Secretary of State for Health

Part of Opposition Day — [12th allotted day] – in the House of Commons at 4:49 pm on 23 May 2007.

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Photo of Patricia Hewitt Patricia Hewitt Secretary of State, Department of Health 4:49, 23 May 2007

The right hon. Gentleman should talk to Health Ministers in the Governments in Africa, with whom we have reached agreements on that very point. Let me also remind him that only last year we took nursing jobs off the skills shortage list in order to ensure that the jobs went to nurses here.

The point that I want to make about the clinical evidence for changes in services is that, as the hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire knows full well, in the case of the most serious emergencies—for instance, strokes and heart attacks—it is much better to bypass the local hospital and be taken straight to a specialist centre, where the specialist staff and equipment are ready 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Close to home wherever safely possible and in a specialist centre where necessary—that is what clinicians are telling us. If the NHS can do that, each year we can save 500 more lives, prevent another 1,000 heart attacks and support more than 1,000 stroke victims to regain their independence, rather than being condemned to lasting disability. That is the clinical evidence. Rather than giving us weasel words, the Conservative party should be supporting clinicians in making the case for change.

If we know that changing services will allow us to improve and save more lives, we would be betraying patients and the NHS if we refused to make those changes just because they were difficult. Leadership is about listening to clinicians, supporting them in making the case for change, involving local councillors and people in consultation, and then having the courage to back the NHS in making the right decision.