HC Deb 16 July 1991 vol 195 cc211-2
8. Mr. Patrick Thompson

To ask the Secretary of State for Health what new initiatives have been taken by the national health service ambulance trusts; and how this will affect patient care.

Mr. Dorrell

All three ambulance service trusts have taken positive steps to ensure quicker response times, staff are fully trained and each ambulance is manned with a paramedic. These improvements enhance the quality of care to patients.

Mr. Thompson

Is my hon. Friend aware that the new, well-run Norfolk and Waveney national health service ambulance trust has recently speeded up its paramedic training and has initiated a 24-hour message handling service for general practitioners? Does not this show that trust status leads to good management and value for money, to the benefit of NHS patients throughout the area?

Mr. Dorrell

My hon. Friend is right. The fame of the NHS as an organisation that runs good ambulance services has spread beyond these shores. Yesterday, the Evening Standard reported that the Barcelona Olympics will benefit from NHS expertise in the operation of an ambulance service. Labour Members will benefit from hearing a quote from the director of NHS Overseas Enterprise Ltd., Mrs. Wark, who said: The NHS gets a lot of criticism within the UK, but it still has the highest reputation of any health service in the world. Most NHS patients would agree with that.

Mr. Clelland

Is the Minister aware that the only initiative taken by the Northumbria ambulance trust, apart from entering the car repair business, has been an increase in the salaries of the officers who first decided to apply for trust status? Does the Minister believe that these increases are in the interests of patients and if he does, will he say why the trust refuses to publish the figures?

Mr. Dorrell

When the hon. Gentleman asks a question, he should be better informed. Since the establishment of the NHS trust in Northumbria, four new accident and emergency vehicles have been introduced into the service, response times for the ambulance service have improved, standby services in Northumbria have been increased so that there is 24-hour manning on the A1 route to Scotland, there is now one paramedic per vehicle, and the Northumbria ambulance service has been approved by the British Standards Institution under the BS 5750 scheme.

Mr. Hayes

Is not it monstrous for Labour Front-Bench spokesmen to go grubbing round our hospitals and ambulance stations with their trade union friends, cynically manipulating the fears of the elderly and the frail for a few cheap votes? Will my hon. Friend ask the hon. Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook) to come clean and admit that trusts are not opting out of the health service and that it is against the law for them to make a profit?

Mr. Speaker

Order. That is a bit wide of ambulances.

Mr. Dorrell

I echo my hon. Friend's invitation to the hon. Member for Livingston (Mr. Cook). Perhaps I might also make a more modest suggestion, which is that he listens to the Devon branch of NUPE, which is anxious to ensure that the Devon ambulance service has the opportunity to become an NHS trust in the second wave.

Mr. Spearing

Is the Under-Secretary of State aware that the London ambulance service is applying for trust status, but at the same time has vehicles with inferior specifications, a reduction in the number of its officers by 50, a capping of the necessary overtime for emergency services and a move to divide patient transport services into 32 different organisations? Is he aware that the management is appointed entirely and directly by the Secretary of State, who, despite those deficiencies, has refused to see a deputation of London Members of Parliament? Is not this arrogant and undemocratic behaviour, which demands the condemnation of the House?

Mr. Dorrell

No. The hon. Gentleman has got it diametrically wrong. Mr. Wilby has offered on a number of occasions to meet hon. Members from both sides of the House—[HON. MEMBERS: "Who?"] Mr. Wilby is the man who has been charged with the management of the London ambulance service and he is accountable to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State. Some of my hon. Friends have met Mr. Wilby. Labour Members have consistently refused to do so. If the hon. Member for Newham, South (Mr. Spearing) was seriously interested in representing the intrests of his constituents, rather than those of NALGO, he would agree to meet Mr. Wilby to learn something about the affairs of the London ambulance service from its management.