Topical Questions — House of Commons, 2017-07-04
Topic: Health
Questions: Leicester and Leicestershire MPs, irrespective of party and led by the hon. Member for Leicester West (Liz Kendall), are united with local people, patients and medical professionals in opposition to NHS England’s badly thought out and, frankly, wrong proposals to close Glenfield hospital’s children’s heart unit. Can my right hon. Friend reassure me that he continues to appreciate the strength of feeling on this issue and that he will ensure that the eventual decision reflects the responses received to the consultation?; Nothing is more important than that people can access a GP when they need one. With that in mind, will the Minister join me in welcoming the move made by South Tees clinical commissioning group to enable 90,000 more appointments a year to be generated for people in Middlesbrough, Redcar and Cleveland by ensuring that appointments are available on evenings, weekends and bank holidays?; With the Scottish Government now committed to a soft opt-out system for organ donation similar to that implemented in Wales in 2015, is it not time that the UK Government followed the lead of the Welsh and Scottish Governments by introducing a similar system south of the border?; One-year cancer survival rates are now at a record high of 70%, but does the Minister agree that we should and can go further by improving early diagnosis and screening?; Would a Minister be willing to meet the all-party group on blood donation after it has been reconvened next week and would they be able to provide an update on the work of the Advisory Committee on the Safety of Blood, Tissues and Organs in respect of lifting or easing the deferral period for gay men who want to donate blood?; Last week I met doctors and nurses at the Friarage, an excellent small hospital serving a rural population spread over 1,000 square miles. Will my right hon. Friend urge South Tees Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust to do everything it can to ensure the continued provision of emergency care clinicians and anaesthetists at this vital local hospital?; At the height of the recent election campaign, NHS England took forward plans to merge, in effect, six south London CCGs, including Greenwich CCG, under one single chief officer. Does the Minister agree that that would be a retrograde step, not only in terms of local accountability, but at a time when primary care has been devolved downwards and all the emphasis is on collaboration and integration at a local borough level?; What action does the Secretary of State intend to take to address the link between suicide and socioeconomic deprivation highlighted in the Samaritans’ “Dying from inequality” report as he seeks to reduce the suicide rate by 10% by 2020?
Jeremy Richard Streynsham Hunt (Conservative, Centre-right): I am more than happy to meet my hon. Friend. The principle behind the capped expenditure process is that we should have fairness between patients in different parts of the country. We should not see patients in one part of the country disadvantaged because the NHS has overspent in their neighbouring area, but the way in which we implement the process must be sensitive and fair. We must ensure that we get it right.