Tag: 2022

Vicky Foxcroft – 2022 Parliamentary Question on Prosecution Rates on Violence Against Women and Girls

The parliamentary question asked by Vicky Foxcroft, the Labour MP for Deptford, in the House of Commons on 7 December 2022.

Vicky Foxcroft (Lewisham, Deptford) (Lab)

What steps she is taking to increase the proportion of cases relating to violence against women and girls that are prosecuted.

Kate Osborne (Jarrow) (Lab)

What steps she is taking to increase the proportion of cases relating to violence against women and girls that are prosecuted.

Geraint Davies (Swansea West) (Lab/Co-op)

What steps she is taking to increase the proportion of cases relating to violence against women and girls that are prosecuted.

The Solicitor General (Michael Tomlinson)

The Government are committed to tackling violence against women and girls, and we have enacted a multitude of new offences designed to target predatory behaviour and to ensure that perpetrators are brought to justice. That includes stalking, coercive and controlling behaviour and upskirting. Further, in the year ending June 2022, prosecutions for rape offences were 49% higher compared with pre-covid levels.

Vicky Foxcroft

Lewisham has some of the highest domestic abuse-related crime levels in London and that appears to be increasing. One of the main challenges in capturing accurate pictures of the levels of violence against women and girls in Lewisham is due to under-reporting by victims. A critical issue for my constituents remains the lack of trust in the system, so what are Ministers doing to restore public trust and increase prosecution rates? The low levels of prosecutions cannot continue.

The Solicitor General

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for her question, and she is right that we need to see an increase in prosecution rates. The rape review action plan is looking at three key metrics: referrals, charge volumes and Crown court receipts. In each case, she will be pleased to know that the figures are up and moving in a positive direction. She is also right about the issue in relation to victims, and independent sexual violence advisers will help in that regard.

Kate Osborne

The commitment to introducing specialist rape courts has not been met. Instead, there is a pilot scheme in just four locations, yet survivors cannot select where their cases are heard. Each day in the UK, there are around 300 rapes, of which around 190 are reported. Of those, only three rapists will see the inside of a courtroom, never mind a prison cell, and the rest will be free to abuse and rape again. Over the Christmas period, the number of rapes rises, so will resources be put in place to ensure that cases reported to the Government’s new 24-hour hotline are actually prosecuted?

The Solicitor General

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for mentioning the new hotline. It is right that, overall, prosecutions are up 49% and convictions for rape are up 41%, but she is right in what she says. There are three pilot areas for rape courts, but each and every Crown court can take on rape cases, and I am determined to see prosecutions and convictions rise.

Mr Speaker

I call Geraint Davies—not here. I call Dr Caroline Johnson.

Dr Caroline Johnson (Sleaford and North Hykeham) (Con)

For women who have been raped, the time that that takes to come to court, when it does come to court, is too often long and traumatic. What is my hon. Friend doing to ensure that the time is shorter for all concerned?

The Solicitor General

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising that issue. Timeliness is clearly important in ensuring that victims stay with and continue to support prosecutions—she is absolutely right. As for the number of days between police referral and Crown Prosecution Service charge, that has been moving in the right direction and was 29 days faster in the last quarter. However, to strike a note of caution, it is important to ensure that the evidence is right and, on occasions, that can take time.

James Daly (Bury North) (Con)

I acknowledge the progress that the Government are making on this issue, but at the heart of the matter is the lack of referrals from the police to the CPS, especially in rape cases. At present, we have a charge-out rate of around 1.7%, and that has to change.

The Solicitor General

I pay tribute to my hon. Friend, who brings considerable experience to the Chamber and to the Justice Committee. As he will have heard, charge rates are one of the key metrics. The overall figure is 72.8%. In comparison, the figure for all crime is 78.8%, which is not that far off. He will be pleased to know that, in his local area, the charge rate is increasing.

Sir James Duddridge (Rochford and Southend East) (Con)

Although I welcome the absolute increase in the number of rape prosecutions in Essex, the percentage of prosecutions is still pitifully low. What more can the Attorney General do to help excellent police and crime commissioners such as Roger Hirst and Members of Parliament across Essex to improve the situation?

The Solicitor General

I thank my hon. Friend for his question and for championing his local area, and he is right. One thing that we can do is to support victims, and we are doing that, not least through the ISVAs. When victims have that help and support, they are 49% more likely to stay with the programme and to continue to support and progress through the criminal justice system.

Mr Speaker

I call the shadow Attorney General.

Emily Thornberry (Islington South and Finsbury) (Lab)

I believe that the Solicitor General is now an old hand at this, but may I welcome the new Attorney General to her place?

As the Solicitor General will know, an estimated one in five women in this country have experienced the daily misery of being stalked and the constant fear that their stalker may one day attack them. In the year ending March 2022, almost 120,000 stalking offences were reported to the police, but less than 6,000 of those reports resulted in a charge. That is a charge rate of just 5%, compared with 7% the year before. Does the Solicitor General think that is good enough?

The Solicitor General

I am grateful to the right hon. Lady for her warm welcome to me and to the Attorney General. She is right to raise the issue. I would gently point out that stalking was created an offence under this Government; I pay tribute to my predecessor, my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Cheltenham (Alex Chalk), for all his work in the area.

The right hon. Lady is right to highlight that prosecution rates and charge rates are not high enough. She will have seen from the action plan that I have referred to that we are determined to see them increase. The Attorney General and I keep a very close eye on the matter.

Emily Thornberry

I appreciate the seriousness with which the Solicitor General approaches these issues but, as he will know, a formal complaint has been submitted by the Suzy Lamplugh Trust and 20 other members of the National Stalking Consortium, asking for an investigation into the overall handling of stalking cases. Whatever the outcome of that process, may I ask him to take on board the recommendations that the consortium has submitted alongside its complaint and to ensure that, at every level of the criminal justice system, stalking is treated with the seriousness it deserves?

The Solicitor General

I pay tribute to the right hon. Lady for the tone that she is striking. She is absolutely right to highlight this issue. The Attorney General and I will look at it incredibly closely, of course, and we will do exactly as the right hon. Lady says.

Mr Speaker

We now come to the SNP spokesperson.

Angela Crawley (Lanark and Hamilton East) (SNP)

May I also take the opportunity to welcome the Attorney General to her place? A commitment to protecting women and girls should mean protecting all women and girls. Safeguards protecting against gender-based violence must be extended to migrant women. What representations has the Attorney General made to the Home Office to ensure that migrant women are offered the same protections as other women in the UK, and to ratify the Istanbul convention fully and without reservation?

The Solicitor General

I know that my right hon. Friend the Attorney General will be very grateful for the hon. Lady’s welcome. The Attorney General works incredibly closely with the Home Office on the issue; more broadly, in relation to victims, she works incredibly closely with the Home Office and with the Ministry of Justice. It is not in isolation, but with our three Departments, that we can make progress.

December 9, 2022
James Murray – 2022 Speech on the NHS Workforce

The speech made by James Murray, the Labour MP for Ealing North and Shadow Minister, in the House of Commons on 6 December 2022.

There can be no doubt that the NHS is in crisis. We have heard shocking stories today from hon. Members about what their constituents are having to endure. Each and every one of these deeply distressing stories helps to confirm the devastating impact of the Conservatives’ neglect of the NHS. Patients deserve so much better than this Government and everyone who works in the NHS deserves so much better, too, for the invaluable work they do.

We all know that from the experience we have in our constituencies, as we have heard so powerfully today. My hon. Friend the Member for West Ham (Ms Brown) spoke powerfully and in detail about the impact of vacancies in the NHS, particularly in maternity services, in her constituency and the surrounding areas. My hon. Friend the Member for Coventry North West (Taiwo Owatemi) spoke about the role of community pharmacists and the wider struggles that NHS workers face. She was speaking with particular authority, given her background in the NHS before becoming an MP. My hon. Friend the Member for Ilford South (Sam Tarry) spoke about the severe impact of vacancies and exhaustion in nursing after 12 years of the Conservatives.

My hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle (Emma Hardy) spoke about the impact that workforce shortages were having, even before the pandemic, on crucial radiotherapy services in her constituency and beyond. My hon. Friend the Member for Streatham (Bell Ribeiro-Addy) spoke about the scale of the crisis that we face in NHS recruitment and retention. My hon. Friend the Member for Leeds East (Richard Burgon) rightly mentioned those shameful attacks by Conservative Ministers on nurses.

My hon. Friend the Member for Bristol South (Karin Smyth) spoke with great experience, having spent three decades working in the NHS, about the growing crisis of retention over the past decade. My hon. Friend the Member for Worsley and Eccles South (Barbara Keeley) spoke about the NHS crisis and set it in the context of the Government’s unfair decision in the recent autumn statement. My hon. Friend the Member for Halifax (Holly Lynch) gave a wide-ranging and powerful speech that drew attention to the genuine sense of fear among people across the country at the prospect of not being able to access vital NHS services. My hon. Friend the Member for Wirral West (Margaret Greenwood) made it clear that the staffing crisis in the NHS is the failure of 12 years of the Conservatives.

Madam Deputy Speaker, that is the truth. The Conservatives have spent 12 years running down the NHS and letting our economy fall further and further behind, but, make no mistake, this is not inevitable. After 1997, Labour not only grew the economy 1.5 times the rate that the Conservatives subsequently managed, but delivered an NHS to be proud of, and we are proud of our record.

Although the challenges now are even greater than they were in the late ‘90s, if we take office at the next election, we will, again, deliver a modern, sustainable NHS that is fit for the future that we face. We know that, to make the NHS fit for the future, it needs a prescription of reform and sustainable funding from a growing economy. For our economy to grow, we need to start getting our public services back on track, too. As my hon. Friend the shadow Health Secretary set out, one of the first steps that a new Labour Government will take to get the NHS back on track is to deliver a workforce plan that addresses the root cause of the crisis it is in.

Under our plan, we would double the number of medical school places to 15,000 a year. We would double the number of district nurses qualifying each year. We would train 5,000 new health visitors a year and we would create 10,000 more nursing and midwifery clinical placements each year, too—all part of a long-term workforce plan for our NHS.

Steve Brine

On the doubling of the number of medical school places, can the hon. Gentleman tell me what the cost of that is, especially as the shadow Chancellor is so handily sitting next to him? It would be helpful for those of us on the Select Committee to put the price tag on that one.

James Murray

All the pledges that the Opposition make are fully costed and fully funded. [Interruption.] If the hon. Gentleman waits one second, I will address that point. Today is about political choices. It is not just a political choice of whether we invest in the NHS; it is a political choice of how we pay for it. That is why we have made it clear that, to pay for our NHS workforce expansion plan, Labour would abolish the unfair, outdated non-dom tax status. Non-dom tax status is passed down through people’s fathers and it costs the public purse £3.2 billion a year, while failing to support economic growth in the UK. Under the current arrangements, a small group of high-income people who live in the UK are able to avoid paying tax on their overseas income for up to 15 years. We would abolish that 200-year-old tax loophole and introduce a modern scheme for people who are genuinely living in the UK for short periods. We believe that if a person makes Britain their home, they should pay their taxes here.

Paul Bristow

My hon. Friend the Member for Winchester (Steve Brine) asked the hon. Gentleman a very specific question about the exact cost of doubling the number of places at medical school. Is the hon. Gentleman able to confirm the exact cost of that—not the non-dom cost, but the exact cost of doubling the number of medical places?

James Murray

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. I have set out that scrapping the non-dom status would raise £3.2 billion, and that our workforce expansion plan would cost £1.6 billion, so we would be well able to afford that measure from the amount of money that we have raised from scrapping this outdated, unfair tax loophole.

Non-dom status should have no place in our modern tax system. It is unfair. When the Government are making working people pay more tax, it is simply wrong to allow wealthy people with overseas income to continue to benefit from an outdated tax break. It is also bad for UK business: the loophole prevents non-doms from being able to invest their foreign income in the UK, as bringing it here means it becomes liable for UK tax. Abolishing non-dom status would end that barrier to UK investment—and, as I have said, raise £3.2 billion, money we would use to put towards priorities including expanding the NHS workforce.

To be honest, we would have thought abolishing non-dom status, replacing it with a modern system and using the money to strengthen the NHS and economy would be a no-brainer. What is it about this Conservative Government, led by the right hon. Member for Richmond (Yorks) (Rishi Sunak), that makes them so reluctant to close that loophole? Last week, during the rushed debates on the Government’s autumn Finance Bill, I asked Treasury Ministers to confirm whether the Prime Minister had been consulted on the option of abolishing non-dom status and whether it was ever considered as an option for last week’s Finance bill. I also asked whether, when the current Prime Minister was Chancellor, he had ever recused himself from discussions on the matter, for obvious reasons.

I put these questions to Treasury Ministers on three separate occasions last week, but they refused each time even to acknowledge the questions, never mind answer them. For a Minister to overlook a set of questions once might be an oversight, but to ignore them three times looks like something else. Perhaps the Minister will today show that they have nothing to hide by answering the questions I have raised.

In the autumn statement and last week’s Finance Bill, the Chancellor chose to leave non-dom status untouched, while picking the pockets of working people, including nurses, with stealth taxes such as freezing income tax thresholds and pushing up council tax. Today, the Secretary of State for Health only mounted a brief defence of non-dom status; I wonder whether his colleague from the Treasury will, in her closing remarks, repeat some of the defences that Treasury Ministers tried to set out last week.

Last week, Ministers tied themselves in knots trying to find a justification for the £3.2 billion tax break for non-doms. They tried to pretend that the Government’s investment relief is working, when only 1% of non-doms invest their overseas income in the UK in any given year, and last week they tried to win praise for ending permanent non-dom status, while keeping quiet about the new loophole they created, which allows people to use trusts to retain non-dom benefits permanently.

The truth is that, unless the Conservatives vote with us today to abolish non-dom status once and for all, the British people will be clear that no amount of reason or common sense will get this Government to come round. The British people need a fresh start and a new Labour Government that would take those fairer choices on tax to support the stronger NHS we so desperately need.

The NHS is an achievement we share together as a country and one that we all have a personal relationship with. We all want to know that when we have medical symptoms, concerns or needs, the NHS will be there for us. We want to know it will be there as a publicly funded service, free at the point of use, able to provide us with the high-quality help we need. That is what I wanted to know in my early 20s, when I started to notice symptoms of what would later be diagnosed as myasthenia gravis, a rare neurological condition that caused muscle weakness throughout my body.

After the best care I could have hoped for from my brilliant consultant and his team and colleagues at the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery in Queen Square, I have been symptom-free for many years now, but the memory of first feeling those symptoms and then finding my way towards the right treatment sticks with me. I would never want anyone to feel symptoms like mine and not be sure whether the NHS would be there to help.

We all know stories like that. We all need the NHS to diagnose and treat us when we are worried. We all need to be able to turn to the NHS so that we get that treatment in good time. We all connect with the NHS through our own lives and the lives of our family and friends. That is why the NHS matters so much to us all and why we are so determined to deal with the crisis the NHS is facing and to make sure it is ready for the modern challenges we face.

At the heart of our vision for the country are stronger public services and stronger economic growth. We know that getting public services back on track will support a growing economy, which will in turn support modern, sustainable public services. Before us today we have a chance to end the unfair 200-year-old tax loophole, which lets a small number of people avoid tax on overseas income, and use the money saved to fund one of the biggest workforce expansion plans in the history of the NHS. That is the choice in front of us today, and I urge all MPs to do the right thing by backing our plan.

December 9, 2022
Margaret Greenwood – 2022 Speech on the NHS Workforce

The speech made by Margaret Greenwood, the Labour MP for Wirral West, in the House of Commons on 6 December 2022.

It is clear that we have a crisis in NHS staffing. For the very first time in its 106-year history, members of the Royal College of Nursing have voted for strike action in their fight for fair pay and safe staffing. I express my solidarity with them. They do not do this lightly. Consecutive Conservative Governments have brought them to this situation.

Staff shortages are putting immense pressure on the NHS. There were more than 133,000 vacancies in the NHS in England in September 2022, up from around 103,000 the year before. There were more than 47,000 registered nursing vacancies in September, about 8,500 more than in March, and there were more than 9,000 medical staff vacancies in September, over 1,000 more than in March.

We all know things were bad before the pandemic, but an already extremely serious situation has got worse. This staffing crisis is a direct result of the failure of Conservative Governments to plan and deliver the workforce we need, and it is leading to very high levels of stress for staff and extraordinarily long waiting lists for patients.

Two weeks ago, I led a Westminster Hall debate on NHS staffing. Numerous organisations provided briefings in advance of that debate, and I will share some of their concerns about staff shortages, the pressures on the NHS and the impact they are having on workers and patients. Their observations reflect the depth of the crisis in the NHS, along with the complexity of medicine and the immense level of expertise in this country. The Government really should listen to them.

Research by the British Medical Association points to a lack of doctors in comparison with other nations. The average number of doctors per 1,000 people in the OECD’s EU nations is 3.7, but England has just 2.9. Meanwhile, Germany has 4.3.

Parkinson’s UK has said:

“People with Parkinson’s are facing huge waiting times for diagnosis, mental health support, check-ups and medication reviews. This is due to critical shortages of NHS staff across England who are available to see people with Parkinson’s. Problems with finding healthcare professionals who understand the condition and accessing the right specialist services have been exacerbated by the pandemic. Waiting times for a consultant after diagnosis are up to two years in some areas.”

The Royal College of Midwives has expressed serious concerns that the NHS in England has 800 fewer midwives than it did at the time of the 2019 general election and that

“midwife numbers are falling in every region of England.”

According to the latest census by the Royal College of Physicians

“52%—more than half—of advertised consultant physician posts were unfilled in 2021. That is the highest rate of unfilled posts since records began, and of the 52%, 74% went unfilled due to a lack of any applicants at all.”

The Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists has said:

“Speech and language therapy services across the entire age range are facing unprecedented demand and there are simply not enough speech and language therapists currently to meet the level of demand.”

Last year’s report by the British Society for Rheumatology found that

“chronic workforce shortages mean departments lack sufficient staff to provide a safe level of care.”

This means

“patients are experiencing progressively worse health, leading to unnecessary disability and pain.”

Cancer Research UK has pointed out that

“critical staff shortages impact all aspects of cancer care”—

I would have thought the Secretary of State would like to listen to what Cancer Research UK has to say. It highlights:

“In 2020-21, £7.1 billion was spent on agency and bank staff to cover gaps in the NHS workforce, an increase of almost £1 billion from an already enormous £6.2 billion spent the year before. This is money that could be spent on training and recruiting full-time equivalent NHS staff, but instead is”—

being used—

“in an attempt to mitigate chronic NHS staff shortages.”

Unison has said it is

“very concerned that NHS services are in a dire state due to there being insufficient staff numbers available to deliver safe patient care.”

It points out:

“While the government has belatedly accepted the need for an independent assessment of the numbers of health professionals needed in future, they repeatedly refused to write such plans into the Health and Care Act 2022, despite a broad coalition of more than 100 healthcare organisations calling for this.”

The TUC is calling on the Government to put in place

“an urgent Retention Package, with a decent pay rise at its heart.”

The 2022 pay award is well below current inflation levels, so it amounts to a real-terms pay cut. The TUC went on to say:

“The 2022 pay uplift needs to be set at a level which will retain existing staff within the NHS”,

is attractive to new recruits,

“and recognises and rewards the skills…of health workers.”

In recent weeks, we have seen announcements of industrial action from other organisations representing NHS workers, including Unite the union, Unison and the GMB. In addition, the Chartered Society of Physiotherapy is balloting members and the British Medical Association will ballot next year. As with the Royal College of Nursing, this is not being done lightly. NHS workers care deeply about patients and the service as a whole, but they can also see that the NHS is at breaking point. It is notable that, in a recent poll of 6,000 adults carried out on behalf of Unite, 73% of respondents supported NHS and care workers receiving pay rises that keep up with the cost of living.

The Conservative Governments’ failure to address chronic staffing shortages in the NHS is putting those working in the service under immense pressure and, in some instances, it is putting patients at risk. Since 2010, instead of focusing on and planning and delivering a well-resourced, well-staffed NHS, the Conservatives have focused their energy on not one but two major reorganisations of the NHS, designed to open it up to privatisation. This ideological agenda is causing immense suffering to patients and great stress for staff.

The Health and Care Act 2022 provided for the revoking of the national tariff and its replacement with a new NHS payment scheme. The national tariff is a set of rules, prices and guidance that covers the payments made by commissioners to secondary healthcare providers for the provision of NHS services. Engagement on the NHS payment scheme is ongoing, with a statutory consultation due to begin this month. Given the requirement in the Act for NHS England to consult each relevant provider, including private providers, before publishing the scheme, I am very concerned that this may well be a mechanism through which private health companies will have the opportunity to undercut the NHS. If that happens, one inevitable outcome would be an erosion of the scope of “Agenda for Change”, as healthcare that should be provided by the NHS is increasingly delivered by the private sector. I ask the Minister to give us an assurance that that will not be used in that way.

As I have said, the Conservative Governments’ failure to address chronic staffing shortages in the NHS is putting those working in the service under immense pressure and, in some instances, it is putting patients at risk. Since 2010, instead of focusing on planning and delivering a well-resourced, well-staffed NHS, they have focused on a privatisation. In the second reorganisation, they held a consultation, allegedly, when NHS staff were working incredibly hard during the pandemic. It was very unfair to carry out a consultation while the people to be affected most by it were dealing with the worst public health crisis we have seen.

The staffing crisis has been created by the Conservatives on their watch. The comprehensive workforce plan announced in the autumn statement is due to be published next year. It is long overdue and it will need to be backed up by sufficient resources. In the meantime, the Government bear a responsibility in relation to how the NHS fares this winter. They have the opportunity to avert industrial action and should do all in their power to do so. They must support those who work in the service and make sure that NHS workers receive a fair pay rise.

December 9, 2022
Holly Lynch – 2022 Speech on the NHS Workforce

The speech made by Holly Lynch, the Labour MP for Halifax, in the House of Commons on 6 December 2022.

It is a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Salford and Eccles (Rebecca Long-Bailey), who made an incredibly powerful speech.

I do not think I am being dramatic when I say that a genuine sense of fear has set in across the country about being in a position of needing to use the NHS. Almost every family now have a story about how they or, even worse, a loved one have needed to access care and have had a very difficult experience. People’s experiences range from waiting at A&E to waiting for an ambulance, from being unable to get a dentist appointment when they were in pain and urgently needed one to facing a wait years long to see a specialist. One member of my team called up on 25 November and was told, “You’re in luck: there’s been a cancellation at the GP’s, so they’ll book you an appointment—but it’s for a telephone consultation on 20 December.” The chronic pressures in staffing across the board are affecting healthcare in every part of the country.

Margaret Greenwood

This afternoon we have heard some horrendous stories about people waiting for ambulances: hideous delays of 16 hours or more for people in pain and sometimes truly tragic circumstances. Does my hon. Friend agree that that shows the abject failure of this Government to provide a health service that we can all be proud of?

Holly Lynch

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Not only is there a massive impact on patient safety and care, with detrimental outcomes for patients, but there is a loss of service to others: while paramedics and ambulances wait outside A&E, there is an impact on care for all the other people who need that provision. My hon. Friend makes a really powerful point.

I want to focus on some key areas of the NHS workforce, starting with midwifery. The chief executive of the Royal College of Midwives, Gill Walton, has told the Health and Social Care Committee that England is more than 2,000 midwives short of the numbers it needs, and the situation is getting worse. The RCM’s analysis shows that midwife numbers fell by a further 331 in the year to November 2022. We need a plan because, as other hon. Members have said, the staffing shortages are driving further staffing shortages. More than half of all midwives surveyed by the RCM said that they were considering leaving their job, with 57% saying that they would leave the NHS in the next year.

In November last year, I joined a March with Midwives rally in Halifax, where midwives held up signs that they had made themselves and that said things like, “I’m a physically and mentally exhausted midwife”, and, “I can’t keep saying sorry for no beds, no midwives, no support and no time”. What really brought home how it is not just about the impact of short staffing on patients and patient safety was the signs that midwives’ children had made themselves. One sign said, “My Mum falls asleep on the driveway after work”. It was made by a girl who told me that she had come out of the house one morning ready for school, only to find that her mum had driven home after a nightshift, pulled on to the driveway and fallen asleep in the car because she was so exhausted. A younger child had made a sign that simply said, “Mummy being late from work equals me being a lonely kid”.

Case studies conducted by the Royal College of Midwives highlighted not just the strain on the service, but the strain in the workforce and their families. A midwife called Julia said:

“We’re reducing the time we give to women, having to close facilities, reduce antenatal education, postnatal visits cut to a minimum. Stretched physically is one thing, you can rest your body eventually when home, but the mind, the mind does not have an easy off switch. The constant unrealistic expectations on maternity staff is damaging their mental health, it’s impacting on the wider service and it’s putting women, babies and families hopes and dreams in danger.”

This is why a Labour Government with a commitment to train 10,000 additional nurses and midwives every year cannot come fast enough.

Karin Smyth

My hon. Friend is making some excellent points, particularly about the impact of those exhaustion levels on families. In my speech I spoke about the recruitment of families who looked forward to their jobs and were proud of working in the NHS. That is important to bringing future generations into the health service, and giving encouragement to young people in schools. It is still a fantastic career, but does my hon. Friend agree that helping young people not to be deterred by that negative publicity and helping them through training routes is a crucial way of solving the current workforce problems?

Holly Lynch

We have all told stories about the NHS heroes in our constituencies today, but my hon. Friend is right about the need to transform that into an attractive skills plan. Some of the midwives and their children whom I met were extremely proud to be in NHS families. Every member of those families is affected by that shared sense of pride, but also by that shared sense of exhaustion, and there are problems for the whole family when there are problems for the NHS worker. My hon. Friend has made a powerful point.

Emma Hardy

As I pointed out in my speech when I was talking about radiotherapy, the reason people are leaving the profession is to do with the work-life balance. It is not just a question of the number of people who are leaving midwifery, but a question of the number of people in midwifery who are reducing their hours to try to achieve that balance. Does my hon. Friend agree that something is seriously amiss when people have not fallen out of love with the job, but are simply finding that they cannot do the job while also maintaining the home life that they need?

Holly Lynch

Once again, my hon. Friend is absolutely right, as I know when I meet those children of NHS staff who hold up signs saying, “When my mummy is late home it means that I am a lonely kid”. As other Members have pointed out, when NHS workers are exhausted at the end of a shift but find that the cavalry is not arriving and there is no one to take over, they cannot walk out of their jobs as other people might be able to. They have to stay and deliver patient safety, rather than leaving those patients at risk. Questions about the life-work balance and childcare—who will feed the kids when they get home?—are not easy questions for workers in that position to answer.

We have to transform the experiences of mothers and families using maternity services. Like almost every other parent who has had to use those services in recent years, I can say that it is a massive worry. You are told, “Once your waters have broken and your contractions are this regular, come to the hospital”, but even after that point I kept being asked not to come to the hospital, because there was only one bed left and it might be needed for someone else. That is the last thing you want to hear when you are in labour. Worrying about staffing and bed shortages compounds what is already one of the most stressful experiences that women—indeed, parents—can go through.

Let me now say something about paramedics, and all those working on the frontline of our ambulance services. I have worked closely with paramedics, in particular with the GMB’s union representative, Sarah Kelly, on the Protect the Protectors campaign, and I have spent a day out with paramedics, seeing just how relentless their days are. Analysis carried out by the GMB found that there were 7.9 million calls for an ambulance in 2010-11, but by 2021-22 that had risen to 14 million, a pretty staggering increase of 77%. The monthly handover delays report from the Association of Ambulance Chief Executives reveals that the performance of ambulance services fell to its lowest ever level in October. The report shows that, across the month, 169,000 hours of ambulance crew time were lost due to delays. That meant that paramedics could not answer over 135,000 calls for help. That number represented 23% of ambulance services’ total potential capacity to respond to 999 calls. All three of these metrics are the worst in the NHS’s history.

Staff have balloted for industrial action, and we can see how they do not feel listened to and that they are carrying so much responsibility. My hon. Friend the Member for Ilford North (Wes Streeting) has already made this point powerfully from the Dispatch Box. None of us here in the Chamber today has to face the reality multiple times a day of knowing that, no matter how hard we work, there could be fatal consequences for the vulnerable people we are looking after because the system in which we work is fundamentally failing. We do not carry that burden; we ask the paramedics, and all NHS staff, to carry it.

We know that, in addition to this, too many workers—after making such an exhausting contribution to the NHS—are facing financial hardship for their efforts. Like in midwifery and other areas of the NHS, research indicates that one in 1,000 ambulance workers have left since 2018 to seek a better work-life balance or better pay, or to take early retirement. It is not that workers are asking for more pay for the sake of it; it is because inflation is at 11%, energy bills have gone through the roof and the cost of fuel to enable them to get to work has shot up. The National Institute of Economic and Social Research has predicted that around 30,000 households could see their monthly mortgage repayments become greater than their monthly income in the months ahead. If the Government got a grip of these factors, they would not have so many workers being forced to ask for more pay just to make ends meet. I ask the Government to please speak to workers, to work with their trade unions and to work through their concerns, which are very real.

Turning to NHS dentistry, I presented a petition to the Government on 1 November on access to NHS dental care, signed by 549 people online as well as a number of signatures in hard copy—some are still coming into my office. Like all MPs, I have had so much casework in recent months where local people simply cannot see an NHS dentist. The British Dental Association says that more than 43 million dental appointments were lost between April 2020 and April 2022, including more than 13 million appointments for children.

Dentistry is now the No. 1 issue raised with HealthWatch, with almost 80% of the people who contact the organisation saying that they find it difficult to access dental care. The General Dental Council says that almost a quarter of the population—24%—report having experienced dental pain in the last 12 months. More locally, HealthWatch in Calderdale contacted every dental practice across Calderdale last year to establish whether they were willing to accept new NHS patients, whether they would register a child and whether they were offering routine appointments. Every dental practice told HealthWatch that it could not currently register a new NHS patient of any age. It is the same story.

Data from the British Dental Association reveals that 3,000 dentists in England have stopped providing NHS services since the start of the pandemic. For every dentist leaving the NHS entirely, 10 are reducing their NHS commitment by 25% on average. A BDA survey from May 2022 shows that 75% of dentists plan to reduce the amount of NHS work they do next year, with almost half planning to change career, seek early retirement or enter fully private practice. As in other areas of the NHS, the combination of pressures and remuneration is driving what remains of a depleted workforce away. It is a self-defeating cycle that the Government have to step in to break.

Other Members have made points today about the potential of community pharmacies. Having worked in a pharmacy when I was in the sixth form doing my A-levels, it became clear to me that this was often the longest standing and most trusted relationship that members of the community had with a healthcare professional. The pharmacy was the shopfront that was always open during the pandemic, where people could go and meet somebody who knew them and knew their circumstances. That really is the value of community pharmacies. We know they have the capacity to do so much more, and hon. Members on both sides of the House have spoken about unlocking that potential and relieving some of the pressure on A&E departments and GP surgeries by empowering community pharmacies to deliver the work they are best placed to deliver because of their deep roots in our communities.

Labour has a plan for the NHS. It is costed, comprehensive and will save the NHS. In today’s debate, the Government have not had the humility even to acknowledge that there is a problem in the NHS, never mind having a plan of action. That is why a Labour Government cannot come soon enough.

December 9, 2022
Rebecca Long-Bailey – 2022 Speech on the NHS Workforce

The speech made by Rebecca Long-Bailey, the Labour MP for Salford and Eccles, in the House of Commons on 6 December 2022.

The national health service is facing one of the worst workforce crises in its history. The decentralisation and deliberate marketisation of large parts of the health service, the driving down of staff pay, 12 years of austerity and so-called efficiency savings have brought frontline services to the brink of collapse.

A report by the Health Foundation revealed that the UK has spent around 20% less per person on health each year than similar European countries over the past decade. As a result of sustained real-terms pay cuts, some hospitals have food banks for staff, some are handing out welfare packages, and there are even reports of NHS staff sleeping in their cars as they cannot afford the fuel to and from work. It is no surprise that there are more than 133,000 vacancies across the NHS.

However, instead of helping to address the pressures faced by an overworked, underpaid and demoralised NHS workforce, the Government appear to be deliberately picking a fight with the trade unions representing those key workers by fiercely resisting entirely reasonable pay claims. There is genuine desperation out there among those workers and other key workers like them who are experiencing the definition of in-work poverty. They are not able to afford the basics of food, clothing, housing and privatised utility bill payments. It is therefore no surprise that they are left with no option but to publicly voice their desperation over low pay, unmanageable workloads and patient safety.

GMB, Unison and Unite have confirmed this week that there will be national walk-outs across the ambulance service. Nurses will strike this month for the first time in their 106-year history; they simply cannot take any more. The Royal College of Nursing’s last shift survey report found that eight in 10 shifts were unsafe, and 83% of nursing staff surveyed said that staffing levels on their last shift were not sufficient to meet all patients’ needs safely and effectively. For context, an experienced nurse’s salary has fallen 20% in real terms since 2010.

As we heard, midwives are balloting for strike action. A recent survey carried out by the Royal College of Midwives shows that more than half of staff are considering leaving the profession, citing inadequate staffing levels and concern for the quality and safety of care that they can deliver. It also estimates that the UK is short of more than 3,500 midwives.

The NHS workforce was rightly lionised by the British public for their selfless devotion and service during the pandemic, yet the abject response of the Government is to unleash yet more austerity on public services that are already cut to the bone, and to further hold down the wages of hard-pressed workers. We had reference to the autumn statement today but, staggeringly, although those workers continue to suffer, hidden in the depths of that statement was not an admittance of culpability for the current economic crisis or a plan to reverse NHS decline, but a massive tax cut on bank profits. The bank surcharge was cut from 8% to just 3%. That comes on top of the removal of the cap on bankers’ bonuses a few months ago and the abject refusal to abolish non-dom tax status. As my hon. Friend the Member for Ilford North (Wes Streeting) said at the start of the debate, the Government made choices—and the choice they made was to prioritise the interests of a select few over the interests of the NHS, patient safety and the welfare of workers in the health service.

Today the Government have the opportunity to recognise their gross misjudgment and make the right choice. They have the opportunity to increase resources across the NHS and set out an urgent workforce plan with measures to increase retention and support staff. They have the opportunity to introduce an immediate restorative pay rise for NHS staff that reflects the value that society places on their vital work. They must also award recruitment and retention premiums to new entrants and existing staff and provide financial support for those who are studying to become NHS professionals.

NHS staff are ringing the alarm and saying that funding, pay and patient safety are inextricably linked. They are the true heroes. They do not ask for thanks; they do what they do day in, day out without fanfare because they truly care. It is time the Government showed them the respect they deserve.

December 9, 2022
Karin Smyth – 2022 Speech on the NHS Workforce

The speech made by Karin Smyth, the Labour MP for Bristol South, in the House of Commons on 6 December 2022.

In 1948, at the dawn of the NHS, we were around 50,000 nurses short. By the 1960s, 40% of junior doctors were from India, Bangladesh, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. Thousands came from the Caribbean. It is estimated that by the 1970s, 12% of British nurses were Irish nationals, my own family among them. My Aunt Margaret Carter came to Stockport and my cousin Maureen McNulty came to Leeds. Britain welcomed them; they were not invaders. We trained them, we gave them accommodation, we offered them prospects. In the three decades I have worked in the NHS, the hundreds of nurses I have worked with remember their first job. They remember being greeted and welcomed. They remember their new belts. They remember it with great pride. We welcomed them nationally and, crucially, we welcomed them locally. We supported them with accommodation, transport and decent prospects.

In January 2019, the then Secretary of State, the right hon. Member for West Suffolk (Matt Hancock), made a statement about the long-term plan and the recommendations. Like the Secretary of State today, he talked about the largest increase in health spending. What he failed to admit, as did the Secretary of State today, was that we had witnessed a decade of the lowest growth the NHS had ever had. In particular, it badly hit public health, capital spending—why we have a £10 billion backlog on maintenance—and workforce education and training. Even if we skirt over the suppression of Exercise Cygnus and pandemic planning, we entered the pandemic unprepared. That is why we had rushed, ad hoc, WhatsApp-panicked procurement processes—about which we will hear much more later today. That is why 2020 was so bad.

Members do not have to take my word for it. In June 2019, following that earlier statement, Baroness Harding and Sir David Behan, chair of Health Education England, gave evidence to the Health and Social Care Committee. I recommend that hon. Members read it. I totally agreed with Baroness Harding that the way we solve the workforce crisis is all about staff retention. It is all about people feeling that their careers were not being developed and that they did not have an opportunity to get on. At the time, retention rates were higher in any other profession. It was also noted that if we had kept at 2012 retention levels, we would have had 16,000 more nurses in 2019 than we had at the time. That is the problem.

There are solutions and we have heard some of them today, but they are a mix of the national and the local. At national level, we need to welcome people. We will always need overseas recruitment, but upwards of 80% of NHS staff are homegrown. We need to incentivise retention—it is cheaper, it is quicker, it is the smart thing to do. The reasons for loss of staff are well known. The Government need to revisit the Augar review. They need to notice what has happened with the loss of bursaries. We need to involve further and higher education in that retention work.

We also need to look at regional solutions. The Lansley Act, the Health and Social Care Act 2012, destroyed the regional architecture but there is still a role, still some semblance of a network, possibly grouping ICSs—we talked about that today—where NHS England could have a role without the performance stick. The emergency planning architecture, which was ignored at the beginning of the pandemic but still exists in some places and did rise to the challenge, linking local authorities and public health, could offer a skeleton of a service to co-operative supportive networks above trust and ICS level. But eventually everything is local. Just as we welcome people nationally and have national support structures to retain staff, we absolutely have to do things locally. We need to look at housing, transport, progression and, as has been said, pay and retention.

I am not particularly interested in the large figures that have been bandied around today, including the millions of people on waiting lists and the 165,000 social care vacancies; I want to know what is happening in Bristol. I want to know what is happening to GP waiting times in Whitchurch, Bedminster and Bishopsworth. I want to know the vacancy rates at the Bristol Royal Infirmary and Southmead Hospital. When I asked the Secretary of State about the vacancy rate in North East Cambridgeshire, obviously, he could not answer, because none of us in this House can answer that question. As MPs, we should know the scale of the problem in our constituencies and, frankly, we do not. We need to know and to communicate to local people what the problem is. We need to help with the local situation and priorities, and we have to build our way out of it.

There are no easy solutions, but there is a path. Sadly, the Government have not even started on that path. If we are to keep spending ever more of our country’s wealth on the NHS and care system—as we will, although it would help if we had grown the economy more in the last 10 years—local people must have a say in that. They have to understand the trade-offs and, crucially, be able to hold someone to account locally for the parlous state of our waiting lists.

December 9, 2022
Richard Burgon – 2022 Speech on the NHS Workforce

The speech made by Richard Burgon, the Labour MP for Leeds East, in the House of Commons on 6 December 2022.

Just two years ago, in the middle of the greatest public health crisis in decades, millions of people came out to clap for the nurses, doctors and other NHS workers who were putting their lives on the line to save the lives of others. As people will remember, Conservative Members were only too happy to be seen joining in the applause. How times have changed.

We now have Tory Ministers wheeled out on the media to attack those same NHS workers with sick claims that their planned action for fair pay is aiding Putin’s abhorrent war on Ukraine. Those disgraceful remarks appear to be the opening salvo in a Tory propaganda war that seeks to blame NHS workers for the deep crisis in our health service. The Tories will attack nurses, as they do every other worker forced to defend their pay and conditions. But nurses did not create the NHS staffing crisis. Nurses did not create record NHS waiting lists. Nurses did not underfund our NHS. Nurses did not hand tens of billions of pounds that should have gone to the NHS over to the private sector, including in corrupt contracts. Whoever the Tories try to blame, the simple truth is this: it is 12 years of Conservative party rule that has created the crisis in our NHS.

At its core is a crisis in the NHS workforce, with workforce shortages at an unprecedented level across the NHS. The statistics are eye-watering, with 133,000 NHS vacancies in England alone and a record high of 47,000 nursing vacancies. This Tory-created staffing crisis is why patients are struggling to get a GP appointment, why heart attack patients face ambulance waiting times of more than an hour and why many are not getting the life-changing operations they urgently need.

Today we will vote on an important policy to scrap the non-dom tax status that is exploited by the super-rich to avoid £3.2 billion in taxes every year. Scrapping that, as Labour advocates, could fund a long-term plan to train enough NHS staff. For example, it could double the number of medical training places and deliver 10,000 more nursing placements.

The Tories should back that plan to put the NHS before non-doms and invest in our NHS instead of lining the pockets of the super-rich. It is a plan that would help bring about a long-term solution to this crisis. For the next two years that they are in government—that is all it will be—they should take the action needed to address the workforce crisis in the immediate term, and we cannot solve that unless we resolve the NHS pay crisis.

A third of public sector workers are actively considering leaving their jobs, and pay is a key factor in that. Key workers in our NHS still earn thousands of pounds a year less in real terms than in 2010. For example, nurses’ real pay is down by £5,200 compared with 2010, while hospital porters’ real pay is down by £2,500. Now the Government expect it to fall even further.

Staff, however much they love their jobs, simply cannot afford to stay in them. Their pay is not covering their essentials. Hospitals are even having to open up food banks for staff. That falling pay is why, over the coming weeks, nursing staff and—it was announced today—ambulance staff will be taking industrial action. Nursing staff do not want to take action, but they feel they have been left with no choice because Government Ministers will not even meet them to discuss pay.

Nurses hope that the Government will listen and open up the pay talks so that they do not have to go out on strike, but if they do strike, they will have public support and I will go and support them. It is not too late for the Government to avoid strikes. They have chosen strikes over negotiations, but they can stop this at any point. The Government need to open up the talks and they need to pay NHS workers properly. They need to give NHS workers the pay rise they deserve.

December 9, 2022
Daisy Cooper – 2022 Speech on the NHS Workforce

The speech made by Daisy Cooper, the Liberal Democrat MP for St Albans, in the House of Commons on 6 December 2022.

Let us imagine what this debate could have been. If the former Prime Minister—the former former Prime Minister, I should say—had accepted the workforce amendment to the Health and Care Bill 13 months ago, this debate could have been so different. The Government could have crunched the numbers, NHS frontline workers would know that the cavalry was coming, and patients would be able to see light at the end of the tunnel. Instead, here we are as Members of Parliament with a roll-call of horror stories, because somehow, in 2022, waiting more than 12 hours for an ambulance is the new normal. How on earth has it come to this?

We know that there are workforce problems in every part of our health and social care sector and every corner of our country, whether general practice, dentistry, pharmacies, midwifery, nursing—all are overstretched and understaffed. But it is midwives who send me their most distressed emails, because they often train for their dream job, only to be plagued by nightmares that they have not done enough to help new mothers and their babies in their time of need.

Just last week I spoke with paramedics and other ambulance staff as I took a three-hour ride out with my local ambulance service. At 7 o’clock in the morning we were called to see the first patient. That patient had been waiting at home, on the floor, since 6 pm the night before—13 hours. Before we could get to see that patient, we were called to a more urgent call. When we finally got to the hospital with that second patient, the paramedics checked the list of patients who had arrived at the hospital. They were distressed that they had not been able to get to that first call, and wanted to make sure that another ambulance had done so. They were exhausted. They said that in a 12-hour shift they may get only one 20-minute break. They were exhausted because there are not enough staff.

For most of my constituents, day in, day out, access to their GP really matters, and too many of them are struggling. That is no wonder, because the Government said they had a target of recruiting 6,000 more GPs, but they have admitted within three years that they will fail to meet that target. It is frustrating for patients, but it is also dangerous for GPs and their staff. This summer we heard reports from Walton-on-Thames in Surrey, where police had been called to a GP surgery because people were making threats of physical violence. That is surely unacceptable. Where is the urgent drive to recruit and retain our GPs?

How on earth will we retain and motivate highly trained professionals when our hospitals are on the verge of collapse? Up and down the country there are hospitals in dire need of repair. In Eastbourne—I see the hon. Member for Eastbourne (Caroline Ansell) is in her place—there have been concerns for a long time about whether the hospital may or may not be coming. It was recently reported by some staff that they had been told—allegedly—that a new hospital was even a bare-faced lie.

Caroline Ansell (Eastbourne) (Con)

I thank the hon. Lady for advising me ahead of the debate that she might mention the hospital in my constituency. I am not sure of her particular interest in Eastbourne, although it was named by Time Out as its place to visit in 2023. For the benefit of those in my constituency who may be following this debate, am I pleased to share that, in relation to the workforce—the matter before us today—there has been a 25% increase in full-time staff over the past 10 years. That is a 10-year increase in nurses and midwives, a 10-year increase in doctors and dentists, and a 10-year increase in allied health professionals. They also report £20 million—[Interruption.]

Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)

Order. It is important to have fairly short interventions.

Caroline Ansell

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. Is the hon. Lady therefore pleased and relieved to hear that, despite staff concerns that there would not be a new hospital, there has been a run of incredibly positive meetings and we are assured that, in the words of the chief executive, “once-in-a-generation” investment is coming?

Daisy Cooper

The hon. Lady asks about my particular interest, and she will be aware that as the Liberal Democrat spokesperson for health and social care I have asked the Government on 10 occasions about releasing funds for my local trust, and other hospital trusts across the UK, for the new hospital programme that the Conservatives promised in 2019.

Other hospital trusts are deeply concerned about the lack of progress on the new hospital programme. In Sutton, for example, St Helier Hospital was built before world war two. My own trust, West Hertfordshire Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust, which covers St Albans, Watford and Hemel Hempstead, has buildings that are life-expired. I have been there a number of times and seen the extraordinary work by professionals in my local hospital trust. We had the first virtual ward during the pandemic, and we have two robotics suites. We also have a lift that breaks down right next to the ward that treats children who are ill. When that lift breaks down, ambulances have to be stationed outside one side of the hospital so that they can drive around to the other side. This is completely unacceptable.

Will the Minister confirm that all of those hospitals right across the UK—wherever they may be—will get the funding they were promised under the new hospital programme and that there will not be delays and penny-pinching? A Conservative Member no longer in his place asked where we would train all of the planned thousands more doctors and nurses. If there is any penny-pinching on the size of our new hospitals, they certainly will not get trained in our area.

Our NHS and social care need people, tech, beds and buildings. There is no silver bullet to solving all of the issues in our NHS and social care, but getting some proper workforce planning in place would be the closest thing to that. That is why my Liberal Democrat colleagues and I are happy to support the motion.

December 9, 2022
Bell Ribeiro-Addy – 2022 Speech on the NHS Workforce

The speech made by Bell Ribeiro-Addy, the Labour MP for Streatham, in the House of Commons on 6 December 2022.

The importance of this debate should not be understated because the NHS is in a dire state, and that is largely the result of a severe staffing crisis. Other than the generally inept economic policies we have seen from the Government, there is no denying that the Brexit deal has had a direct impact on staffing numbers, and that chronically low pay and poor working conditions have resulted in an exodus of staff leaving the NHS to work in the private sector, work abroad or leave the healthcare profession entirely.

I would like to start with one of the most undervalued groups in our NHS, which is the first that most of us meet in modern Britain—the midwife. The Royal College of Midwives has estimated that it has an existing and long-standing shortage of more than 2,000 midwives, and that for every 30 who are trained, NHS England loses 29. Vacancies for nurse positions are estimated to be at an all-time high, with a survey at the start of the year finding that 57% of nursing staff across healthcare settings are thinking about quitting or actively planning to quit their jobs.

With figures such as these, we cannot blame existing staff for wanting to leave or blame others for not wanting to fill these vacancies, particularly when we see the TUC’s estimates that, since the Conservatives took office in 2010, midwives have had a total real-terms pay cut of £5,657, nurses’ pay is down by £4,310 in real terms and the pay of all doctors is down by about 7.4%. We cannot forget the thousands of non-medical staff, who are often overlooked, but are integral to keeping the NHS running. Cleaners, security guards, porters and other important workers have, along with other NHS staff, faced real-terms cuts in pay since 2010.

Is it any wonder that the NHS waiting list has now tipped to over 7 million? When we hear of the scale of the vacancies, can we really be surprised that some A&E patients are left waiting for over 12 hours, or that ambulances are repeatedly failing to meet their target response times? The staffing crisis in the NHS is having a dire impact on patient safety, and if we are going to tackle the NHS backlog, address the crisis in staff recruitment and retention, and bring the NHS back to the standard it should be, we first and foremost have to address pay. We cannot be gaslighting nurses by saying that they should drop their pay demands to send a message to Putin, which is absolutely ridiculous.

We have to pay nurses what they are worth, and if the Government were not aware of what they are worth, the pandemic should have shown them. We called them key workers because we could not do without them, yet the Government justify their pay by calling them low-skilled workers. There is no such thing as low-skilled work; there is only low-paid work. All work is skilled when it is done well, and our NHS staff are the best example of this. On the contrary, Ministers, who are paid multiple times more but who have shown little skill in running the country, if the cost of living crisis and the economic situation are anything to go by, are completely different. They get paid so much more, but we cannot see their sense of skill in running this country.

In the past year, a number of NHS personnel have been taking strike action against low pay, and nurses will be striking later this month for the first time in the Royal College of Nursing’s 106-year history, while ambulance staff have announced their strike today. If that does not show us the scale of the crisis facing workers in the NHS, I do not know what does. No one wants to have to take strike action, least of all the workers in our NHS, but the dire situation of chronic underpayment and poor conditions is leaving them no choice. This Government have left them no choice. When we have 27% of NHS trusts operating food banks for their staff, when one in three nurses is taking out a loan to feed their family and when NHS staff across the board are severely underpaid, of course they are at the point of saying that enough is enough.

No one goes to work for the NHS for the money, but it cannot be fair to expect people to live on poverty wages. If the Government want to address this crisis in recruitment and retention, they must get over this ideological aversion to paying public sector workers what they are worth. That means committing to a proper cost of living pay rise, and setting out plans to reverse a decade of real-term cuts in pay for our NHS workers.

December 9, 2022
Emma Hardy – 2022 Speech on the NHS Workforce

The speech made by Emma Hardy, the Labour MP for Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle, in the House of Commons on 6 December 2022.

In Hull West and Hessle, 1,730 people are waiting more than 28 days to see a GP and 6,225 are waiting more than 14 days. The ratio of GPs to patients in Hull is one of the lowest in the country, which is fuelling some of the many problems that we are seeing in accident and emergency. That is combined with the concerns that I raised with the Secretary of State about the delay to discharge; the 30% vacancies in our adult healthcare sector; and the delay in money that the Government promised to adult healthcare services, which means that delays are only increasing. I am incredibly concerned about what will happen over the winter.

I will focus my remarks on my concerns about radiotherapy, about which I have written to the Minister of State, Department of Health and Social Care, the hon. Member for Faversham and Mid Kent (Helen Whately). With respect, I wrote to her on 3 September and received a reply on 28 November, which is disappointing on such a serious matter. I raise that issue today because, in August, I received an update from the Humber and North Yorkshire cancer alliance about the state of radiotherapy. For those who are unfamiliar, radiotherapy is used to treat and kill cancer cells and to shrink tumours. It is often used in the early stages of cancer.

In the briefing note that the Humber and North Yorkshire cancer alliance sent me, which I can only assume it sent to other Members of Parliament, it says:

“It is expected that the radiotherapy position at HUTH will worsen through the year. The reduced capacity obviously could pose a risk to patients (from a health and wellbeing perspective, as well as from a patient experience perspective).”

The reason it wrote to me to tell me of its concerns about radiotherapy is the shortages we have in the area. It says that the percentage of Hull University Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust patients who began radiotherapy as their first definitive treatment for cancer and who did so within 62 days of an urgent referral for suspected cancer—within 62 days of an urgent referral—was 22% in July, 50% in June and 29% in May, compared with over 50% previously. The percentage of HUTH patients who received radiotherapy following their first definitive treatment within the 31-day target was 44%. So the majority of people are not being seen for their cancer treatment within the 31-day target, and only 22% of people sent for urgent referrals for suspected cancer are being seen.

The reason for this is given in the briefing note, which says:

“Many of HUTH’s therapeutic radiographers have left the profession to pursue a better work-life balance, while those who have remained in their roles have also sought improved work-life balance by seeking roles closer to where they live to reduce commute times.”

That is the reason people are leaving—to seek a better work-life balance. It is not because they do not care or they do not wish to continue to treat people, but because they simply cannot maintain it at this level. The note says that

“staffing shortages is an issue experienced across the country.”

It also says—this is a key point because the Government’s defence is often that the pandemic has caused all these problems:

“Therapeutic radiography has been considered a vulnerable profession for years.”

Pre-pandemic we were having problems with radiographers, but no action was taken, and this is still considered a problem right now.

I wrote to the Minister and the Secretary of State about this, quoting from the briefing note. I sent the letter on 3 September, and I said:

“I am sure you will agree that the evidently increased waiting time for potential life-saving or life-prolonging treatment is extremely concerning.”

I understand that Hull University Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust is doing everything it possibly can. It has taken on two apprentices to be trained up as radiographers, but we all understand that we cannot instantly produce the radiographers we need. As I say, I sent the letter on 3 September, and it was also signed by my right hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull North (Dame Diana Johnson) and my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull East (Karl Turner). It took the Minister until 28 November to reply, even though I started the letter by saying:

“I am writing having received a very worrying update from the Humber and North Yorkshire Cancer Alliance regarding a reduction in services”

in my constituency.

In her reply, the Minister admitted:

“HUTH advises that, to protect existing staff and maintain the service, it was necessary to reduce capacity to sustainable levels, which has in turn led to the inability to reach specific targets and a growing waiting list.”

So this is a problem that the Government are well aware of, despite their delay in responding to it. It is a problem that has been around for years, and it is a problem that is literally a matter of life and death. If people do not get the cancer treatment they need when they need it, we know the consequences. The failure to deal with and address the NHS workforce is not just a mild inconvenience; it is an incredibly serious matter that has been a long time coming and a damning indictment of 12 years of Conservative mismanagement of our NHS.

December 9, 2022