Ashford MP’s Reaction to Lord Darzi’s Report

Today (16th September 2024), Lord Darzi’s independent report on the state of the NHS entitled: the Independent Investigation of the National Health Service in England was published.  

Sojan Joseph, the Member of Parliament for Ashford (Labour), who spent 22 years working in the NHS as a mental health nurse for the Kent and Medway NHS Community Trust, is Ashford’s first ever Labour MP. He took the seat from 27-year incumbent Conservative Damien Green in the election in July earlier this year.  

Mr. Joseph believes that a greater emphasis on recruitment and retention will be key to fixing the NHS in the future, ensuring that more nurses and doctors are trained and bought into the NHS, but also kept and not lured away to the private sector or higher paid roles – a position reflected in the independent report, which describes the state of many community and mental health trusts as having a “needless recruitment and retention crises”. 

Mr. Joseph also recognises the need to tackle the long waiting lists, an issue highlighted in Lord Darzi’s report, to improve the standard of patient care in the Ashford constituency. In a recent visit to the William Harvey Hospital, Mr. Joseph saw 19 patients being treated in corridors – something he raised recently in the House of Commons to ask for a debate on overcrowding. Lord Darzi states in his report that “I have no doubt that significant progress will be possible, but it is unlikely that waiting lists can be cleared and other performance standards restored in one parliamentary term”. However, through significant reforms by the new Labour Government, which will work towards increasing hospital efficiency, Mr. Joseph believes we will make good steps towards reaching some targets. 

 Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, Wes Streeting, addressed the concerns over waiting times today and stated today that:
 

“Within our first couple of months, this Government employed 1,000 more GPs on the frontline who had been left unemployed by the previous Conservative Government. We did that pretty much immediately. We have settled—I hope; we await the outcome of the ballot—the junior doctors’ dispute, so we can remove the cost of disruption and industrial action and start work on getting the waiting lists down. We will be working at pace to deliver 40,000 more appointments every week so that we can cut waiting lists, and 700,000 urgent emergency dentistry appointments so that we can ensure that people get the care they need. Every single promise in our manifesto, notwithstanding the challenges in the public finances, was a fully costed, fully funded promise that we will keep and that the country can afford.” 

The findings in Lord Darzi’s report were outlined in nine key points (via The Mirror): 

1. NHS progress going backwards
2. ‘Lasting damage’ of austerity
3. A&E queues have more than doubled
4. Kids’ health is getting worse
5. No progress on cancer stage 1 and 2 diagnoses
6. Long term conditions up
7. UK behind on tech
8. UK performed worse in pandemic
9. Waiting time targets being missed across the board

Sojan Joseph Quotes: 

“I agree with the findings in Lord Darzi’s report. I experienced many of the same issues when I was working in the NHS, myself. I saw people taking their own lives because of long waiting lists for mental health services. I saw children as young as nine self-harming. The new Labour Government is determined to reform mental health services and cut waiting lists so people can receive the help they desperately need.” 

“We can see the extent of the damage caused by consecutive Tory governments inflicted on our local hospitals, such as the William Harvey in Ashford. Patients are being treated in corridors because of lack of primary care, increased pressure put on staff and severe damage to our A&E services. We cannot have a return to sticking-plaster fixes with our NHS. I agree with the Prime Minister and the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care that the NHS needs reform and that it is broken but not beaten.” 

Lord Darzi’s report concludes that “the NHS is in critical condition, but its vital signs are strong.”