Mr Gerald Malone: None.
Mr Gerald Malone: No. The hon. Gentleman is talking nonsense. I thought that he might have been rising to record the 6.9 per cent. increase in the number of general practitioners since 1978–79 in his local health authority, or perhaps to congratulate it on 60 per cent., of the local population being covered by fundholding, but no, he raises yet again another argument that we killed off both in Committee and...
Mr Gerald Malone: I am happy to endorse my hon. Friend's points. Of course it is true that the Labour party still has an ideological point of view about any private sector involvement, no matter how new it may try to appear to the public. That would mean fewer services for patients.
Mr Gerald Malone: Perhaps it is about time the hon. Lady started to think about patients when she talks about health care and the quality of services that are being provided. Put into context, the figure she mentions is about 1.9 per cent. of fundholding budgets. It provides better care for patients and services that patients want. The whole nation will know that the Labour party would deny them those services...
Mr Gerald Malone: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that. He gets to the heart of who—Conservatives or Labour— will provide better services for patients. I have no doubt that he will be campaigning vigorously on that point and on the White Paper that my right hon. Friend has recently published on the matter, so that the electorate will have a clear choice. That choice will be in favour of this...
Mr Gerald Malone: All Governments since 1951 have accepted that patients who can afford to should make some contribution towards the cost of their dental care. National health service dental treatment is free to those aged under 18 and extensive exemption and remission arrangements protect vulnerable groups.
Mr Gerald Malone: I shall tell the hon. Gentleman what has happened in his constituency between 1991–92 and 1995–96. Perhaps he is not interested in that, but is interested only in what is happening to him. The proportion of adult courses of treatment provided free in his health authority has risen from 48.5 per cent. in 1991–92 to 59.5 per cent. We shall take no lessons from Labour on charging until the...
Mr Gerald Malone: Dental charges have been supported by Governments since the early 1950s. I cannot tell my hon. Friend how many hospitals would have to be closed, but £381 million would have to be recovered. Labour has recently reneged on what it had said about free eyesight tests. The public know what Labour would do about dental charges if it were ever elected to office.
Mr Gerald Malone: I do not know where the hon. Gentleman has been living. He has certainly not been following the affairs of this House recently. In the context of a growing dental service with more dentists and more treatments than ever, we have just given a Third Reading to a primary health care Bill that will address the problems of locating treatment in certain parts of the country. Access schemes have...
Mr Gerald Malone: I am delighted that my hon. Friend the Member for Rugby and Kenilworth (Mr. Pawsey) has secured the opportunity of an Adjournment debate on a vital issue in his constituency. First, I set on the record my thanks to him for all that he has done so far. Since problems with the trust first emerged he has, as he has said, had five meetings with me apart from all the other meetings that I know...
Mr Gerald Malone: It gives me great pleasure to commend this important Bill to the House. I thank the hon. Member for Dulwich (Ms Jowell) for her concern. I have never felt alone during our proceedings, although on occasions I have felt, to use the parlance of the Bill, like a single-handed practitioner. However, they now practise in different—usually high-quality—circumstances in a way that would not have...
Mr Gerald Malone: I will be brief, as I have little to add to what I said in Committee. I do not pretend that this is an easy issue to deal with, and it is extremely important. No one is suggesting that people should be inhibited in any way from raising proper concerns about what is going on in any organisation in which they work within the NHS, and I will show in a moment how we have reinforced that as an...
Mr Gerald Malone: The hon. Member for Bolton, North-East (Mr. Thornham) raises an important issue. He gave examples of a number of sensible objectives on which we are at one, but I hope that I can persuade him that his amendment is not necessary. I draw his attention to clause 4, which requires health authorities to comply with any directions given to them by the Secretary of State about the extent to which,...
Mr Gerald Malone: I remind the hon. Gentleman that the distribution of the dental work force has an entirely different history from that of general practitioners. The statutory system established in 1947–48 did not include dentistry. Dentists have differing commitments to the NHS, and the distribution of dentists is often not the whole story, because they are free either to participate in NHS services or...
Mr Gerald Malone: The Bill will not prejudice GPs who provide the services that they currently provide with the arrangements that they choose. If they are providing out-of-hours services, they can continue to do so in the way that they choose, but if they wish to enter into a contract for the new part I arrangements, and if they wish to use the vehicle that currently provides an element of what they do and it...
Mr Gerald Malone: No.
Mr Gerald Malone: Unusually, the hon. Gentleman has not entirely understood the purpose of the new clauses tabled by his own party. He is distorting the point, which is that, to qualify either to bid for a pilot or to enter into permanent part I arrangements, the individuals concerned must be members of the NHS family, or form an agglomeration—either a partnership or, as we discussed in Committee, a...
Mr Gerald Malone: It is not a question of whether I believe. Frankly, the stories that we still see rerun in Pulse are grossly overdone. Whenever I have spoken to anybody with any remote connection with those organisations, the last thing that they have done is express an interest in taking on part I arrangements in primary care. It a question not of my belief, but of examining the Bill and seeing what the...
Mr Gerald Malone: I am not entirely certain that a specific register would be helpful. Conflicts of interest are regulated by other professional bodies, including the General Medical Council. On reflection, those arrangements have served well over time. If the hon. Gentleman had brought me some evidence to show that they would not serve well in respect of part II arrangements, I might have considered the...
Mr Gerald Malone: I have listened to the debate on new clause 4 wondering whether I would hear any new or more compelling arguments than we heard in Committee. With respect to hon. Members, who pressed their suits as vigorously as they did in Committee, I have to disappoint them, and say that I did not hear much to persuade me that I should accept the new clause. I shall explain briefly why, but first let me...