§ Mr. Ashleyasked the Secretary of State for Social Services (1) how the addition of the specialist postgraduate hospitals to the responsibilities of district health authorities affected the application of the formula of the resource allocation working party to the districts concerned; what will be the position when the protected funding of the hospitals ends; and if he will ensure that there is continued recognition of the national role of these hospitals;
170WSurveys has, however, published detailed statistics on abortions and births combined, analysed by the age of the mother at conception, and these can be found in OPCS Monitor No. FM1 84/6 dated 17 July 1984, a copy of which is in the Library.
(2) whether any restrictions were placed on the spending of the protected funding of the postgraduate London hospitals now run by district health authorities; whether the protected funding is being fully spent by the hospitals for which it was intended; whether and for which hospitals there has been any borrowing by the district health authority; whether there are plans to maintain the future funding of these specialist hospitals; and if he will make a statement.
§ Mr. Kenneth Clarke[pursuant to his reply, 11 December 1984, c. 475.]: When the then Secretary of State, my right hon. Friend the Member for Wanstead and Woodford (Mr. Jenkin), announced the transfer of the management of four postgraduate hospital groups to district health authorities, he said that for a period of three years their funds would be separately identified in allocations to the regional and district health authorities concerned. The authorities are North-East Thames regional health authority and Bloomsbury health authority for the Royal National Orthopaedic hospitals, the Royal National Throat, Nose and Ear hospitals and the St. Peter's group of hospitals; South-East Thames regional health authority and West Lambeth health authority for St. John's hospital.
Funds have been separately identified by both the Department and the regions for the three years 1982–83, 1983–84, and 1984–85. In the case of St. John's, all the separately identified moneys have been allocated to the hospital.
In the case of the three hospital groups transferred to Bloomsbury, I understand that the district health authority has applied its policy of seeking efficiency savings to those hospitals. This has reduced their revenue by about £700,000 up to 1984–85, but these reductions in revenue 171W have to be considered against the major capital investment already under way for providing the Royal National Orthopaedic hospital with its own discrete accommodation in the Middlesex hospital, the proposed relocation of the St. Peter's group and the proposed development of the Gray's Inn road branch of the Royal National Throat, Nose and Ear hospital.
The special arrangements end, as envisaged, on 31 March. Thereafter normal allocation procedures apply and it will be for the responsible authorities to decide on levels of funding taking account of service needs, resources and maintenance of the hospitals' national postgraduate role. I do not envisage any further form of central protection, but the authorities are free to apply to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for supra-regional funding for any part of the hospitals' services if they believe those services meet the criteria for such funding. If the authorities consider that the normal allocation procedures, including those for supra-regional service funding, do not match any special needs of these hospitals, then we will be happy to consider any representations. The overriding aim is to ensure the proper, orderly, integration of the services and management of these postgraduate hospitals into their health authorities in a way that provides maximum benefit to patients and preserves their national role in service, teaching and research. I have every reason to believe that all parties involved will continue to work together to achieve these objectives.