Dr Rosena Allin-Khan
MP for Tooting · Labour · United Kingdom
“I hope my hon. Friend’s mum is making a swift and healthy recovery, and I am sorry to hear that that was her family’s experience. I agree that prioritising care for the frailer, elder population can often be dealt with more effectively before someone comes to hospital.”
“My hon. Friend and I are not performing a double act today, but he leads me on perfectly to the next part of my speech, as I go on to say that “corridor care” is something of a misnomer.”
“We cannot have a debate like this without recognising the terrible inequalities that scar our healthcare service—we have to work to reduce the disproportionate burden of long waits on deprived communities, older patients and people with mental health needs.”
“The hon. Member is right, but I know that the Government care deeply about this. This is not something on which I am in tension with the Government in any way.”
“By healthcare staff I do not just mean doctors such as myself, but nurses, porters, healthcare assistants and cleaners—we are one big family in the NHS, and no one job is more important than any other. We are unable to do any of our roles without all the others, and for that we are truly grateful.”
“As I have just outlined, this unacceptable and dangerous situation is shared not just by patients, but by their families and NHS staff, who are trying to do their best in a difficult situation.”
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“I beg to move, That this House has considered NHS corridor care. I express my sincere thanks to the Backbench Business Committee for granting time to the important subject of corridor care, and I declare my interest as a proud serving NHS emergency doctor working in A&E at St George’s hospital in my Tooting constituency. In my 21 years as a doctor—I know; I can hear the audible gasp because I do not look old enough—I have never felt more proud to serve with a group of individuals such as those at St George’s hospital. The leadership team, to which we welcome a new CEO in Mat Shaw, and the team of nurses, doctors, reception staff, porters and healthcare assistants in my emergency department, make me proud to go and do every single shift that I do there, and it feels like a pleasure, not a chore.”
“Trusts are applying these standards differently, and some feel the need, sadly, to game the system to artificially lower their corridor care statistics.”
“It is not just corridors, because patients across the NHS have been seen in antenatal rooms, store cupboards, waiting rooms and even car parks, filling every conceivable inch of a hospital. Members can imagine that people are coming in feeling particularly vulnerable, and they are happy to get the care wherever they can get it. I have never heard of any of my colleagues across the country say that they have had a patient who refused to be seen in a cupboard; they are just grateful to be seen. Even the official definition of so-called corridor care is problematic. NHS data relies on local clinical judgment about whether an environment is safe and whether patients’ privacy and dignity are being maintained.”
“My hon. Friend and I are not performing a double act today, but he leads me on perfectly to the next part of my speech, as I go on to say that “corridor care” is something of a misnomer. Treatment in a corridor, far away from oxygen, proper equipment and emergency cords to pull, without privacy or dignity, without access to decent and appropriate toilet facilities, and without the highest standard of infection prevention and control, cannot be classified as care in any realistic sense. It is important to say that the staff go above and beyond with what they have. It is not the case that patients are suffering in pain because the staff do not care or do not provide a first-class service; it is because, quite simply, a corridor or any other space not built to serve and care for patients in is not the right place for a patient to be.”
“My hon. Friend is absolutely right, and I am so sorry to hear of the situation in her community in Scotland. It is regrettable, and patients and their families deserve better. Absolutely, if we cannot accurately assess the issue in full, it is impossible to deal with, and I hope the Minister will talk today about how she will commit to revising this definition to make it more robust.”
“Friends in the Chamber, that when someone comes to A&E, it is often the worst day of their life. It could be the worst day of their life because of their experience as a patient, or it could be the worst day of their life because someone they love—their child, their partner, their mother or their father—is dying or has died. When we think about the dignity and care that we give, we have to look at it holistically—not simply as a set of symptoms that we are treating but as a family and the experience that they take away with them of what has happened on that day. People are in tears, people are in pain, and we owe it to them to get this right.”
“The hon. Member is right, but I know that the Government care deeply about this. This is not something on which I am in tension with the Government in any way. I have spoken to the Ministers and the Secretary of State, and I know that they are committed to acting and ensuring that every single patient across our country gets the best possible care. Let us be really clear: the NHS should not be a political football. Safe and dignified healthcare should not be a political football. I hope that we are all in agreement on this issue today. I would have hoped to see more Members on the Opposition Benches today, and I hope that their absence is not a reflection of how much they care about the issue, because, quite frankly, we owe it to all our communities to get this right. I know from my own experience, as will other hon.”
“Frankly, that is impossible in a corridor, even with the greatest will in the world. In my A&E at St George’s hospital we have patients in corridors, as we do across the country, but we have nurses who are there and dedicated to check their observations, ask if they need pain relief, and try to deliver—and they do—the best possible gold-standard care. But there is no privacy in a corridor, or in a cupboard, or anywhere where there should be, and that simply is not right. In emergency departments across the country, regardless of data that some trusts try to put forward to show that it is in only a certain number of places, we know from our inboxes that corridor care is everywhere.”
“That is absolutely right—the hon. Member makes a valid point. People can be enduring a heart attack; they can be losing a baby; they can have had a road traffic accident and be lying on a trolley, blocked and collared, or lying on a board and looking up at the ceiling, wondering when they might make it into the scanner. People will definitely be having a time in hospital that will be etched on their memory, and sadly for many patients, and many loved ones, that is the last day they will ever see—the A&E will be the last place they know. In the NHS we want that experience to be as comfortable and reassuring as possible. We want the best possible care, delivered in the fastest possible time, to patients who are treated fairly, efficiently, and with compassion and dignity.”
“By healthcare staff I do not just mean doctors such as myself, but nurses, porters, healthcare assistants and cleaners—we are one big family in the NHS, and no one job is more important than any other. We are unable to do any of our roles without all the others, and for that we are truly grateful. Knowing that they might be caring for a patient in their mid-80s, who is trying to hold back tears because they do not want to upset anybody very publicly in a corridor, is absolutely heartbreaking and takes a toll on their mental health. Our nurses, doctors and all the staff I have mentioned are going home absolutely burnt out—this is not what they trained and studied for, and not what they go to work to deliver. They go to work to deliver the best possible gold-standard care for the community that they care about.”
“I hope my hon. Friend’s mum is making a swift and healthy recovery, and I am sorry to hear that that was her family’s experience. I agree that prioritising care for the frailer, elder population can often be dealt with more effectively before someone comes to hospital. I also know that my hospital of St George’s in Tooting has a special dedicated frailty unit that goes a long way in speeding things up for people. Good pilots are going on across the country, where care can be taken to our elderly community before people come in. Tackling social care is something I am coming to in my speech, because we could not have a speech on corridor care without a huge nod—or an entire body bend—to social care and the need to fix it. While this situation is extremely hard for patients and their families, the toll it takes on healthcare staff is huge.”
“People are spending hours in pain and distress, desperate for privacy, and exhausted staff are working while feeling that they have one arm tied behind their back.”
“I remember meeting my hon. Friend before he became an MP when I visited a hospital in his community, and I know that he has been a powerful advocate from long before he came to this place. I thank him for that and for raising this issue. We often think about winter pressures and forget that different communities experience different pressures—it is not a one-size-fits-all situation. It is important to look at the tourist season in Cornwall, and I am hopeful that the Government take that into account in their planning. Madam Deputy Speaker, you will be appalled, as we all are, to know that there are places up and down the country where bodies are being wheeled to the mortuary past living patients in corridors.”
“Most significantly, we need leadership that is willing to address the crisis with the urgency it deserves, so that people get the highest quality of care.”
“Without a hospital back door that works efficiently, we simply cannot get people through the front door to treat them effectively and move them on appropriately. The social care sector must be empowered because that will prevent hospital admissions in the first place and support timely discharges. All sorts of unappealing names are given to people who have to spend a long time in hospital waiting for appropriate social care. Our vulnerable elderly, our grandmas and grandpas, are called bed blockers because they cannot get the social care that they need to safely be in their own homes. This requires a complete change in thinking and approach, one that understands the inherent link between the NHS and social care.”
“My hon. Friend is a powerful advocate for the people of Scotland. Yes, of course those statistics should be published, because in order to have any understanding of the issue, we have to have the data. Quite frankly, without the data, it is “not happening”. We should keep pushing for that and I hope that he puts the clip of him asking this question on social media to spark a little fire under some boffins to make that happen. The reality is that corridor care is happening in every corner of the country. The drivers of the issue of corridor care are multifaceted, but one key cause that we cannot escape is our failing social care system that forces medically fit patients to sit and wait in hospital beds, seemingly endlessly.”
“We need to create more partnerships between our emergency departments and mental health trusts, where mental health patients can be triaged and seen by a mental health team in a more dignified and appropriate manner. St George’s hospital, where all hon. Members will know by now that I work my A&E shifts, is exploring a partnership with South West London and St George’s Mental Health NHS Trust, which would set up an assessment unit to triage mental health patients outside the emergency department. That would be safer, more appropriate and more dignified, and a calmer and more pleasant environment in which those patients could be assessed by mental health professionals.”
“Very often, they are shouting very loudly, and other patients will be concerned, not understanding that they have a mental health issue. As doctors and nurses, we are not allowed to talk about somebody else in the hospital, so we can have a very loud A&E department, with someone who is very vulnerable—screaming and shouting and really suffering—being completely in the wrong place for so long and with everyone confused about why they are there. That is not appropriate, safe or dignified for mental health patients. We are as far away as ever from parity between mental and physical health in the NHS. As I have just outlined, we witness that daily in emergency departments across the country.”
“Simply put, we cannot dither or delay; we need answers to the social care crisis, and we need them quickly. Another group of people who are very often overlooked are mental health patients. They continue to spend extraordinary amounts of time waiting in A&E. People experiencing a mental health crisis are two-and-a-half times more likely to face long delays in A&E. Just for a moment, let me paint a picture of what that looks like. The patient could be somebody with auditory or visual hallucinations who feels extremely scared and vulnerable. They may need security to ensure that they do not leave their room. They may be wondering what they have done to deserve this. They may not have staff there who know about their usual medication.”
“I am heartbroken to hear about the hon. Member’s relative. This is the point: anyone who works in a hospital understands that, just by being in an emergency department waiting room and accessing people who are unwell, it is possible to catch other illnesses. One thing we try to do is prevent unnecessary admission, because we know that a vulnerable elderly person who comes to hospital and is admitted to a ward with people who are unwell is more at risk of catching illnesses. As in the case of the relative of the hon. Member for Yeovil (Adam Dance), people can be vulnerable and not in an appropriate bed. There may not be enough staff able to check on them appropriately. Without tackling social care, we will never get on top of that issue. I am truly sorry to hear about the hon. Member’s relative.”
“It results in violence against our own NHS heroes—the very best of humanity—who, in a fractured and dangerous world, exemplify compassion, decency and selfless care for strangers. I can tell the House beyond a shadow of a doubt that staff in emergency settings are upset, traumatised and driven to tears of rage, and we know that NHS staff have to take a disproportionately large number of days off for the sake of their mental health.”
“As I have just outlined, this unacceptable and dangerous situation is shared not just by patients, but by their families and NHS staff, who are trying to do their best in a difficult situation. Moving on to the professional bodies, corridor care has rightly been condemned by the Royal College of Nursing, the Royal College of Emergency Medicine—my royal college—the British Medical Association, and other professional bodies and trade unions. Some 65% of respondents to the Royal College of Emergency Medicine’s violence and aggression survey, which is due to be published later this year, said that care in inappropriate and non-clinical spaces contributes to the increase in violence and aggression towards staff and other patients. The impact of corridor care is clearly much more wide-reaching than we realise.”
“I think my hon. Friend has been on most of my last A&E shifts with me. [Laughter.] That is absolutely a common occurrence, and that is not the best, safest or most efficient place for any of our incredible teams of police officers and mental health nurses, who are trying to get on with their job. It is incredibly distressing. In parts of hospitals, colleagues tell me that they are waiting in relatives’ rooms with police officers and mentally unwell patients next to the resus area of an A&E department with bereaved families. None of that should be happening for anyone involved. I am sure the Minister will agree that the best solution to this crisis will involve a holistic, multi-agency approach involving councils, social care providers and NHS trusts.”
“I thank the hon. Member for his intervention. Although it digresses from the debate about corridor care, I will happily answer his question. I think everybody in the NHS must be able to go to work free of intimidation, bullying and harassment. Wherever that happens, people should feel free to speak out—not to their direct line manager, because very often they are involved, but to a safe third party within the hospital, clinic or public setting where it happens, so that they will not be concerned about finding themselves moved or no longer in the job they love. I thank the hon. Member for raising that point; I have gone off topic, but it is an important point to acknowledge.”
“The fact that we in the UK have people dying because they have been treated in a corridor is simply unacceptable to me and other Members of this House, so let us commit today to ending it once and for all, and ending corridor care forever.”
“We cannot have a debate like this without recognising the terrible inequalities that scar our healthcare service—we have to work to reduce the disproportionate burden of long waits on deprived communities, older patients and people with mental health needs. Those measures would make a real difference to hospital systems, patient experience, and the overall effectiveness of the NHS. The founding principles of the NHS are stretched to breaking point every time someone waits for 10 hours, in terrible pain and sometimes in their own urine, under the harsh strip lights of a corridor, unable to feel that they can ask for help. It is completely undignified. The Minister will be very familiar with the stats we have sent to the Department, which show the disproportionate number of deaths in our country that are due to corridor care.”
“Thank you very much for raising that, Madam Deputy Speaker—I am nothing if not a talker. I am sorry that I am taking such a long time, and I will move forward quickly with my speech. The Royal College of Emergency Care and I, as the chair of the all-party parliamentary group on emergency care, have put together a number of recommendations. First, restore patient flow by reducing delayed discharges; secondly, focus equally on four-hour and 12-hour performance; thirdly, reform funding and incentives; fourthly, spread responsibility for patient flow across the hospital; and lastly, address inequalities in access and outcomes.”
“If we know there are things we could be doing—money we could be spending, a social care system we could be fixing to ensure people have extra precious time with their loved ones and that people have dignity on what is, on many occasions, the last day of their lives—we must spend every ounce of energy in the Department of Health and Social Care to fix this problem. I thank everyone who has taken part in this debate and I thank the Minister. Let us end corridor care for good. Question put and agreed to. Resolved, That this House has considered NHS corridor care.”
“I am really pleased to hear the commitments from the Minister, especially as we know that, according to the Royal College of Emergency Medicine, 1,300 excess deaths occur every month due to long A&E waits. That is the equivalent of a plane crash of people dying every single week. We cannot allow that to happen. I appreciate everything the Minister said, but my closing request is this. Can we please do everything we can to heed the remarks of everyone across the House today and speed up whatever we can to ensure there is not a single excess death attributed to something that could be avoided? For every person who dies when it could have been prevented, we have a family in grief and a life taken too soon.”
“As I stand here now to give my closing remarks, I am filled with a sense of pride. There are very few occasions when we all come together across the House in unison on an issue. Today is an example of where Members from every party and those who sit as independents have come together to say: enough is enough, we all stand united against the scourge that is corridor care. It would not be fair of me to single out individual contributions, because they were all worthy of accolades. Members have shared their own deeply personal experiences or those of their families. They have highlighted how important it is that we understand the geographical implications of how this is a challenge that does not require a one-size-fits-all approach.”
“T4. Mr Speaker, you will be alarmed to know that one in seven NHS staff in England experienced a physical attack while on shift last year. Our paramedics, doctors, nurses, police officers and firefighters go to work every day to save lives, yet they face unimaginable abuse. We have to clamp down on those who perpetrate these vile attacks. Will the Secretary of State commit to reviewing sentencing guidelines for such heinous crimes?”
“I will call Liz Jarvis to move the motion, and I will then call the Minister to respond. I remind other Members that they may make a speech only with prior permission from the Member in charge of the debate and the Minister. As is the convention for 30-minute debates, there will not be an opportunity for the Member in charge to wind up.”
“The brutal suffering of Palestinians on the west bank remains unchallenged, and the Norwegian Refugee Council has now exposed that depraved sexual violence by Israeli soldiers and settlers is rampant against Palestinian women and girls. That is abhorrent. Will the Foreign Secretary tell us what she is doing to take a firm stand against this cruelty, and will she commit to holding Israel to account for its heinous crimes against innocent Palestinians?”
“Order. Because so many Members wish to speak, you are likely to have two minutes each. If anyone intervenes, that limit will reduce or some of you will not be called, I am afraid.”
“The pain that Denis’s family went through—the horrors of that night, replicated another 71 times—must absolutely never be forgotten. We cannot stop until, quite frankly, those responsible are jailed for their actions. We owe it to the families and to everyone who lost their lives that fateful night. Grenfell must remain a turning point for this country. A permanent memorial will stand as a reminder of the lives lost, but it must also stand as a reminder to learn the lessons of Grenfell and as a reminder of the demands for justice. The 72 people who lost their lives that night and their families deserve nothing less.”
“I remember speaking to his son and sister in the days after—the unimaginable pain they went through, listening to Denis on the phone as the fire spread. Denis was categorically true to himself, trying to calm his neighbours and children, even though he knew his final moments were imminent. I still remember afterwards how many parts of the system worked so well to support Denis’s family, but I also remember how the system added to their pain. The Department for Work and Pensions demanded benefit repayments from the family, and so quickly afterwards; they had not even held the funeral. Finally, I remember Denis’s funeral, packed to the rafters: an entire community grieving, but giving a great man an emotional yet beautiful send-off.”
“Justice delayed is painful, but justice denied would be absolutely unforgivable. The Bill before us today is simply about remembrance, dignity and respect. Grenfell Tower should serve as a place where those who are lost are never, ever forgotten, but it is essential that the memorial reflects the wishes of those most affected: those who have lost loved ones, those who survived the fire, and the community who live in its shadow. They must be at the very heart of the decisions on the future of Grenfell. If I may, I would like to take this opportunity to pay tribute to Denis Murphy, who lived on the 14th floor of Grenfell Tower and who has family in my constituency of Tooting. Denis was one of the 72 lives lost that evening in 2017.”
“The area surrounding the tower is home to some of the most expensive homes in Britain, yet Grenfell Tower was neglected. Its residents were marginalised, ignored and treated as an afterthought. We cannot and must never allow those disparities to be ignored, because they sowed the seeds of this disaster. The lessons of Grenfell must not simply be documented in reports and recommendations, only to be forgotten; they must be acted on. The words we utter today, the thoughts and feelings and the value of everything we have learned, and the people who we have held in our communities through all this over the past nine years, cannot be in vain. The families of the deceased have waited for too long as accountability has been kicked down the road. Those responsible for the decisions and failures must be held to account—they must.”
“Anyone who has lived through grief knows that sometimes putting one foot in front of the other on the best of days is hard enough, let alone campaigning for justice to prevent this ever happening to anyone again. That fight is not over yet, but I want each of the family members to know that their work so far to ensure that this can never be allowed to happen again has unequivocally saved lives. The Grenfell Tower inquiry laid bare the scale of systemic failures that led to the fire. Warnings were disregarded and residents’ concerns about fire safety fell on deaf ears. It is really important to underscore that the structural inequalities in Grenfell are stark. Of the residents who died in the fire, 85% were from ethnic minority backgrounds—85%.”
“Almost nine years later, the hurt and pain of that night remains raw. As my hon. Friends have said, the rest of the world has continued turning, but for many people they are merely existing, not living, due to the loss they experienced that night. What happened that evening in Grenfell was not simply a tragedy. It was a catastrophe that was, sadly, entirely avoidable, with lives taken too soon due to foreseen circumstances, failures of regulation, failures of safety and failures of responsibility. To the families and survivors watching this debate, either here in the House or on television, I want to say clearly that we all stand with you. In the years since the fire, through their pain and their grief, they have fought for changes in the law, campaigned for accountability and demanded action.”
“I associate myself with all the comments made by my hon. Friends the Members for Kensington and Bayswater (Joe Powell) and for Hammersmith and Chiswick (Andy Slaughter). It is an honour to follow them. This is not an issue on which there will be any contention at all between me and the Secretary of State, who I know cares deeply about this matter and who, like all of us in the House today, wants to see a swift and just resolution. Today, we debate a Bill that touches on one of the deepest wounds in our national conscience. The fire at Grenfell Tower in June 2017 which claimed 72 lives was nothing short of tragic. They were men, women and children who today should still be with their families—those empty spaces at tables, memories that will never be made and lives that were taken too soon.”
“Q7. The suitability and financing of temporary accommodation needs addressing urgently. Children arriving on my shifts in A&E with breathing problems due to mouldy rooms in their temporary accommodation has become a grim reality. Since 2019, 74 homeless children have died due to the conditions of their temporary accommodation. Meanwhile, councils face a huge funding black hole of £4 billion if the Government subsidy remains frozen. Every death is a tragedy, so does the Prime Minister agree that an urgent review is necessary to investigate the financial shortfall and to help guarantee safe homes for every child in the country who is in temporary accommodation?”
“Order. This is an incredibly important topic. I remind Members that they should bob if they wish to be called to speak. Because so many Members want to get in, I would be grateful if you can try to stick to approximately four minutes each, to allow everyone to get a say.”
“I remind Members that it is discourteous not to attend for the opening speeches and then to make interventions. As a result, those Members who have been here from the start and will be here until the end will now have a shorter time limit imposed on them. Because of the number of Members who have indicated that they wish to speak, with the authority of the Chairman of Ways and Means, I am imposing a time limit on Back-Bench speeches of three and a half minutes.”
“Order. I know that people are keen to hear from the Minister, so I will bring the speaking time down to three minutes. If there are any interventions, I will have to bring it down even further.”
“I will call Adam Dance to move the motion and then the Minister to respond. I remind other Members that they may make a speech only with prior permission from the Member in charge of the debate and the Minister. As is the convention for 30-minute debates, there will not be an opportunity for the Member in charge to wind up.”
“I remind Members that they should bob if they wish to be called in the debate. Timings-wise, we will stick to approximately five minutes per person at the moment, which should make possible one or two interventions as well.”
“The passion is very welcome, but in the spirit of trying to be fair and make sure everybody gets at least five minutes, we are now on a strict time limit, with no more than five minutes for the final two speakers. I call Josh Newbury.”
“Working my shifts in A&E over Christmas and the new year, like many colleagues up and down the country I experienced what has become the undignified norm of corridor care. I welcome the Secretary of State’s commitment to ending it. The all-party parliamentary group on emergency care, which I chair, working closely with the Royal College of Emergency Medicine, is keen that the Government adopt our recommendations on ending corridor care. The Secretary of State previously agreed to meet us. Will he today reaffirm his commitment to meet us to end this scourge in our A&Es?”
“I know this is a matter about which the Secretary of State cares deeply, so will he meet us to discuss the report’s recommendations to provide safe and more dignified care for patients and staff?”