Opposition Day Debate

Acute Hospital Services

21 st February 2007

Hansard Vol 457

No 46

Nicholas Soames intervened during the Secretary of State for Health’s speech

[Columns 3089]

Mr. Nicholas Soames (MidSussex) (Con): It is very kind of the Secretary of State to give way, even from behind her papers. I agree entirely with the point that she makes about the requirement for a serious, grownup conversation about the services. The point that my hon. Friend the Member for Upminster (Angela Watkinson) made, however, applies in constituencies throughout the land, where serious grownup conversations are taking place and people acknowledge that changes need to be made, but where local people know that lines in the sand are needed to protect services that are vital for local people, such as proper A and E and maternity services. When vast numbers of those people, after serious conversations, object to what is proposed, what then should happen?

Mrs Hewitt: Thanks to the changes that we have made in the whole statutory framework for consultation, there is now a very clear process of initial involvement with the public and staff to generate the options and formal consultation on those options, with the involvement throughout the entire process of the local overview and scrutiny committees. In many cases-it is probably the majority of cases in which reconfigurations take place-the issues are settled through the process with the support of the local councillors on the overview and scrutiny committee. It is only if the committee is not happy with the outcome, the consultation process or both that the matter even comes to me as Secretary of State. Depending on the strength of the clinical case and the nature of the objections that are being made, what I am able to do-I have done it in a number of cases-is bring in an independent panel of clinicians to take a further look from outside the area at the decisions that are

proposed locally. I think that that is the right way to deal with decisions that are often difficult, but need to be made in a way that ensures the best care possible for everybody in every part of the country.

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