliamentary feat of being in two places at once.

Eating disorders have not been debated in the House since 2007, a considerable time ago, yet over the course of the past few weeks I have become aware of several hon. Members and members of staff with family connections to those with eating disorders. Just this afternoon, I received an e-mail from an hon. Member’s chief of staff, who told me the moving and difficult story of his wife’s experience with an eating disorder. I pay particular tribute to my hon. Friends the Members for Enfield, Southgate (Mr Burrowes), and for Wells (Tessa Munt), and the hon. Member for North Tyneside (Mrs Glindon), who applied with me for this debate and have significant knowledge of and interest in eating disorders.

Some 1.6 million people in this country have been or are currently known to be affected by eating disorders. That is a massive number, equivalent to nearly 2,500 in every parliamentary constituency. However, the number of unknown sufferers is also of significant concern. The true number of those who suffer is not fully understood owing to the paucity of data relating to those who are not in the system. The Department of Health acknowledges that unreported cases of eating disorders are a huge problem, and the true figure could be higher than 4 million, which is 6.5% of the UK population, or about 7,000 people per constituency.

[Stephen Metcalfe (South Basildon and East Thurrock) (Con)]

Those statistics are staggering. As someone relatively new to the issue, I was not aware that the numbers were quite so large. How many of those people are men, and are there data identifying the proportion of sufferers who are men of whatever age, and the proportion who are young men?

--- Later in debate ---

[Caroline Nokes]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely bang on. Many parents of sufferers have commented to me that they feel their GPs do not understand enough, and nor do schools and colleges. I will cover all the points that he raised later.

The fastest increase in eating disorders has been among young men. As well as facing the mental health problems typically associated with female sufferers, they are coming under more pressure than ever before to conform to a stereotype of the body beautiful. Imagery in magazines and advertising plays a significant role.

Of particular concern is the prevalence of eating disorders among gay and bisexual men, who are twice as likely to be sufferers as heterosexual men. I understand that eating disorders in gay and bisexual men are even more linked to concerns about body image than in heterosexual male or female sufferers. Although males account for only 11% of the total of those with eating disorders, the percentage is increasing, and we should be conscious of that. In the 10 years up to 2011, the number of hospital admissions for men suffering from an eating disorder rose by 67%. Furthermore, there is evidence that undiagnosed disorders are even more commonplace among men than among women. The scale of the hidden problem could be immense.

It is not only the young who are afflicted, although there is certainly a trend towards eating disorders manifesting at an earlier age than ever before. I was particularly moved by my contact with a woman whose daughter started suffering from anorexia nervosa at 10 years old but was not diagnosed for years, as her GP and other medical practitioners thought that she was too young to have the condition. Eating disorders are also being diagnosed much later; some sufferers present in their 50s and 60s, and there is evidence that increasing numbers of sufferers manage their conditions not just over the average of seven years, but for decades. An increasing number of people in their 30s and 40s have lived with their eating disorder for more than 20 years.

“Eating disorder” is a term used to describe a wide variety of conditions, some well known and others far less so. Obviously, the best known and most recognisable is anorexia nervosa, in which a sufferer intentionally deprives themselves of food and has a body weight at least 15% below the recommended minimum. People with anorexia have an extremely distorted view of their own body and a fear of gaining weight. However, anorexia is but one condition among several. Eating disorders also include bulimia, which in many cases is harder to detect, as sufferers may maintain a normal-looking weight. However, it is achieved through bingeing, purging and fasting, and like anorexia it can cause long-term damage.

From my research for this debate and my conversations with many sufferers of eating disorders, I have learned of many other conditions: binge eating; compulsive overeating; food neophobia, an extreme fear of trying new food; and compulsive over-exercising. A year ago, I met a young man who ran up to 30 miles every day. There is also selective eating: sufferers eat only an extremely limited range of foods.

Bulimia is a disorder linked closely to low self-esteem, emotional problems and stress. The sufferer may think constantly about calories, dieting and ways of getting rid of food that they have eaten. It is actually more common than anorexia, but it is more hidden, because people with bulimia usually maintain an average or just-above-average weight. Bulimia can go unnoticed for a long time while sufferers feel incredibly ill and unhappy.

Those with bulimia become involved in a cycle of eating large amounts of food and making themselves sick, cutting down or starving for a few days, or trying to find other ways to make up for the food that they have eaten. It can cause them to become so hungry that they eat large amounts of food because their bodies crave nourishment. Some people do not vomit, but instead take laxatives, which are especially dangerous. Just because bulimia does not cause the extreme weight loss of anorexia does not mean that it is less serious. Sufferers need help and support, as the side effects and consequences can be serious. I appreciate that I have given a very rapid description of some eating disorders, for which I apologise, but I am sure that other Members will wish to discuss some of them in more detail.

I do not wish to generalise, and I apologise if my next remark causes any offence, but in many instances, due to the extreme control with which sufferers approach their food consumption, eating disorders are a type of addiction. However, unlike addictions to alcohol or narcotics, a fixation with how one controls one’s calorie intake must be faced and addressed every day of a sufferer or recovered sufferer’s life. They cannot simply remove food from their lives in the way that others might develop strategies to avoid alcohol, for instance. They must eat to live. For sufferers, by necessity, that battle will occur three times a day for the rest of their lives.

Eating disorders are not trivial conditions. Anorexia kills about 20% of sufferers, and 40% never recover. It is the single biggest killer of all mental illnesses. It has been dismissed for too long as a problem of teenage girls who just need to get a grip on their eating patterns. That is far from the truth. Eating disorders are serious, potentially fatal, mental illnesses, which, even long after a sufferer has recovered, can have long-term implications for their health. The impact on fertility is well known, but there are many other serious implications. Abnormal heart rhythms are commonplace, even in teenagers with eating disorders. In fact, heart damage is the most common cause of hospitalisation for those suffering from eating disorders, but the kidneys and liver are also badly affected, and reduction in bone density leading to osteoporosis can happen in sufferers, even before there has been any physical manifestation of a problem.

As chair of the all-party group on body image, I have been privileged to work with a number of leading charities supporting those suffering from eating disorders and their families. I pay particular tribute, during eating disorders awareness week, to Beat; many of its members are in the Public Gallery. I also pay tribute to Anorexia and Bulimia Care and the Succeed Foundation. I vividly recall hearing the moving stories of ABC members at a reception hosted by my hon. Friend the Member for Wells a few months ago. These charities all do fantastic work with sufferers and their families, and to ensure that the wider community—Members of Parliament, the medical profession, schools, colleges and universities—have a better understanding of the signs of eating disorders, and how to help those in the grip of such a disorder and those who may be at risk. They also work with the media to ensure that they understand the importance of the portrayal of responsible images on advertising and in editorials.

[Stephen Metcalfe]

My hon. Friend is making a powerful, moving speech. These issues have been discussed and debated before, but there seems never to have been any progress in addressing the issues and tackling the problems. Why does she think no progress has been made in the past 10, 20 or 30 years? These things were known about, yet there seems to have been no move forward.

[Caroline Nokes]

That is a difficult question. Later, I may even suggest that we are moving backwards. Unfortunately, these are hidden conditions that the media and others have chosen, occasionally, to trivialise. They are not trivial and they need much higher priority.

--- Later in debate ---

[Caroline Nokes]

I have been struck by the number of times that relatives of sufferers have contacted me to make the point that their family member was slow to get a diagnosis, or to say that the GP dismissed the eating disorder as nothing more than a teenager being a bit fussy about their food. It is critical to raise awareness, not only among the wider community and the media, but among our general practitioners, because we need these disorders to be identified earlier so that damage to growing bodies, in the instance of young people, does not become permanent.

[Stephen Metcalfe]

As well as the medical profession being aware of these conditions and the first signs, should not parents have some knowledge of the indications, so that they can help their children earlier, before the condition gets too serious?

[Caroline Nokes]

One of the messages that I have received from parents is that they already feel enormous guilt, in some instances completely unjustifiably. They feel shame for what is going on with their child, and as if they are somehow to blame. They are not, and I find that in the majority of cases, parents were the fastest to identify the condition. They instinctively knew that something was wrong with their child, even though they might not have been able to put their finger on what exactly it was. I have heard some terrible tales from parents, which I will come on to—I assure you, Mrs Osborne, I am getting towards the end—about the responsibility and burden placed on them. I have even heard about parents who have been told that it is their fault. It simply is not.

We do not fully understand what causes eating disorders; it is complicated. All the parents I have spoken to have done the most fantastic job in supporting their children. As one sufferer’s mother said to me on the phone just yesterday, there is nothing that she would not have sacrificed to get her daughter the help that she needed. Had the mother been able to buy private health care, she would have sold her house to do it, so desperate was she for her daughter to get well.

I know how long sufferers have had to wait to gain admission to April House—something that has been emphasised to me incredibly strongly—and the picture from around the country is that the average wait from diagnosis to treatment in a specialist unit can be as long as nine months. For sufferers, that is simply far too long. As we move from primary care trusts to clinical commissioning groups, it is imperative that awareness of the scale of the problem is uppermost in the minds of GPs, who will be responsible for commissioning the relevant services.

I have mentioned briefly one significant theme, but I would like to mention it again. It is a message that has come from the parents about the impact on families. The effects are many and varied, and certainly include huge feelings of guilt and despair, and lack of comprehension of why this has happened to their child, or why an individual might choose to deprive themselves of the necessary nutrition to lead a healthy life.

--- Later in debate ---

[Stephen Metcalfe (South Basildon and East Thurrock) (Con)]

It is very generous of you to call me, Mr Walker, because I had not intended to speak in the debate. I am not sure I will detain Members long, because I am not sure what I am going to say.

Twenty-four hours ago, the debate was not on my horizon at all, but in discussion with colleagues yesterday, I was very taken by some of the numbers that were bandied around. Today, having heard the opening speech by my hon. Friend the Member for Romsey and Southampton North (Caroline Nokes), I felt compelled to say something in the debate. I come relatively new to this issue. I have sat here listening to powerful, passionate and informed speeches, and mine will be nothing like that. However, I hope it will give an insight into the epiphany I have had over the past 24 hours.

The numbers have been referred to many times this afternoon, but what strikes me is that although 2,500 people in my constituency may suffer from an eating disorder, not one has contacted me, either before the debate or in the two and a half years I have been a Member of Parliament. I hope that is because the services they receive from the primary care trust and the mental health trust are exemplary, but I would be surprised if that was the case. I therefore encourage constituents who are struggling to access the services they need to contact me.

I was also struck by the fact that 1.6 million people nationwide have been identified as suffering from an eating disorder, but that number could be as high as 4.2 million, because we count only those who have presented and who are seeking treatment. Another thing that struck me was that a quarter of those people could be men.

As I said, I came new to this subject. Following my discussions yesterday evening, I eventually went home. My children—I am fortunate to have two, who are 22 and 20—were up. Our television is currently broken, so one of our pastimes is talking to each other, which is a novel experience, I have to admit. We got talking about what I had been discussing—this afternoon’s debate and my intention to come along and perhaps make an intervention to highlight the fact that a quarter of those suffering from an eating disorder may be men.

I was surprised by my children’s responses, and I am going to refer to them. I have texted my children to apologise to them in advance, in case I embarrass them. I was shocked because both of them talked about friends and acquaintances who had suffered from eating disorders. What took me aback most, however, was that they both admitted that they had probably had an encounter with some form of eating disorder. For the record, that has not manifested itself in anything particularly serious, and they both see what the pattern was at the time, but it could have been serious, and that is why I felt compelled to speak.

I want to say a little about what my children said, and about what I think the reasons behind what they said were. My son, Tom, is 22. He is a fitness trainer and he runs a gym. He is a health fanatic: he is very fit, he is always at the gym and he plays rugby football. He recognised some time ago that he was getting to the point where, however much exercise he took, he still felt there was too much fat on him. He was deliberately avoiding food and certain other things to try to slim down. There is not an ounce of fat on him, and he does not need to do that. He knows that now, but at the time, for whatever reason, he felt he had to change his body shape.

My daughter, who is 20, is incredibly slim. She suffered the reverse problem from my son: people would accuse her of perhaps having an eating disorder, when she did not think she had one. The problem was that that gave her cause for concern and made her ask whether she perhaps did have an eating disorder. As it happens, she does not; she is fine—she is just a slim girl. Both my children therefore felt under pressure because of the way other people saw them, or because of their perception of the way other people saw them.

I know the reasons behind eating disorders are complex, and we have heard about them, but the thing that concerns me most is the idea of body image, of perfection and of trying to be something that we cannot be. We know the numbers: only 5% of us could ever get close to the perfect image we see in the press and the media. The rest of us are struggling to conform to that or just to be comfortable in ourselves. That is one of the main drivers of this issue. Those who get past their brush with an eating disorder may do so because they see through that. However, if there are other pressures in people’s lives—pressures relating to relationships, family breakdown, the future, money and education—they might trigger the body image issues that push people towards having a fully-fledged eating disorder.

The other thing that surprised me is that eating disorders are on both sides of the gender divide, and they affect old and young alike—there is pressure on not just the young, but all of us. However, I want to focus most on young men such as my son, who perhaps felt under pressure to change his image.

There is the statistic that gay men are twice as likely as straight men to suffer from an eating disorder, and I can see how that could well be true. However, when we hear that the proportion of men, including young men, suffering from eating disorders could be between 11% and 25%, how can we have any confidence that those figures are accurate, given that one is more than double the other? We do not know how widespread this problem is. Gay men may be more prone to coming forward to seek help, and straight men may not seek help. I do not know, and I suspect we will not know until we do more research. However, we do know that there has been a 68% increase in 10 years in the number of men presenting with an eating disorder, and the number is still rising. We therefore need to take action.

One remark that struck me earlier was from my hon. Friend the Member for Enfield, Southgate (Mr Burrowes), who said that if we are not aware of a family member, a friend or a constituent with an eating disorder, we are out of touch. Well, I have to say that I probably was out of touch. I feel less out of touch now, and I am grateful to my hon. Friends for putting me back in touch, but that, I think, is one of the issues, and I referred to this earlier in an intervention. I am not sure that, as a parent, I fully understood some of the tell-tale, early-warning signs, and I do not know how we get that information across to parents, especially parents of boys.

We have to help parents accept that these problems are not their fault, and they need not to feel the guilt that is perhaps associated with this issue. They can then signpost those who are suffering towards help at an earlier stage, rather than hiding the issue from themselves because it does not fit with the way they view their family set-up.

We also need to educate young men. We need to say that eating disorders are serious and affect not only young women, but young men. If young men do not seek help, that can have ramifications for the rest of their lives. We therefore need to help them deal with any stigma that might be associated with that.

The problem, which is obviously serious, has only come to my knowledge in any great detail in the past 24 hours. The condition affects all parts of society and all ages, and crosses social divides. I hope that through debates such as this one, and awareness week, and the information that I have been provided with, we can push the agenda a little further onward, so that we can help those who are in desperate suffering, many of whom suffer in silence. I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Romsey and Southampton North for obtaining the debate, and I am grateful for the opportunity to speak, and to become more informed about an important issue.

Oral Answers to Questions

Stephen Metcalfe Excerpts

Tuesday 10th January 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lansley]

The intention is that from January 2014 as new medicines are introduced through the value-based pricing system, the reimbursement price in the NHS will reflect their value and therefore, by extension, they will all be available through the NHS.

[Stephen Metcalfe (South Basildon and East Thurrock) (Con)]

5. What steps he is taking to ensure drugs approved by the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence are made available to all patients in the NHS.

[The Secretary of State for Health (Mr Andrew Lansley)]

The NHS is required to fund drugs and technologies recommended in NICE technology appraisals, in line with the NHS constitution. The NHS chief executive’s report “Innovation, Health and Wealth” sets out plans for the introduction of a compliance regime to ensure rapid and consistent implementation of NICE technology appraisal recommendations throughout the NHS.

[Stephen Metcalfe]

I greatly welcome the Government’s recent announcement on swift and proper implementation of NICE guidance that allows patients access to innovative treatments. In order for cost-effective treatments to secure NICE guidance approval, in the first instance will the Secretary of State ensure that NICE’s methodology review reinforces the importance of appraisal appropriately reflecting clinical practice when assessing new treatments?

[Mr Lansley]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend, who clearly understands that NICE is responsible for the methods it uses in the development of its guidance and that it is undertaking a review of its appraisal methods. I expect that that will be published for consultation this year. NICE should issue final guidance only after careful consideration of the evidence and public consultation with stakeholders, including patient and professional groups.