HC Deb 06 December 1954 vol 535 cc584-5
18. Mr. Blenkinsop

asked the Minister of Health what improvements are proposed for the treatment of casualties at Newcastle General Hospital; and whether he will speed up their implementation by assuring the Newcastle Regional Hospital Board that they will have sufficient funds at their disposal to enable urgent work of this kind to be carried out.

Mr. Iain Macleod

I am informed that the Regional Hospital Board are considering what can be done to improve the department. It is for the Board to decide on priorities for capital works within the limits of the total sum available to them, and I am not in a position to increase their allocation for 1955–56.

Mr. Blenkinsop

Is the Minister aware that this is just the difficulty and that no further partial remedy will suffice to overcoming the problem, which involves major replanning for existing buildings to ensure any effectual change? Will he not therefore reconsider the decision not to make further sums available to the Regional Board?

Mr. Macleod

I agree that the casualty department is inadequately housed. There are plans in the programme for the out-patients and casualty department. However, that in itself does not put it necessarily at the top of the Regional Board's priority list, and it is not for me to decide, as I should if I made a special allocation for this work, what the Board's first choice should be.

Mr. Blenkinsop

Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that this hospital has been chosen as a major regional hospital, and not just a general hospital, and that, therefore, the Board's own action makes more urgent the need for these changes?

Mr. Macleod

If the hon. Gentleman is arguing that that work is, in fact, at the top of the Regional Board's list, and if they agree with him about that—about which I am not so confident—then it will be done, because it will come to the top of the Board's list.