I agree. In Hampshire we are lucky that 30% of Mountbatten’s services are contracted by the NHS. The ICB—which is in special measures, as my hon. Friend Bob Seely said—is not doing a good enough job of providing those services. If a hospice wants to explore getting some of that funding from the national health service, it should be allowed to do so, while recognising the independence of spirit of many hospices that choose to go their own way. My hon. Friend is right to raise the work of the hospice in his constituency, and I hope that it will be able to acquire some ICB funding.

It will cost Mountbatten an extra £750,000 just to provide the same services, while the number of people it supports will rise by 200%. The Minister will say that this Government awarded another £1.5 billion for hospice services through ICBs. That is entirely welcome, and I congratulated her on her announcement in my debate last year. But I say now what I said in that debate: the ICBs are not passing on the money for the purposes set out. ICBs—particularly mine in Hampshire—are riding roughshod over the Government’s wishes and are exacerbating a problem in a system that already fails to take into account the varying nature of needs across different parts of the country.

My hon. Friend Bob Seely and I had a meeting last week with representatives from our ICB. I asked how much of that £1.5 billion had been awarded to the Hampshire ICB. They could not give an answer. I asked how much of that was allocated to hospices in the region. They could not give an answer. I say what I said last June to the Minister, who is doing an excellent job: that money was very welcome but I hope we can look at a better way of holding ICBs to account, to ensure that when the Government put hard-pressed money into our health system, ICBs deliver it to the frontline services for which it was intended. That is no different in Hampshire. The leadership of Hampshire ICB needs to look at that seriously.

Mountbatten also has to compete with the NHS for its workforce. It rightly chooses to pay and award its staff along the same pay guidelines as NHS staff. This year, that represented a 4.8% rise in costs, and will represent a further 5% next year. Again, I thank the Government for awarding an extra £450,000 to Mountbatten, but that will still leave a deficit of £1 million overall this year. It is right that it chooses to pay its staff adequately, but that will mean Mountbatten will have to lay off some of its workforce, harming outcomes for families in my constituency. That will be the case in the rest of the UK if other hospices have the same problem.

The funding instability—which in my case I blame on the ICB, which is leading a review into hospice care—seems entirely one-sided. It will end up costing the NHS more money, as hospitals will pick up the burden of care, and beds will be used by people who should be in hospices. We all know the impact that energy bills and covid had on the sector.

I do not mean to sound depressing to the House, but we must continue to look at this issue. The Government’s investment is extremely welcome, but we need more. I would like to hear from the Minister how the Government and the NHS nationally intend to work together to provide a sustainable long-term funding settlement for hospice care, while retaining that independence that hon. Members have outlined. We need the Minister to review how much money ICBs are passing on to hospices, and to take a stronger line in reviewing the role of ICBs and holding them to account if they are not giving that money to the frontline.

The Government, the hospice sector and the ICBs have a clear choice: a sustainable funding model for our hospices, or more pressure on an already stretched national health service. The hospice staff I have met care and want to deliver on the challenge that many of our constituents face across the United Kingdom, but they need a level playing field in order to provide that care. Let us help them do that and improve hospice care.