Danny Beales

We certainly heard about some issues today that I did not expect to be on the agenda. The waxiness or not of dogs’ ears will certainly stay with me for a while. I am glad that the hon. Member for Winchester (Dr Chambers) clarified that he is a vet. I wondered whether checking dogs’ ears was a particularly Lib Dem thing to do to, so I am glad he clarified that he does it professionally rather than personally. We have had contributions from experts across the health sector and experts by experience of hearing loss, and I think we covered many of the key issues for audiology, such as workforce challenges and occupational hearing loss, as well as rural areas, regional variation and unacceptable delays. My hon. Friend the Member for Bury St Edmunds and Stowmarket (Peter Prinsley) made a powerful point about the importance of quality assurance of services. Yes, we want more community access, but it needs to be quality community access. I thank the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Hinckley and Bosworth (Dr Evans), and the Minister for their kind remarks. I thank the Minister for visiting what he called the fantastic development of neighbourhood health services in Hillingdon. We are fortunate in that, as well as the developing neighbourhood hubs, we have an ICB community-based audiology service. Hillingdon is very fortunate in having community audiology services, and I hope such services will be provided in all ICB areas. I welcome the Minister’s recognition of the importance of self-referral and the Government’s continued commitment to it. I also welcome his recognition of the need to deal with the issue of variation across the country. In his response, he mentioned the key opportunities in developing the workforce plan, which we expect in the spring, and this Government’s broader neighbourhood health agenda, and I hope that audiology will feature strongly in those developments. Thank you, Mr Vickers, for your time and the Clerk for their time. I wish everyone a merry Christmas and a happy new year. Question put and agreed to. Resolved, That this House has considered community audiology.