Doctors and Nurses (Hansard, 13 July 1983)

§ 3. Mr. Eadie
asked the Secretary of State for Scotland how many qualified doctors and nurses in Scotland are known to be unemployed by reason of being unable to find employment in their professions.

§ The Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. John MacKay)
This information is not available.

§ Mr. Eadie
Is the Minister aware that, despite that succinct answer, figures are being made available projecting the rate of unemployment among skilled nurses and doctors? Does he agree that it is nothing short of a national scandal that such skilled people should be unemployed at a time when hospital waiting lists are so long? Does he agree also that it is a scandal that such skilled people should not be allowed to practise their skills and so earn their livelihood?

§ Mr. MacKay
I am aware that the BMA, for example, is concerned about doctor employment in the future and is having discussions with my Department about that. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman welcomes the reality of the figures in recent years, which show, for example, that from September 1979 to September 1982 the number of nurses employed in the National Health Service in Scotland increased from 26,930 to 31,020. I do not consider that to be a disgrace. I consider it to be a very good record.

§ Lord James Douglas-Hamilton
Is it not the case that the number of doctors and dentists has increased by more than 250 since 1979 and the number of nurses and midwives by more than 7,000? With a net increase in public expenditure on the Health Service, does my hon. Friend agree that the emphasis should be on better patient care?

§ Mr. MacKay
My hon. Friend is right. We are emphasising that we expect the increased resources which we have made available to the NHS in the last four years to be put into direct patient care, with the other services concerned with the Health Service being run as efficiently and economically as possible.

§ Mr. Kirkwood
Will the Minister confirm that he has now received plans from the health boards as a result of the White Paper which was produced almost three and a half years ago on the structure and management of the National Health Service in Scotland?

§ Mr. MacKay
I am not certain to which plan the hon. Gentleman is referring. If he is referring to the plans of the health boards on the SHAPE priorities, I can tell him that my Department has received plans from most of the boards and are chasing up those which have not put them in. We are starting to hold discussions with the health boards to make sure that their plans accord with the SHAPE priorities laid down by the Government.

§ Mr. Corrie
Is my hon. Friend aware that in the Isle of Arran there is a new wing at the hospital, with new equipment and a consultant surgeon and anaesthetist, yet it will be used for only emergency operations? With the facilities and the necessary skilled people there, should it not be used for general surgical purposes?

§ Mr. MacKay
My hon. Friend has already brought this matter to my attention. I hope that the Ayrshire and Arran health board will, when it considers this matter, take into account the fact that this new facility exists and that there is a surgeon and anaestheist to run it.

§ Dr. M. S. Miller
Reverting to the original question asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Midlothian (Mr. Eadie), may we be told why the information is not available? Is it because the Minister does not want to acknowledge that there are unemployed doctors and nurses in Scotland?

§ Mr. MacKay
The information is not available because since 1982 the unemployed count has been based on unemployment benefit office records and occupational details are not needed for benefit purposes. I do not propose to divert NHS resources from patient care to be able to quote statistics.

§ Mr. Michael Forsyth
Does my hon. Friend agree that the development of private sector medicine provides jobs for those about whom Labour Members claim to be concerned? Does he further agree that the crocodile tears being shed by them would be more credible if they did not have an ideological opposition to the development of the private sector?

§ Mr. MacKay
My hon. Friend is right. Nurses and doctors can and do find employment both in the NHS—obviously the majority of them — and in the private sector, and it is a fact that many of them work in that sector. The Government are in favour of that tandem arrangement, as opposed to the blinkered opposition to private health care by Opposition Members.

§ Mr. Ewing
If the Minister is saying that the figures asked for by my hon. Friend the Member for Midlothian (Mr. Eadie) are not available, how on earth was it that in The Scotsman on Saturday morning he was able to deny the figures that were made available by the National Union of Public Employees? Are we to assume that yet again the hon. Gentleman did not know what he was talking about? What effect will the cut of £20 million—which he also announced in The Scotsman on Saturday — have on further employment prospects for doctors and nurses in the NHS in Scotland?

§ Mr. MacKay
I am well aware of the number of people employed in the NHS. The figures that were bandied about related to those who might lose their jobs because of the adjustments that we have had to make in public spending. Those figures suggested that the NHS employed many more people than it should, and they were baseless. Once my right hon. Friend decides on the amount of money to be saved in the health budget, the health boards will have to consider how to make the necessary savings. I made it clear over the weekend that I expect them to make them in areas away from direct patient care.