T1. If he will make a statement on his departmental responsibilities. (52573)

My responsibility is to lead the NHS in delivering improved health outcomes in England; to lead a public health service that improves the health of the nation and reduces health inequalities; and to lead the reform of adult social care, which supports and protects vulnerable people.

The Alzheimer’s Society predicts that by 2021, there will be a million sufferers from dementia in this country. Will the Secretary of State reassure my constituents that those people suffering from it will get the support they need—now and in the future?

Yes, I can tell my hon. Friend that the response to dementia is a key priority for this coalition Government. I think we have already demonstrated it in our commitment to dementia research. We need to improve both earlier diagnosis of dementia and the possibilities for treatment. We have demonstrated our commitment to improving standards in dementia care, both in hospitals and in care homes, and, indeed, in the further work we have done on reducing the use of anti-psychotic medicines.

How does the Health Secretary square the Prime Minister’s promise to pause in his changes to the NHS with the NHS chief executive saying a week later:

“I want to stress very firmly that we need…to maintain momentum on the ground.”

With the Government’s health Bill, are we not seeing both rushed pre-legislative implementation and confused post-legislative policy making? If the Prime Minister really gets cold feet about his NHS changes, let me ask the Health Secretary for a fourth time whether the Government will guarantee the extra time needed for this House to examine the changes fully?

Let me be clear about the right hon. Gentleman’s point. Both things are entirely compatible because there are 220 GP-led consortia that have come together as pathfinders to demonstrate how they can improve commissioning and the service to their patients; 90% of local authorities have come together in health and wellbeing boards; while at the same time, we have to deliver the challenge of improving productivity, quality and efficiency. All of that requires us, on the ground, to continue the momentum of improvement for patients. At the same time, we are listening not least to all those clinicians and members of the public who want to be sure that the Bill will provide them with the opportunities for involvement and the safeguards they are looking for in the NHS in the future.

The Health Secretary ducked for the fourth time this afternoon the question of whether he will do right by this House in allowing sufficient time for proper scrutiny of any changes to the Bill that come forward. While he is listening, will he consider the risks he is running with the NHS? The Prime Minister promised a real rise in NHS funding, yet this year more than nine out of 10 hospitals are faced with cutting costs by more than 4%; one in seven by more than 8%; while nearly £2 billion for patient care is being held back to cover the costs of the internal NHS reorganisation. Will he admit that this reorganisation is now piling extra pressure on NHS funding and services so that patients are seeing waiting times rise, operations cancelled and front-line staff jobs cut as the NHS starts to go backwards again under the Tories?

I find the hon. Gentleman’s cheek astonishing. It was his party which, before the election, announced its intention of making up to £20 billion of efficiency savings, it was his party which told us after the election that the NHS should be cut, and it is his party which is actually cutting the NHS in Wales. It is the coalition Government who have made decisions that will give the NHS £2.9 billion—a 3% cash increase—and, because of the way in which we are tackling the costs of management, will put more people on the front line. Following the election, there are 3,500 fewer managers and 2,500 more doctors and nurses.

T2. The Secretary of State is well aware of concern in the Yorkshire area about the review of children’s heart units, and I thank him for his recent letter, but does he accept that there is a contradiction between the logic applied to the south of England and that applied to the north, where 14 million people rely on the fact that the children’s heart unit in Leeds is only a two-hour drive away? (52574)

I should make it clear that the review is being led by the Joint Committee of Primary Care Trusts, not by the Department of Health, and that it is being conducted by an independent team who are employing an independent consultative process. My colleagues and I have made no decisions so far, but we will expect all the points made by the hon. Gentleman and others throughout the country about paediatric cardiac surgery to be taken fully into account in the consultation.

T4. The Secretary of State will be aware that, according to the quarterly monitoring report from the King’s Fund, waiting times have hit a three-year high. Does he accept that that is a direct result of his actions, particularly the abolition of the centrally managed target in June last year? (52576)

I can tell the hon. Gentleman that waiting times in the NHS are stable. The average waiting time for patients who are admitted to hospital is nine weeks, and the average waiting time for out-patients is three and a half weeks. I think that people in the NHS might reasonably say that it is not fair to cite February 2011, when patients waiting for elective operations could not be admitted because critical care beds were occupied in the immediate wake of a severe winter and the largest flu outbreak since 1999.

T3. According to recent press reports, hospitals have used money earmarked for front-line NHS services to pay salaries to trade union officials. Does my right hon. Friend consider it acceptable to spend taxpayers’ money on paying union hatchet people, and will he order an investigation? (52575)

The Government consider it right for NHS staff to have access to trade union representatives at work, but that should not be abused. Arrangements for reimbursing staff for trade union activities should be agreed locally between trusts and unions. There are no current plans to review union facility time.

T6. Given that, according to the King’s Fund, waiting times are increasing as a result of the reorganisation, does the Minister expect things to improve now that the financial squeeze is starting to bite? (52578)

As I have already explained, I do not accept the premise; but would the hon. Lady apply the same logic to the fact that the number of cases of hospital-acquired and health care-acquired infection has fallen substantially over the past year, the fact that access to services for strokes and transient ischaemic attacks has improved, and the fact that diabetic retinopathy and bowel cancer screening are improving? Would she argue that those developments are a result of our reforms? No, because our reforms have not been implemented., but we are making the investment in the NHS that the Labour party would not make, and we are giving the NHS the credit, which the Labour party would not do.

T5. There is some concern about whether GP consortia will be given enough specialist support when commissioning integrated cancer services. Will my right hon. Friend use the pause in the passage of the Health and Social Care Bill to consider extending the guarantee for cancer network funding from 2012 to 2014, when the transition period ends and GP commissioning comes fully into effect? (52577)

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his question. The listening exercise is a genuine one, and we intend to bring forward appropriate changes as a result. I can certainly give the commitment that we will want to take on board such representations. We are, and consistently have been, committed to such clinical networks for the valuable contribution they make.

T7. If Bassetlaw council refers the reconfiguration of accident and emergency, paediatric and maternity services at Bassetlaw district general hospital to the Secretary of State, what criteria will he use to make a decision? (52579)

Under those circumstances, if a referral is made to me, I will wish to apply the kind of criteria that I set out last year for reconfigurations across the country for the first time: that they must meet the tests of being consistent with the result of any public consultation and with the public’s view, with the views of prospective future commissioners—such as the commissioning consortia that are coming together as a pathfinder in the hon. Gentleman’s constituency—and with the future choices made by patients about where and how they want services to be provided to them, and that they must meet clinical criteria for safety and quality.

May I join my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds North West (Greg Mulholland) in urging the Secretary of State to protect the children’s heart unit at Leeds hospital as it is a very worthwhile facility for people in Yorkshire, and does my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State agree with me that doctors should go to where the patients are, rather than the other way around by expecting patients to travel for many hours to get to such an important service?

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his question, but in response I will simply reiterate what I said to our hon. Friend the Member for Leeds North West: that these matters are currently the subject of consultation by an independent group representing the primary care trusts collectively, and not by the Department of Health at this stage.

T8. Given the concerns of researchers and medical research charities and their belief that the research provisions in the Health and Social Care Bill should be strengthened, what discussions has the Secretary of State had with the medical research community during this pause? (52580)

The hon. Lady will know that the Health and Social Care Bill does make specific provision for NHS organisations to have regard to the needs for research. She will, I hope, also be very well aware that, by virtue of decisions made by this Government in the spending review, we have been able to sustain the level of research in the NHS. In particular, I was recently able to announce a new 30% increase in funding for translational research funded through the NHS.

When the consultation on the future of children’s heart surgery units is complete, will the Secretary of State bear it in mind that it would be a preposterous and perverse conclusion that the unit in Southampton, which is one of the two best in the country, should be threatened with closure?

I am, of course, aware of these issues, which have been raised by colleagues on both sides of the House. At this stage, may I simply reiterate that the consultation team should consider the points that I know my hon. Friend and others are making to it? After the consultation team has fully reflected on all the points, I hope Members will be able to see that it has fully taken them into account in whatever proposals it brings forward.

T9. The Secretary of State has just appeared to blame the rise in waiting times on, as it were, the wrong kind of snow. Can we infer from that that if waiting times continue to rise over the coming months, he will reinstate the targets that brought waiting times down and kept them low? (52582)

The point I made was that average waiting times are stable. Maximum waiting times continue to be a right of patients under the NHS constitution. I recommend that the hon. Gentleman should go to Luton and Dunstable hospital and discuss with the staff there how they dealt with a combination of circumstances that led to there being unprecedented pressure on critical care beds. He must know that if hospitals do not have critical care beds immediately available, it is not in the patients’ interests for the hospitals to bring some patients in for elective surgery. That had an inevitable consequence on waiting times for a small minority of patients.

I have received representations from constituents regarding the reclassification by the primary care trust of elderly relatives for continuing health care funding, with severe needs apparently becoming moderate over time. Does the Secretary of State share my concern about this, and how widespread is this practice in the current climate?

My hon. Friend’s point is important and I regularly receive correspondence about this from hon. Members from all parts of this House. If she wishes to write to me, I will be happy to discuss the matter with her further, once I have had a chance to look at the details.

Given that Department of Health officials are actively discussing the privatisation of my local trust behind closed doors and are signing secret documents, will the Minister publish all those documents and will he make a statement in the House about the Government’s plans to privatise some of our NHS hospitals?

I am afraid that I do not accept the premise of the question. May I tell the hon. Gentleman that this Government are not seeking and will not ever seek to privatise either the whole of the NHS or an individual trust? St Helens and Knowsley Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust is, like all other health trusts, currently agreeing plans to achieve foundation trust status by April 2014. That involves ongoing discussions with the North West strategic health authority and the Department of Health to determine the issues the trust faces and the actions needed to address them.

May I join my hon. Friends the Members for Leeds North West (Greg Mulholland) and for Shipley (Philip Davies) in supporting the children’s heart unit in Leeds? If the review fails to take full account of, and reflect on, the issues raised, what steps will the Secretary of State take to ensure that that is done so that we can fully understand the problems that would face families in Yorkshire?

I understand my hon. Friend’s concern and that of colleagues in other locations across the country. If—I repeat the “if”—the consultation were not to arrive at what he or others in any specific location regarded as justified conclusions, it would be open to them, as this is a service reconfiguration of the NHS, to seek a referral of the proposal to me as Secretary of State.

Diabetes UK has a strategy to reduce the number of people with diabetes across the whole UK. Will the Minister tell the House what discussions he has had with the Northern Ireland Assembly—the matter is devolved in Northern Ireland—to ensure that the strategy of prevention, awareness and education is followed across the whole of the UK?

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right, because this strategy must contain four elements; it must be about prevention, earlier diagnosis and appropriate self care, and we also have to have world-class research. Discussions with the Northern Ireland Assembly are ongoing.

Professional autonomy need not come at the expense of transparency in the provision of public services. Given that the Department for Education was able to extend the Freedom of Information Act to academy schools, does the Minister agree that it would be healthy for the Act to apply also to GP consortia in the NHS?

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that. The Health and Social Care Bill establishes the commissioning consortia as public statutory bodies and, as such, that Act will apply to them.

As part of his consultation exercise on NHS reform, the Secretary of State recently visited Liverpool, where he met nurses. When he was listening to the nurses at the Royal College of Nursing conference, what did he hear?

I heard many things, including the nurses’ concerns about front-line services, which I share; Dr Peter Carter has said time and again that he is very worried that the NHS might go through a process of trying to salami-slice services to the detriment of patients when it is actually possible to deliver greater efficiency through cutting out waste, administration and bureaucracy. I agree with many of the things I heard and I want to make sure, as a matter of urgency, that right across the country that efficiency is achieved and we do not act to the detriment of front-line services.

Will the Secretary of State join me in congratulating GP practices in Gloucestershire, all of which have decided to participate in the single consortium taking forward the commissioning of health services? Will he reassure those of my constituents who still have concerns that this whole process is about protecting front-line services and that it is absolutely not about the back-door privatisation of the NHS?

Yes. My hon. Friend makes an extremely important point and his pathfinder consortium in Gloucestershire is focused on how it can deliver more integrated services. One of the things that we are looking for is the integration of services, which has not happened sufficiently in the past. In Gloucestershire, both in the commissioning consortium as it comes together and in the work done by the local authority, we can see how, on the ground, there is determination and enthusiasm to make the modernisation of the NHS work for patients. We must ensure that the legislation supports it.

rose—

Order. I am sorry to disappoint colleagues but as is so often the case, demand has exceeded supply and we must now move on.