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Mr. Maude: On a point of order, Mr. Martin. Many of us have been present for the debate all evening and take the matter extremely seriously. The debate is about the right of children to receive the education that has been contracted for. Is it appropriate for the Government Benches to be filled with hon. Members who have been brought in from all parts of the building in various states of refreshment, who clearly have no interest in the debate? It should be placed on the record that they are spending their time giggling, chatting to each other and taking no interest--
The First Deputy Chairman: Who comes into the Chamber is not a matter for the Chair. However, I must appeal again for quietness when an hon. Member is addressing the Committee.
Mr. Forth: I am grateful to you, Mr. Martin, and I am truly grateful to my right hon. Friend the Member for Horsham (Mr. Maude). I am attempting to bring to the Committee the real case of a constituent of mine who contacted me this morning to tell me of her desperate anxieties about the Bill.
The First Deputy Chairman: Order. I want to hear about the amendments, not the Bill. [Hon. Members: "That is what he is doing."] Order. It is all right for hon. Members to say that that is what the right hon. Gentleman is doing, but I can hear the right hon. Gentleman, and he is talking about the Bill. I want to hear about the amendments.
Mr. Forth: That is absolutely correct, Mr. Martin. The amendments concern the ability of parents to be confident that their children can receive an education through to the age of 13 and beyond where that is appropriate. That is the context in which I believe that a genuine individual case is relevant.
But I confess that I also wanted to take this opportunity to pick up a point made by none other than the Minister himself when earlier he said that parents would rejoice at the Bill. This individual case is very poignant. The next paragraph of the letter relates directly to the amendments. It says:
To meet a point raised earlier, I am more than happy to put the letter on the record so that the Committee can consider it. As has been pointed out, for a party which often claims some monopoly of care and compassion, the Labour party is showing precious little sign of any of that in tonight's proceedings.
I have set the scene for that part of the case that I wanted to make and I shall now make the briefest reference to amendment No. 28. That amendment seeks to ensure, for avoidance of doubt, that
I have kept my remarks deliberately brief because I wish to allow my hon. Friends to develop the arguments. I hope, however, that I have given the Committee enough of a flavour of the thrust of our amendments and that the arguments will be developed further.
To report progress and ask leave to sit again.--[Mr. Nick Brown.]
Committee report progress; to sit again this day.
Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.--[Mr. Jamieson.]
Mr. Andrew Mackinlay (Thurrock):
The subject of my Adjournment debate is Orsett hospital, which is situated in the borough of Thurrock. I speak on behalf of my hon. Friend the Member for Basildon (Angela Smith), who has yet to make her maiden speech. [Interruption.]
Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael J. Martin):
Order. Adjournment debates are very important to Back-Bench Members, and we must give the hon. Gentleman a hearing.
Mr. Mackinlay:
I am grateful for your assistance, Mr. Deputy Speaker. The debate is important to me and to my constituents, who are aggrieved by the way that the Basildon and Thurrock General Hospitals NHS trust has behaved over Orsett hospital. As I was saying before the interruption, I speak on behalf of my hon. Friend the Member for Basildon. I wish to make it clear that the Basildon constituency that she represents is different from the Basildon constituency in the previous Parliament. Approximately one third of my hon. Friend's constituency is situated in the borough of Thurrock, and Orsett hospital is just within the boundaries of her constituency.
By way of background, I wish to point out that Basildon and Thurrock are two separate urban areas. The equivalent of mountains and rivers separates them and there is no relationship between them that facilitates having one district general hospital for both areas. Going back in history a little, I should point out that Basildon is a new town and had large resources applied to it in decades past. It was deemed that the town should have its own general hospital. Nobody foresaw that policies would change and that the way in which health care was delivered would shift so that one district general hospital would serve the two urban areas of Basildon and Thurrock.
Thurrock has had a district general hospital, and it was known as Orsett hospital. The site of the hospital has been occupied for 100 years by buildings connected with the poor law or used as a hospital. Orsett hospital is situated between the two urban areas and was built some 30 years ago. It is a relatively modern building which functioned as a full district general hospital with an accident and emergency department, and it provided acute care, including intensive care, cardiac beds and maternity services.
Just over 10 years ago, the health authority decided to close the maternity unit and centralise provision at Basildon hospital. Understandably, there was a strong local outcry, but the health authority gave assurances to, primarily, the people of Thurrock--but also the people of Basildon--that better provision would ensue. It also suggested that that was the last change that would be made.
Then, in 1990, the then health authority announced its decision to close the accident and emergency department at Orsett hospital and to centralise all the facilities at Basildon, which is not a central point for the two urban
areas. It said that acute surgery and intensive care, including cardiac care, would also go to Basildon. Again there was a massive outcry, met by assurances--which are not worth the paper that they are written on--from the health authority about the future.
We think that the shift of A and E services to Basildon--along with many other services--is perverse, given Thurrock's riparian, industrial, Lowryesque urban area, which runs some 14 miles along the river. There is a large amount of industry: the Lakeside shopping park--which 25 million people visit each year--and the various petrochemical industries. Thurrock is probably the biggest and fastest-growing residential area in the south-east.
People may ask why anyone should make such a perverse decision of centralising at Basildon, rather than centring services in Orsett. One reason is that the surgeons and consultants who largely influence and run the health service wanted the convenience of being closer to the private hospital--Nuffield hospital, at Brentwood. That has been one of the driving factors in the perverse location and centring of so many important services.
Mrs. Teresa Gorman (Billericay):
I am sure that it was due to an oversight that the hon. Gentleman forgot to mention that my constituency also uses the Orsett and Basildon complex. I share his concern that Orsett hospital should be kept, and kept in good order, for the use of his constituents and those of the hon. Member for Basildon (Angela Smith). Is it not true, however, that the last Government found an extra £18 million that has helped to provide Orsett with a new eye unit that is servicing the whole of Essex, that there is a brand new minor injuries unit and that many of the maternity wings that were once a feature of Orsett hospital have been rehoused in very nice new facilities, including the Thurrock community hospital? Are there not three good new institutes in my constituency, in the Wickford and Billericay area?
"like most parents we thought that by taking up such a place, our children's education would be honoured as long as they continued to perform to a level which justified this place, ie until they reached 18 years. It has been with an increasing sense of frustration and anxiety that we learn that our second child is to lose this place . . . The toll that this additional stress is taking on my husband's health is incalculable."
The letter goes on, but I shall not read it all to the Committee.
"Unless the Secretary of State is satisfied that the pupil in question will receive secondary education which is comparable to the primary education which he has received in regard to . . . its religious content; . . . the curriculum provided; . . . opportunities for sport; . . . size of classes; and . . . single-sex provision, he"--
the Secretary of State--
"shall determine that that pupil shall continue to hold that place during the period which he receives secondary education."
That amendment is crucial in one important respect, to which we shall return in later amendments because we want to develop the argument. It is simply that we must find a mechanism whereby even if the Bill ends the benefits of an assisted place to a young person, the alternative provision in the state sector, about which the Under-Secretary of State spoke so proudly earlier, will be fully as good, and guaranteed to be fully as good, to every child who may lose his or her provision under the assisted places scheme. That is what we are asking, and what we hope that the amendments will achieve. I am sure that my arguments will be developed by my hon. Friends when they speak. We wish to provide a mechanism that will give the guarantee that parents deserve that the alternative provision will be every bit as good.
1.16 am
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