NHS: Winter Preparedness Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateDepartment: Department of Health and Social Care
Steve Barclay
Main Page: Steve Barclay (Conservative - North East Cambridgeshire)Department Debates - View all Steve Barclay's debates with the Department of Health and Social Care
NHS: Winter Preparedness
Steve Barclay Excerpts(1 day, 20 hours ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Urgent Questions are proposed each morning by backbench MPs, and up to two may be selected each day by the Speaker. Chosen Urgent Questions are announced 30 minutes before Parliament sits each day.
Each Urgent Question requires a Government Minister to give a response on the debate topic.
This information is provided by Parallel Parliament and does not comprise part of the offical record
Wes Streeting
It is one thing for the BMA to have rejected the offer we made; it is quite something else to have done that following a 28.9% pay rise—but we are where we are. The thing that I find utterly inexplicable and indefensible about the BMA’s position is that we offered it the chance to extend its strike mandate to the beginning of February, in order that strikes could be delayed into January, to give the NHS a clear run at an extremely difficult and challenging winter and the most challenging time of the year for the NHS. The only reason the BMA is choosing this week to strike is that it knows it will inflict maximum damage on the NHS, but in doing so it risks avoidable harm to patients. That is unconscionable, indefensible and unnecessary, and I ask ordinary members of the BMA, whatever their views on the offer or this Government, to bear that in mind when deciding whether or not to leave their patients this week.
Steve Barclay (North East Cambridgeshire) (Con)
Given the pressures from flu and strikes, can the Secretary of State confirm that the evidence he gave to the pay review body remains correct—that any pay rises must be funded from within his Department? If so, given that the Office for Budget Responsibility says that inflation next year will be 3.5% and he has offered 2.5% across the NHS, and said that a 1% increase would cost £1.5 billion, does he intend to give NHS staff a real-terms pay cut, or to take £1.5 billion from headline Government commitments?