HC Deb 05 May 1981 vol 4 cc5-6
4. Mr. Cryer

asked the Secretary of State for Social Services if he will make a statement on the provision of training facilities in the National Health Service.

Mr. Patrick Jenkin

Responsibility for the professional training of most NHS staff is vested in statutory or other independent outside bodies. Advice on other training is provided by the National Training Council for the NHS and the five national staff committees.

Mr. Cryer

Will not NHS training facilities be used by the private sector? For example, the promoters of the Yorkshire clinic, which is being built near Bingley, will almost certainly draw NHS-trained staff from Airedale general hospital, in my constituency. What will the right hon. Gentleman do about private sector promoters and those consultants who put greed before need, in placing private profit before the duty of service towards NHS patients?

Mr. Jenkin

I must make it clear that I disagree with the hon. Gentleman's view about the private sector. We welcome the growth of the private sector, because it adds to the total of health care resources available to the people of this country. In addition, it relieves pressure on the NHS. However, the private sector could and should make a greater contribution to the training of health care staff, particularly nurses. My hon. Friend the Minister for Health has been having discussions with the joint liaison committee for independent health care on how the private sector's contribution to staff training might be increased.

Mr. Pavitt

In view of the bottleneck caused by the private sector's drainage of specialised nurses, such as trained theatre nurses and those qualified in renal dialysis, will the right hon. Gentleman put special money into crash courses to repair the damage done? Given the unemployment problem, will he discuss with the Secretary of State for Employment the problem of training in the professions supplementary to medicine, particularly chiropody, in which many school leavers could do a useful job?

Mr. Jenkin

I am not sure that I would want to be operated on in a theatre in which staff had been through a crash course. As I said, we want the private sector to make a better contribution. I welcome the fact that the Wellington Foundation has established a lectureship in nursing at the Chelsea college of the University of London. I am glad to say that that will make a considerable contribution towards allaying the anxieties expressed by the hon. Gentleman.

Mr. Dobson

Will the Secretary of State confirm that, to date, the private sector has made no contribution to the training of medical and nursing staff?

Mr. Jenkin

I absolutely deny that. I direct the hon. Gentleman's attention to the excellent relationship that has existed for many years between the Roehampton school of nursing and the Royal Masonic hospital, where nurses have done much training. In addition, medical training can often be greatly enhanced if a consultant can use some of the less common cases found in some private hospitals for teaching his students.