Part of Oral Answers to Questions — Scotland – in the House of Commons at 12:00 am on 19 June 1991.
John Home Robertson
, East Lothian
12:00,
19 June 1991
After the drastic reduction in the number of hospital wards in my Constituency of East Lothian, we now find that the disgraceful waiting lists for hospitals in Edinburgh are being further aggravated by waiting lists for ambulances to take patients from my constituency to and from those hospitals. As to the waiting list arrangements for the proposed private hospital in Haddington for the continuing care of elderly patients, can the Minister give any guarantee that beds will be available for elderly NHS patients who need care in that unit, whenever it is introduced?
Ministers make up the Government and almost all are members of the House of Lords or the House of Commons. There are three main types of Minister. Departmental Ministers are in charge of Government Departments. The Government is divided into different Departments which have responsibilities for different areas. For example the Treasury is in charge of Government spending. Departmental Ministers in the Cabinet are generally called 'Secretary of State' but some have special titles such as Chancellor of the Exchequer. Ministers of State and Junior Ministers assist the ministers in charge of the department. They normally have responsibility for a particular area within the department and are sometimes given a title that reflects this - for example Minister of Transport.
In a general election, each Constituency chooses an MP to represent them. MPs have a responsibility to represnt the views of the Constituency in the House of Commons. There are 650 Constituencies, and thus 650 MPs. A citizen of a Constituency is known as a Constituent
