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29 Apr 2003 : Column 342W—continued
Amey Plc
Mr. Blunt: To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many PFI contracts his Department or its agencies (a) have with and (b) are being tendered for by (i) Amey plc and (ii) consortia involving Amey plc; what the total value is of those contracts; what the average length is of the contracts or proposed contracts; and what assessment his Department has made of the financial position of Amey plc and the implications for his Department. [108328]
Mr. Hutton: Amey pic. does not have, nor is it bidding for, any major private finance initiative (PFI) hospital schemes with National Health Service trusts.
Information on bidders is not held centrally for PFI hospital schemes with a capital value below £20 million.
Cancer and Heart Disease (Hemsworth)
Jon Trickett: To ask the Secretary of State for Health what percentage of (a) cancer patients and (b) heart disease patients were successfully treated in (i) the Hemsworth constituency and (ii) England in the last 12 months. [109873]
Ms Blears [holding answer 28 April 2003]: There were 7,111 in-patient consultant episodes for cancer and 18,490 for heart disease in national health service trusts within the West Yorkshire strategic health authority area in 2001–02. These figures are not available at constituency level. The numbers of in-patient consultant episodes for England for cancer and heart disease for the same year were 140,912 and 383,062 respectively.
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It is not possible to calculate how many patients were treated successfully as there is no agreed definition of "successfully treated".
Commission for Health Improvement
Dr. Fox: To ask the Secretary of State for Health whether the Commission for Health Improvement is able to charge a fee to an NHS body in respect of its function to conduct a review or investigation of that body. [106643]
Mr. Hutton: The Commission for Health Improvement (CHI) does not charge a fee to a national health service body in respect of its function to conduct a review.
CHI also has a statutory function to conduct special investigations into particular areas of concern in the delivery of healthcare. CHI's costs of investigations are recovered by the Department of Health from the relevant strategic health authority (SHA). The SHA is free to recover the costs from the organisation concerned.
Correspondence
Andrew Mackinlay: To ask the Secretary of State for Health (1) when he will reply to the letter dated 2 January 2003 from Councillor Yash Gupta of Thurrock borough council about health and social care; [110061]
- (2) why he has not yet replied to (a) the letter of Councillor Yash Gupta of Thurrock borough council about health and social care dated 2 January 2003 and (b) his two reminder letters of 2 February and 8 March 2003. [110062]
Mr. Lammy: A reply was sent to Councillor Yash Gupta on 26 March 2003.
Dementia
Mr. Paul Marsden: To ask the Secretary of State for Health what percentage of pensioners were suffering from dementia in each year since 1997. [109676]
Jacqui Smith: This information is not routinely collected. From research, it is estimated that about five per cent. of people over 65 have dementia.
Dentists
Mr. Wray: To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many dentists worked within the NHS in each year since 1997; and what steps he has taken to ensure people have access to an NHS dentist. [109206]
Mr. Lammy: The number of dentists seeing national health service patients at 30 September in each of the years 1997 to 2001 is shown in the table.
| 1997 | 1998 | 1999 | 2000 | 2001 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Number of dentists | 20,506 | 21,066 | 21,587 | 21,931 | 22,506 |
The corresponding figure for September 2002 is not yet available.
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Among other initiatives, the following steps have been taken in recent years to improve access to NHS dentistry in England:
- £10 million was made available between 1997 and 1999 under the Investing in Dentistry scheme to allow dentists to increase their NHS commitment or start new practices in areas of poor access.
A Dental Care Development Fund of £4 million was made available in 2000–01, along with £6 million Dental Action Plan money in 2001–02, to allow practices to grow and treat more patients.
49 dental access centres have been established since 1998, treating unregistered patients in areas of poor access.
The Health and Social Care (Community Health and Standards) Bill, currently before Parliament, proposes that each primary care trust be given a duty to provide or secure primary dental services to the extent it considers reasonable to do so. This would mean that access issues could be addressed at the local level.
EU Directives
Mr. Bercow: To ask the Secretary of State for Health if he will list the EU Directives and Regulations which have been implemented by his Department since 17 April 2002. [106837]
Mr. Hutton: The Department of Health has led on the implementation of two Directives since 17 April 2002:
Directive 2001/37 European Parliament and the Council of 5 June 2001 on the approximation of laws, regulations and administrative provisions of the Member States concerning the manufacture, presentation and sale of tobacco products was transposed by the Tobacco Products (Manufacture, Presentation and Sale (Safety)) Regulations 2002 (SI 3041). These regulations were made and laid on 10 December 2002. The Regulations entered force on 31 December 2002.
Council Directive 90/385/EEC, Council Directive 93/42/EEC, Directive 98/79/EC of the European Parliament and the Council, Directive 2000/70/EC of the European Parliament of the Council, Directive 2001/104/EC of the European Parliament and the Council were transposed by the Medical Devices Regulations 2002 (SI 2002 No 618—came into force on 13 June 2002.
Hospital Inspections
Mr. Amess: To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many times, on average, NHS hospitals are inspected each year; and by whom. [106540]
Mr. Hutton: The only body which undertakes a full inspection of national health service hospitals is the Commission for Health Improvement, which undertakes a rolling programme of clinical governance reviews. On average, each trust might be inspected once every four years.
There are other Department of Health organisations which inspect differing aspects of the provision of hospital care at infrequent intervals, but these are not full inspections and generally focus on one particular aspect of healthcare provision. These include
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Community Health Councils, which can inspect NHS hospitals at any time and patient environment action teams, which visit NHS hospitals annually to assess standards of cleanliness.
Information Technology
Mr. Flight: To ask the Secretary of State for Health what his Department's (a) total managed expenditure, (b) total spending on Information Technology and (c) spending on Information Technology as a proportion of its total managed expenditure was in each financial year since 1997–98. [107176]
Mr. Hutton: The National Health Service does not separately identify spend on information technology, so exact figures are not available. Net NHS expenditure in England for 2002–03—estimated out-turn—is £54.4 billion. Estimated baseline spend for 2002–03 was collected which indicated some £850 million of expenditure for information technology was anticipated. The indicative amount of £850 million spent on information technology as a proportion of total NHS spend is 1.6 per cent.
National Insurance
Mr. Bercow: To ask the Secretary of State for Health what the cost will be to public funds in 2003–04 of the rise in national insurance contributions on the salary bill of his Department. [107906]
Mr. Lammy: I refer the hon. Member to the response given by my right hon. Friend, the then Chief Secretary to Her Majesty's Treasury, Andrew Smith, on 29 April 2002, Official Report, vol. 384, column. 542W.
NHS Charges
Mr. Wray: To ask the Secretary of State for Health whether charges are applied to NHS patients who are (a) referred to private hospitals and (b) treated in European countries; and if he will make a statement on the extent to which the NHS is dependent on foreign and private hospitals. [105950]
Mr. Hutton: Making use of spare capacity in the United Kingdom and in Europe can be an effective and appropriate way of increasing capacity available to treat national health service patients. NHS hospital treatment, wherever it is carried out, is provided free at the point of delivery.
NHS Operations
Chris Grayling: To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many operations were carried out in private hospitals at NHS expense, broken down by (a) hospital and (b) PCT area in the past year. [109195]
Mr. Hutton: The Department of Health does not hold information on operations carried out on National Health Service patients by private hospitals.
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