Out-of-Hours Primary Care

Part of Oral Answers to Questions — Health – in the House of Commons at 2:30 pm on 12 May 2009.

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Photo of David Taylor David Taylor Labour, North West Leicestershire 2:30, 12 May 2009

Both the National Audit Office and the Public Accounts Committee have, for some time, pointed to significant flaws in the private provision of out-of-hours general practitioner care. As Lorely Burt said, there have been fatal shortcomings in outsourcing an essential aspect of primary care. Does the Minister agree that more and more PCTs across the country should follow the example of Leicestershire County and Rutland primary care trust, and bring outsourced out-of-hours provision back in-house? Failing that, should not the performance of organisations be tracked much more closely by the Department of Health, so that our constituents are not left to the mercies of cowboy clinicians?