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Health Inequalities

We are discussing health, and I am afraid that my health is not particularly good today, so I shall not speak for long because my voice might not last. I want to speak because this debate is important, and I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Wigan (Mr. Turner) on securing it, and on speaking so strongly on this important subject. I speak for Luton, which is seriously and consistently underfunded, and has been for many years. It is the most underfunded health area in the relatively prosperous eastern region, yet we have the greatest health inequalities, enormous levels of heart disease and diabetes, and serious mental health problems, which are not being addressed as they should be because we are underfunded. I was recently called to a meeting by Amicus, which is now part of Unite, because its members include health visitors and there are not enough health visitors. Luton has a large young population with many children and a high birth rate, so we need health visitors and we do not have enough. I have recently been informed that Luton has the longest waiting times for musculoskeletal treatments. Again, that is simply because of underfunding. Some non-statutory funding areas have been cut—for example, foyers for people with mental health problems—and there are funding squeezes all around. There was a health funding freeze two years ago, when Luton should have been treated rather better than some other areas, but it was treated worse and had the worst health funding cuts of any primary care trust in the region. Others in the more prosperous leafy shires and relatively middle class areas were allowed to increase their spending when we were forced to cut ours. That was gross inequity by any standard. More recently, in the past year or so, we have had a savage cut in our walk-in centre. Walk-in centres were recently trumpeted by the Prime Minister, and the then Secretary of State for Health opened our walk-in centre with a great fanfare, but its hours were later cut to a quarter of what they had been. It was a wonderful facility that took pressure off GPs and the local accident and emergency department, and enabled people who might not have gone to their doctor to drop in. Some people with health problems, particularly middle-aged men, do not go to their doctor when they should, and walk-in centres pick up on conditions. I do not blame the health professionals, who do their best in difficult circumstances, and I commend my local patient and public involvement forum, which has done a tremendous job in lobbying on behalf of local patients. Some months ago it called a special meeting to discuss the walk-in centre and other matters with representatives of the primary care trust and the strategic health authority. The PCT officers, to their credit, turned up at that meeting. They had a hard time, but they turned up. The SHA officer did not turn up and there was a vacant seat. I understand that a few days later, the SHA called the PCT officers to an early-morning meeting elsewhere in the region and told them to get the PPIF in line. The SHA's behaviour was outrageous. Not only did it impose unfair spending cuts; it lambasted its own officers in the PCT for not keeping local patient representatives in line. Luton has serious problems, which must be addressed. I have written many times and at length to successive Secretaries of State for Health about our funding problems. I want Luton to be treated fairly in future, and I urge my right hon. Friend the Minister to look carefully at Luton's funding and at other areas that are similarly poorly treated, to ensure that we have fair funding levels in future.