Our recovery plan for urgent and emergency care provides £1 billion of additional funding for NHS capacity, alongside £250 million for capital improvement schemes up and down the country. Local integrated care boards are now responsible for working with their partners to decide how best to use that funding to improve services to meet the health needs of their changing populations, and all integrated care boards will shortly set out their plans for the next five years through a joint forward plan process.
Rugby is the largest urban area within Coventry and Warwickshire that does not have its own A&E provision. In the wider region, Kettering, Shrewsbury, Redditch and Burton upon Trent all have similar or smaller populations, each with their own A&E services. Rugby is growing fast, with 12,500 homes being delivered between 2016 and 2031, when the population will exceed 135,000. Will the Minister say at what population level it will be appropriate for local health commissioners to upgrade the A&E provision at the Hospital of St Cross in Rugby?
As my hon. Friend knows, the provision of services, including accident and emergency, are a matter for local NHS commissioners and providers. I know that he regularly meets local NHS leaders about this matter and will continue to do so. I am very happy to meet him and, of course, visit. Funding for Coventry and Warwickshire Integrated Care Board has increased to over £1.6 billion this year. My hon. Friend is a huge champion for his constituents; I would be happy to meet and visit.
The population of my constituency is due to grow rapidly over the next 10 years and beyond. On that basis, can the Minister give a completion date for the new Whipps Cross Hospital, which was announced last week?
We have recruited an extra 4,500 NHS children’s mental health specialists, which is a 40% increase on 2019. That is part of our additional £2.3 billion of investment into mental health services, compared to four years ago.
Notices of Decision for Care Homes: Change of Ownership
When a care home is taken over, the Care Quality Commission assesses and re-rates it under its new ownership. Previous notices of decision cannot legally be passed to a new provider, but they do inform the CQC’s approach to an assessment and how soon it takes place. During the time between the takeover and the CQC’s carrying out a new assessment, the legacy rating is shown on the CQC website.
Earlier this year, I was contacted by a mother who told me how her daughter, who has been both autistic and anorexic, has been receiving treatment since she was 13. Sadly, her condition has significantly deteriorated in that time, and it is her firm belief that closer integration of the different services she was accessing would have resulted in much better outcomes for her daughter. Will the Secretary of State consider a review of mental health services for children and young people, to look at how to better integrate services and ensure continuity of care?
I am sure the whole House is sorry to hear that her constituent’s condition has deteriorated. The hon. Lady raises a very important point about integration, which is exactly the right approach. The 2022 reforms were about integrating health and social care and empowering commissioners to take a more integrated place-based approach. I am sure her local commissioners will take note of the valid point that she raises.
A 14-year old climbing out of hospital windows; a child absconding to a local railway station; a teenager with complex needs brought to A&E, requiring four police officers to spend an entire shift watching them, only for them to abscond the next day. There is a pattern here. At almost every step of the way, children needing mental health services face a perfect storm of delay and treatment in inappropriate settings, fuelled by an under-resourced service with over-stretched staff. In light of the Met’s announcement that they will stop attending emergency mental health calls, is it not time for the Government to get their act together, or simply do the right thing and step aside?
One can see the way the Government are responding constructively to these issues by looking at the pilots we have been rolling out in Humberside, where police are released within one hour in 80% of section 136 detentions. We intend to roll out that pilot nationally.
The hon. Lady is right on the first part of her challenge, as demand for mental health services is increasing. In fact, there was a 41% increase in new referrals to mental health services in 2021 compared to the previous year. Where she is wrong is on the resourcing. She missed my previous answer that set out how we are committing an extra £2.3 billion of investment into mental health services, compared to four years ago.
My constituents Brenda, Gary and Trina lost their parents after they were placed in Melbourne House care home, which the CQC later deemed to be “inadequate”. However, because the notice of decision lapsed on its transfer to the original owner’s family, the home, now known as Earlsdon Lodge, is able to operate as if nothing had happened. Will the Minister meet my constituents and me to explain exactly why that was allowed to happen, and what is being done to prevent it from happening to other families?