HC Deb 13 December 1954 vol 535 cc1387-8
32. Mr. E. Johnson

asked the Minister of Health what action he is taking to provide spastic children with increased facilities for physiotherapy and speech therapy.

Mr. Iain Macleod

The physiotherapy and speech therapy services provided under the National Health Service are available to spastic children as to others. Local education authorities also provide these services in special schools and as part of the school health services, for which my right hon. Friend the Minister of Education is responsible.

Mr. Johnson

Would my right hon Friend agree that these facilities are available in an altogether inadequate quantity? Very few of these people can obtain the necessary treatment. Would not he further agree that if they can receive treatment between the ages of three and five, spastic children may be able to lead perfectly normal lives later on, and that in any case such treatment would greatly improve the possibility of later treatment being beneficial? Will he bear in mind that a stitch in time will save nine?

Mr. Macleod

I have studied the speech made by my hon. Friend in the debate on the Address, and I should like to consider that question. I think we have to make a start in the great cities. in view of the small numbers of spastic children involved and the difficulty of bringing them together in groups. A start is, in fact, being made in London.

Mr. Emrys Hughes

Will the Minister consider giving the Secretary of State for Scotland the benefit of the speech therapy service?

Mr. J. R. H. Hutchison

Can my right hon. Friend say exactly what he has in mind in the direction of giving some aid? At the present time the heat and burden of the day is being carried, quite inadequately, by voluntary services, and many thousands of children and adults are not getting the treatment they are entitled to receive.

Mr. Macleod

I should think that a great deal of the burden is being borne by the National Health Service, whose facilities to people injured or disabled are available here, as in any other field.

At the end of the questions—