Health Select Committee Reports on NHS deficits

Member of the House of Commons Health Select Committee, Mike Penning, comments on the findings of the committee.

Hemel MP, Mike Penning is a member of the House of Commons Health Select Committee which has just published its report into NHS Deficits. The report criticises a combination of the funding formula, poor central management and poor local management within the NHS.

Mike, who has long condemned the unfair funding formula, said:

“It is obvious that the funding formula is significantly weighted towards Labour-held constituencies. Tony Blair’s constituency got £1,210 per head last year. Health Secretary Patricia Hewitt’s constituency got £1,300. In Dacorum we only got £960 per head. That’s a difference of £340! We all pay the same into the NHS we should all get the same out of it! If it costs an average of £1,300 for the healthcare of a person living in Leicester why does the Government think it will only cost an average of £960 in Hemel Hemsptead?”

“It would take less than an extra £100 per head to solve West Herts Hospitals Trust’s deficit problems. Now Hemel people have lost their A&E and even local GPs are admitting that lives are being put at risk.”

The Committee went on to condemn the totally unrealistic estimates of the costs of introducing the ‘Agenda for Change’ and the new GP and consultant contracts. Also targets set for A&E have been expensive to implement. The government has been constantly making changes and moving the goalposts at short notice.

There is considerable variation in the quality of local NHS management and the Committee criticised auditors for not picking up on potential overspends sooner.

Commenting on the conclusions of the Committee, Mike said:

“In most cases this report just tells the Government what the rest of us already knew. Yet again the people of Hemel and the south of England are propping up mismanagement elsewhere in the country.

“The people of Dacorum, quite rightly, question how – when so much additional funding is given to the NHS – are we ending up with a significantly worse health service locally. It is outrageous that the local NHS has been reduced to such a sorry state. A combination of bad allocation of central funding and mismanagement at every level has left local people without the healthcare they deserve.”