HC Deb 10 July 1984 vol 63 cc863-4
4. Sir David Price

asked the Secretary of State for Social Services what progress in standards of health care has been made in the Wessex health region over the last 25 years.

Mr. Fowler

The Wessex region was set up 25 years ago to provide a better focus for the development of health services in an area of growing population. It has achieved considerable success. The development of a completely new teaching hospital and medical school in Southampton has been complemented by new district general hospitals now open in Poole, Swindon, Basingstoke and Portsmouth. We are continuing this programme of investment with new schemes in Dorchester, Bournemouth, Southampton and Winchester. The people of the region are also receiving better services, with inpatient, outpatient and casualty attendances up by about 20 per cent. in the past decade and with hospital day cases almost doubled.

Sir David Price

Is my right hon. Friend aware that, despite the excellent record of improving health care in the Wessex region, the region remains consistently underfunded not just in absolute terms, but in terms of the Government's RAWP formula? May we have an undertaking that we shall be at least on target within the next five years?

Mr. Fowler

My hon. Friend can have the undertaking that we are working to the RAWP formula and are endeavouring to make it better and to set off inequalities between different areas. My hon. Friend will have seen what the chairman of the regional health authority said about Wessex. He said that the National Health Service in Wessex was working harder and more efficiently than ever before in that region.

Mr. Carter-Jones

I congratulate Wessex on its progress, but will the Secretary of State pay the same attention to Salford?

Mr. Fowler

Yes, Sir.

Mr. Key

Does my right hon. Friend accept that the remarkable progress made by the Wessex authority is highly regarded by all people, and that the spinal units at Salisbury and Odstock have been much appreciated? Will my right hon. Friend not forget that the Health Service is dependent upon the voluntary sector, which will provide many of the services for the way forward in the future and which we must encourage at every turn?

Mr. Skinner

Get on your horse.

Mr. Speaker

Order.

Mr. Fowler

If I may just intervene for a moment, I agree with what my hon. Friend has said. I underline the importance of the voluntary sector. One of the most impressive improvements in the Wessex region, as elsewhere in the country, has been the increase in capital spending. Capital spending between 1978–79 and 1984–85 has increased by 66.7 per cent. in real terms. That follows the previous Labour Government's period of cuts.

Mr. Dobson

Is the Secretary of State not being a trifle complacent, when hospital waiting lists which stood at 32,000 in 1976 in the Wessex region now stand at nearly 47,000? Is he not also being complacent when no fewer than three quarters of the 4,300 people on the urgent waiting list in Wessex have been waiting for urgent operations for more than a month?

Mr. Fowler

I notice that the hon. Gentleman chooses the 1976 rather than the 1979 waiting list figure. If he feels so strongly about people on the waiting list, as I do, it is a pity that, when it comes to industrial action, he does not do more to condemn it.

Mr. Colvin

Is my right hon. Friend aware that over75-year-olds take up to 10 times the health care resources required by 20-year-olds? Will he bear that in mind—

Mr. Speaker

Order. Is this question related to the Wessex health authority?

Mr. Colvin

Yes, Mr. Speaker.

Will my right hon. Friend bear that in mind when deciding his resource allocations, because Wessex region has one of the fastest growing proportions of the elderly population in the country? It has been traditionally underfunded because of that accelerated growth. Will he take that into account when deciding his resource allocation?

Mr. Fowler

I shall do that. We shall be going to a new system of looking at the projections for the increase in the elderly population, which I believe will help Wessex considerably.