Hunt warns of hospital crises unless social care is reformed
HOSPITALS WILL continue to suffer bed shortages during winter crises unless social care is reformed as a matter of urgency, the former Health Secretary has warned.
Jeremy Hunt, the former Health Secretary, rebuked his successor, Matt Hancock, during a Queen’s Speech debate on NHS reforms.
He was joined by Sheffield Central MP Paul Blomfield who accused the Government of delaying the “plan” promised by Boris Johnson on the day that he became Prime Minister in July 2019.
Mr Hunt, who chairs Parliament’s cross-party Health Select Committee and who has become an increasingly vocal critic of Ministers, ran the Department of Health from 2012 until 2018.
“I had four winter crises in a row because we tried to fix the problems of the NHS without trying to fix the problems of the social care system at the same time,” he told MPs.
“I know that money is a big issue – this is a very expensive thing – but if the NHS really is a priority for this Government, the social care system has to be as well.”
Meanwhile Mr Blomfield said that Britain – and all those who work in the care sector – could ill-afford more broken promises.
“I recognise that the Prime Minister has a loose relationship with the truth and a willingness to make commitments with no intention of honouring them,” said the Labour MP.
“But the Health Secretary has said that the Government will bring forward proposals this year, with the Prime Minister
now claiming that he wants cross-party working to develop a plan. I hope he means it, and that there will also be real engagement with those in receipt of care, those who work in care and the hundreds of thousands of unpaid carers.”
He also said the care system was being propped up by “an invisible army of young carers — extraordinary children and young adults with huge resilience and strength, facing all the demands imposed on adult carers with the added challenges of schooling and making the most of their young lives”.
Earlier Mr Hancock, in a debate on the Health and Care Bill, reiterated the Queen’s Speech commitment “to reform adult social care” in order “to give everyone who needs care the dignity and security they deserve”.