NHS Trusts: Accountability — House of Commons, 2018-07-10
Topic: Health
Michael Penning (Conservative, Centre-right): It is all well and good saying that there should be, perhaps in legislation, but unless people have the confidence that their career is not going to be curtailed, or unless they are close to retirement and are not going to put their pension at risk, they are not going to blow the whistle. What really upsets me is that although I was sent to this House to represent people and for them to be able to tell me, in confidence, anything that they needed to, so that between the two of us we could discuss how to take it forward—often without using their name, but if necessary we can—that is not happening. That really worries me an awful lot To go back to Nascot Lawn, we went to a judicial review. We have done that before in our part of the world. The judge sided with the patients, but all that happened—it was about process, of course—was that it went back to the CCG, which turned around and said, "We will consult slightly differently. We will address what the court said, and by the way, we are going to go ahead and do it." It is a sham, and we should be honest about that in the House When we tried to prevent our acute hospital from being closed—I pay tribute to my community for that—we did everything in the world. We got a coffin on a trolley, and thousands of us pushed it from my A&E that was going to close to the nearest one at Watford hospital, which it was proposed people should go to, in order to show just how much passion there was. We managed to get the money together to go to judicial review—a lot of money; in excess of £60,000—and the judge said, "You have a moral case. You have an ethical case. I agree with you, but you don’t have a case in law because all the powers are with the trust and the PCT", as it was then. I ask the Minister: how can it be right that people must be so concerned, not just in my constituency but elsewhere Lastly on this part of my speech, let me talk again about what happened when we lost our A&E. I have raised this in the House before, so the Minister knows what I am talking about. To go back a bit further, St Albans, Hemel Hempstead and Watford are covered by West Herts, and at one time all three had A&Es. We are a massively growing population. The largest town in Hertfordshire is Hemel, which will have a projected 20,000 new homes in the next 20 years. St Albans is expanding, and so is Watford. There was a consultation, but the public were ignored. The A&E was closed and made into an elective surgery facility in St Albans. The public promises to the people of St Albans were that Hemel’s A&E would look after them. It is not a particularly long ride—it is clearly not in St Albans town centre, but that was going to be that. However, a few years on, those responsible said, "Let’s shut Hemel’s A&E and move it to Watford, because that can look after West Herts," so the promises went out the window. The public went mad in St Albans and in our area. They were all on the streets, and what did we get? An urgent care centre, some out-patient services and a fracture clinic. Really and truly, that is all that is left in Hemel.