HC Deb 24 November 1987 vol 123 cc125-7
4. Mr. Cryer

To ask the Secretary of State for Social Services if he will make a statement on the progress of community care programmes undertaken by district health authorities.

Mr. Newton

Considerable progress has been made in implementing Government policies on community care, although the rate obviously varies from place to place.

Mr. Cryer

Does the Minister accept that there is much evidence that mentally handicapped people are simply being dumped on the community and are being given highly inadequate facilities and inadequate care? Will he give me an assurance that he will look sympathetically at village community schemes developed, for example, for Westwood hospital in my constituency rather than see hospitals close? Patients have been dumped on the community and the sites have been sold for private speculative development.

Mr. Newton

I do not accept the generalisation at the outset of the hon. Gentleman's question, but I certainly accept that some schemes have been better planned than others. Certainly the hon. Gentleman's suggestion about village schemes could be considered.

Mr. Latham

Will my hon. Friend confirm that it is not, and cannot be, Government policy that elderly or handicapped folk should just be sent home, and that it is essential to ensure that the necessary supportive welfare is in place before any old hospitals are closed?

Mr. Newton

Not only could it not and should it not be Government policy, but it is not Government policy. It is Government policy to ensure proper preparation of the sort that my hon. Friend rightly advocates.

Mr. Wigley

Does the Minister accept that, for there to be a positive policy that facilities are available in the community, those facilities must include provisions such as domiciliary services for physiotherapy, speech therapy and so on? Does he accept that in practice that just does not happen in many areas, which means that the commitment to community care is a charade in those areas?

Mr. Newton

I agree that we would like to see a good deal more progress in various ways. The hon. Gentleman is well aware that we hope to make a further statement about primary care generally before too long. That statement will have some relevance to the points that he has raised.

Mr. Nicholas Winterton

Can my hon. Friend say when Sir Roy Griffiths is to report to the House on care in the community? Will he ensure that no psychiatric hospital or hospital for the mentally handicapped is closed before the report is published and the House has had a full opportunity to debate this critical issue?

Mr. Newton

We expect to receive Sir Roy's conclusions early in the new year. I do not think that I can give my hon. Friend the guarantee that he asked for in the latter part of his question. However, at our previous Question Time I gave him a guarantee that we would not agree to the closure of any hospital unless we were satisfied that proper alternative arrangements had been made.

Mr. Tom Clarke

Does the Minister accept that the assertions of my hon. Friend the Member for Bradford, South (Mr. Cryer) are supported by the Comptroller and Auditor General's report, in which Sir Gordon Downey commented most unfavourably on the Government's approach to community care and was particularly scathing about transitional funding arrangements? Does he accept that many hospitals are closing, not as a natural progression towards community care, but because they are in such a dreadful state of disrepair? Finally, whatever the hon. Gentleman says at the Dispatch Box today, does he agree that the Government's community care policies have been fatally and skilfully undermined by their approach to social security payments, which means that private homes are being subsidised to the hilt?

Mr. Newton

I do not accept either the last part of the hon. Gentleman's remarks or his suggestion that hospitals are being closed simply for reasons to do with buildings rather than patients. I readily accept that many areas of community care policy have been the subject of criticism. We accepted that those areas needed looking at, and that is precisely why we commissioned Sir Roy Griffith's work.

Mr. John Browne

Does my hon. Friend accept that sufferers of schizophrenia require not just community care on discharge, but a gradation of community care? Will he please take that into account before closing hospitals and institutions and when advising local district authorities on the sort of care that they must have in place?

Mr. Newton

The question of psychiatric patients is particularly complex, and undoubtedly a range of care in the community is needed. In my judgment, it is being planned or provided in many places.