HC Deb 19 June 1991 vol 193 cc276-7
2. Mr. Eadie

To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland what extra financial resources he has now decided to allocate Lothian health board for elective coronary surgery.

Mr. Michael Forsyth

Negotiations are continuing with Lothian health board, but I will be making an extra ³£3.8 million available for cardiac surgery in Scotland. I will be looking to health boards to achieve a considerable increase in operations as a consequence.

Mr. Eadie

Is the Minister aware that Lothian health board has informed me that the wait for cardiac surgery is one year? It also informed me that that cannot be amended unless new financial resources are allocated. Is the Minister further aware that we are discussing the question of a better quality of life—and tragically even death—for people in the Lothian health board area?

Mr. Forsyth

The first point is that patients who require emergency treatment are admitted immediately. It is true that the waiting list is too long, but the waiting list in Lothian has been reduced by 5 per cent. during the past year. We are making additional resources available and we are currently negotiating with Lothian about how much they should amount to in order to make further progress. Since 1983 we have doubled funding for cardiac surgery from ³10 million to just under ³20 million and the number of operations has increased from 1,700 to just over 3,000.

The hon. Gentleman is right to point to the problems, but, equally, we are trying to tackle them by making more resources available.

Mr. Darling

The Minister must be aware that it is no comfort to know that patients will be admitted in the event of an emergency. We need to stop patients being admitted as an emergency and deal with them at the proper time. Is he aware that recently there has been a spate of cancellations, not of operations, but of preliminary examinations and interviews? Does he realise that it is intolerable that people have to wait months to be seen by a consultant and then wait a considerable time to have the operation that they desperately need?

Mr. Forsyth

If the hon. Gentleman and his colleagues had not supported those who took strike action against competitive tendering, waiting lists would not be as long. Waiting lists are considerably shorter than when the Labour party was in government.

On the overall position, the hon. Gentleman is right to point to the need to reduce waiting times. We are agreeing with every health board target for waiting times, which we mean to see achieved during the course of the next Parliament and the next Conservative Government.