Winchester & Chandler's Ford MP Steve Brine took part in an Opposition Day debate on the NHS on Wednesday 17th November.
Speaking the day before wife Susie was due to give birth to their second child at Winchester’s Royal Hampshire County Hospital, he began his address by telling the House that he was about to see rather a lot of the NHS in the coming days!
He continued by pointing out that Winchester’s very own Royal Hampshire County Hospital is the sort of institution that is the ‘cornerstone’ of the National Health Service, a classic district general hospital with a full service, and maternity and A&E at its heart.He said: “Of course, the hospital would like to do more, but it sits at the heart of the community in Winchester and the surrounding areas because it is continually strengthened by the fact that the people who work there—the nurses, the midwives, the consultants and the cleaners—live in and around the city of Winchester.”
He went on to agree with the Government’s view to liberate the NHS, recognising that while the local trust will undergo many changes, he was not ‘hung-up on the name at the top of the wage slip’, and was merely concerned for the services the NHS in Winchester offered the people he represents.
Backing David Cameron’s decision to put the NHS at the heart of his programme for government, he added: “My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister ...must have been watching closely because I did the same in Winchester. I am especially proud to be elected as a new member of the new Government, who made the political choice—it is a choice; we did not have to do it—to protect health spending in the recently announced spending round.”
More information...
The debate can be watched in full via www.parliamentlive.tv/Main/Player.aspx?meetingId=6914 skipping to 1 hour 43 minutes.
You can see a Hansard transcript of the debate via www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm/cmtoday/cmdebate/04.htm