Press briefing from the Prime Minister’s Official Spokesman on: House of Lords Reform, Gun Crime Summit, Road Pricing, Security Services Report and Health
House of Lords Reform
Asked what had prompted the Leader of the House to change his mind, the Prime Minister’s Official Spokesman (PMOS) replied that this was a matter for the Leader of the House to brief on. We had made clear from the start that this was a matter for the House and for Parliament.
Put to him that this created a serious risk that there would not be any reform at all, and did No10 not have a view on this, the PMOS replied that this was entirely a matter for the House and he would not speculate on the outcome of a free vote. What he would say was that the Prime Minister strongly supported the Leader of the House’s efforts to try and find a consensus on the way forward. The Prime Minister believed that the Leader of the House had done a very good job in a situation where people, including members of the Cabinet, did have different views.
Gun Crime Summit
Put to him that he had mentioned this morning that a gun crime summit would take place in the next few weeks, but John Reid had since confirmed that it would take place on Thursday, the PMOS replied that this showed how much progress could be made in a few hours! Asked what happened, the PMOS replied that earlier today he was being cautious as it was proving difficult to get an early date that suited everybody, but we managed to get a date in the end.
Road Pricing
Asked what the Prime Minister would be saying in his reply to the 1,605,764 who had signed the road pricing petition, the PMOS replied that at the risk of stating the obvious, the journalist would have to wait until Wednesday. Pushed again for an answer, the PMOS replied that first and foremost, the Prime Minister welcomed the debate. The Prime Minster recognised that there were strong opinions on this issue, and that there were strong opinions even before the e-petition. All the e-petition did was give people the opportunity to express those strong opinions. Equally however, the Prime Minister believed that congestion was an issue that we could not do nothing about, we had to do something. That was why the Government was proposing the ten pilot schemes, to learn from the experience about what was possible and what was not possible. He also believed that whilst people felt strongly about this issue, if they rejected the way in which the Government was going, then the onus was on them to come up with positive alternatives. Just burying our heads in the sand and doing nothing about the problem was not an option.
Asked whether the Prime Minister thought the London congestion charge scheme was working well, the PMOS replied that the Prime Minister had gone on the record as saying that he believed the way in which the London congestion charge was introduced was courageous, and did show that congestion could be tackled.
Asked if the Government was still taking the view that the "do nothing" option was not an option, the PMOS replied that doing nothing was certainly not an option. All the research and surveys showed that doing nothing would lead to gridlock, and people were even more strongly against gridlock. The problem was that people were then faced with hard choices, but we had to make those hard choices if we were to resolve this issue. The pilot schemes would allow us to test whether certain solutions, including road pricing, would work. What we were not proposing was to go in one step to a national road pricing scheme.
Put to him that there was a view in the Department of Transport that the petition had killed off the idea of a satellite tracking system, the PMOS replied that it was too early to get into discussing particular options, because the pilot schemes were precisely designed to test options and then to go forward on the basis of that experience.
Security Services Report
Asked if the Prime Minister thought it was fair that the Security Services could tap the phones of MSPs and MEPs, but not MPs, the PMOS replied that the conventions on this were laid down some time ago. The Government came to the position it had after serious consideration of the issue.
Health
Put to him that a poll in the Times this morning said that most doctors now believed that this Government essentially wasted tax payers money on reforms, and an internal Department of Health report said that 96% of officials in the Department had no faith in their leadership, which must mean the Security of State, and asked what was the PM’s view on these, the PMOS replied that we should look not at polls but at the facts.
The facts were:
- 85,000 more nurses and 32,00 more doctors since 1997;
- 10 years ago half of the NHS estate was built before the NHS itself, this was now down to a quarter;
- 157 new hospitals had opened;
- More than 2,800 GPs’ premises had been improved or refurbished;
- All waiting lists were down by more than 383,000;
- Virtually nobody waited longer than 6 months;
- 21 ISTCs had delivered over 300,000 treatments and diagnostic tests;
- 99% of people with suspected cancer were seen by a specialist within 2 weeks or being referred.
The list went on, but the basic point was that the factual position showed that whilst we fully recognised all the difficulties involved in achieving change, change for the better was being achieved. Money was resulting in real differences, not only in terms of the level of provision, but also actually in the impact on diseases. People needed to look at the facts and balance that against the other things.
Put to him that the doctors polled were seeing the reality on the ground, the PMOS replied that it was very difficult to comment on polls without knowing how representative the survey was. What had to be put up against these polls were the actual facts of what had changed.
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