§ 30. Mr. Sorensenasked the Minister of Health what is the approximate proportion of nurses and domestic staff to private fee-paying patients and to ordinary patients respectively in hospitals within the North-East Metropolitan Region compared with other regions; and whether in that region the number of part-time trained nurses has increased during the past two years.
§ Miss PittI regret that the information requested in the first part of the Question is not available. The Answer to the second part is "Yes".
§ Mr. SorensenDoes not the Parliamentary Secretary think it rather necessary to get this information? Could she not initiate investigations to see what information is available to answer not only my request but the request of many other people? On the second point, is she satisfied, seeing that we are now bound to have a very large number of part-time nurses, that everything is done to consider domestic circumstances?
§ Miss PittWithout considerable expenditure and effort, we could not get individual figures of the allocation of nurses to private beds. In fact, I wonder whether it would serve any useful purpose because, in general, the same nurses undertake duties at pay beds and National Health Service beds. I agree that it is important to consider the domestic circumstances of part-time nurses; it is for individual matrons, of course, to try to accommodate them in arranging the rota of duties, and matrons are well aware of that.
§ Mr. SorensenReturning to the hon. Lady's reply to the first part of my Question, could she not at least make one or two sample investigations into the circumstances at particular hospitals? I am well aware of the difficulties, but I feel that there will be a tendency in certain hospitals to give more service to patients in pay beds than to those in National Health Service beds.
§ Miss PittI will certainly inquire as to whether it is possible to do any sampling, but I would be surprised if the answer showed anything different from what I have suggested.