John Glen

It is a pleasure to contribute to the debate, Dr Huq. In every Budget that I have seen over the past 15 years, either as a Treasury Minister or as a constituency MP, more money—whether it is 1%, 2% or 3% more—has gone into the NHS, yet there is still a demand for even more money at the next fiscal event. In the south-west, there are 5.7 million people, 30% of whom live in rural areas. We will always have limited resources, so we have to be radical in organising them differently. I urge the Minister to look at not just how we deal with care based on the physical location of acute hospitals, but how we deliver more localised digital care and investment in relevant digital infrastructure. The chief executive of the Bath, Swindon and Wiltshire hospitals group tells me that a national approach to AI would be hugely welcome to unlock the delivery of radiology, pathology, clinical administration and risk stratification in a much more effective way. We have to level with our constituents that services cannot all be delivered at the local hospital if we are going to have the best service and the appropriate aggregation. I urge the Minister to address the issue of digital systems. How can we bring them to a different level and deal with demand management? Demand is outstripping supply, and we have to look at investment in public health. To that end, I urge her not to move most of the Porton Down campus to Harlow, which would save a considerable sum of money that we could use in the south-west.