Part of Oral Answers to Questions — Health – in the House of Commons at 11:30 am on 22 February 2005.
Paul Burstow
Shadow Secretary of State for Health
11:30,
22 February 2005
These are the hidden waiting lists that the Government say they will finally publish. They will not, however, publish them until after the General Election. The Secretary of State has just rehearsed some figures on improvements in diagnostics, but will he share all the figures that he has with Members of the House, so that we can see for ourselves how the NHS is improving? Will he also confirm that the announcement that he made last Friday in fact involves expending from existing NHS budgets to deliver the new contracts, rather than from new NHS funds? Will he allow the local NHS to take decisions for itself about how best to cut diagnostic waits, rather than bouncing it into a nationally arranged contract? Will he also ensure that all NHS scanning equipment is being used to the full, rather than sitting idle, as much of it is now?
Secretary of State was originally the title given to the two officials who conducted the Royal Correspondence under Elizabeth I. Now it is the title held by some of the more important Government Ministers, for example the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs.
In a general election, each constituency chooses an MP to represent it by process of election. The party who wins the most seats in parliament is in power, with its leader becoming Prime Minister and its Ministers/Shadow Ministers making up the new Cabinet. If no party has a majority, this is known as a hung Parliament. The next general election will take place on or before 3rd June 2010.
