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Private Sector (NHS)

I, too, congratulate the hon. Member for North Durham (Mr. Jones) on securing this important debate. I also congratulate other hon. Members, who have made important contributions. I am delighted to hear that the hon. Member for Northavon (Steve Webb) has nothing against short, healthy people or tall, healthy people. 19 Oct 2005 : Column 289WH It will be interesting to hear the Minister's response to the series of questions that he has been asked. I hope that he will pay more attention to the views of his colleagues in the House than the Secretary of State did to ordinary Labour party members when the vote on this important issue was held at the conference in Brighton. Conservative Members welcome the fact that the Government are talking much more about the need to introduce patient choice. However, choice is a meaningless term if we do not have spare capacity. That is where the private sector will become increasingly important in delivering NHS services. The Government have issued some statistics regarding their intentions. About £3 billion will be spent over the next five years to pay for about 1.7 million operations in the private sector, mostly via independent treatment centres, as we have heard. Conservative Members believe that the private sector could play a much greater role for the benefit of the NHS and that the Government's approach is not the way to proceed; indeed, it is fundamentally flawed. In essence, they are block-booking capacity and deciding where capacity will be needed. That runs the severe risk not only of being inefficient, but of ignoring what patients want and need. The example given by the hon. Member for North Durham clearly illustrates the point. The chief executive of a university hospital is claiming that the Government have contracted out MRI scans despite the fact that his own scanner was "considerably underemployed" and that he could practically have eliminated waiting lists, times and numbers if he had been given the cash instead. That is complete nonsense; it is not how the system should be working. As we have heard from several Members, another problem is that the evidence suggests that the Government's approach is more costly. I commend the hon. Member for North Durham on his tenacity in extracting answers from the Government, and according to a recent parliamentary answer to a question from one of his colleagues, "it is estimated that procedures purchased under the ISTC programme cost on average 9 per cent. more than the national health service equivalent cost".—[Official Report, 16 March 2005; Vol. 432, c. 273W.] As several hon. Members have said, the Government's nationally agreed targets with the private sector have been poorly drawn up and have resulted in valuable NHS resources lying idle. The contract with Alliance Medical is one such example. To create downward pressure on prices in the private sector and encourage more competition, the Government need to create a right to supply the NHS. Otherwise, the result will be exactly what we have at the moment—private companies selected by the Government continuing to be paid to cherry-pick easy operations from the NHS. That is not the right way to proceed—it is neither sustainable nor sensible. It also risks antagonising staff and alienating them from the private sector and the benefits that it has to offer.