§ Mr. A. T. DAVIESasked the Minister of Health how many London and provincial hospitals are supported, or receive assistance from, public funds, and what are the respective amounts allocated; whether he is aware that over 200 beds are now closed in two hospitals in London alone for want of funds; that over 10,000 persons in London alone have been accepted by the hospitals for operations or treatment and cannot be admitted; whether the Ministry has the hospital system of London and the provinces under review; and what it is proposed to do, if anything, to relieve or improve the present state of affairs?
§ Mr. WHEATLEYThe Voluntary Hospitals Commission completed the distribution of the grant from public funds administered by them at the end of the last financial year. No hospitals are now receiving direct assistance from public funds, but many receive from local authorities contributions towards the cost of certain grant-aided services which are subsidised jointly from public and local funds. I am aware that two of the452W large London Hositals have closed beds, but more than half of the closed beds have at no time been available to the civil population and have never been occupied except by military patients during the War. I have no exact information as to the extent of the waiting lists, but this is one of the questions now being investigated by the Voluntary Hospitals Commission, who have been asked to report on the extent of the additional accommodation required in voluntary hospitals and the best means of providing and maintaining it.