Ian Sollom MP: Will the new government finally join up planning for health with planning for growth?
Opinion | Ian Sollom, the newly-elected MP for St Neots and Mid Cambridgeshire, writes the first of his regular columns for the Cambridge Independent.
Six or so weeks on from a momentous General Election, one which brought significant changes of representation across Cambridgeshire, the Parliamentary recess is providing a welcome opportunity to spend more time in the constituency, connecting and reconnecting with residents on those issues that propelled my victory.
Being elected as the Member of Parliament for St Neots and Mid Cambridgeshire – indeed, to be the first MP for this new constituency – is truly an honour, one for which I am profoundly grateful, but it is not one to simply sit back and admire. The real honour is representing constituents, pushing for the changes that so many wish to see in our area and beyond: not the winning, but the work.
That work started before even traveling down to Westminster for the first time, with new housing minister Matthew Pennycook contacting me to talk about government plans to accelerate delivery of homes and the town centre at Northstowe.
While welcome, the build-out of Northstowe has been marked by a failure to deliver the required infrastructure and services alongside the construction of the much-needed new homes. Any housing minister’s focus will by default be on houses, but we desperately need to escape a pattern of siloed ministerial thinking when it comes to planning for growth.
Making links in planning across departments – environment, transport and health, as well as local government – will be vital not just to the success of our new communities like Northstowe, but for all of us. It’s a challenge to which I hope Mr Pennycook and his government colleagues will rise, perhaps none more so than health secretary Wes Streeting.
Talking with constituents on the doorsteps of St Neots and Mid Cambridgeshire during the election, without question their single highest priority is improving health services, and I know it is similar for many across Cambridgeshire as a whole.
One of my first acts as an MP was to join with my new Cambridgeshire Lib Dem colleagues – Charlotte Cane, MP for Ely and East Cambridgeshire and Pippa Heylings, MP for South Cambridgeshire – to write to the health secretary to call for changes to the current funding formula for GPs, which is particularly hurting our area’s primary care services. With Labour pushing hard on a national growth agenda, Mr Streeting should also finally address long-standing and fundamental problems with the delivery of health services in and around new and growing communities.
Far too often growth in our health services lags the growth in our population. Investment in new services follows patient registrations too slowly and the delay further strains our already overstretched primary care services. This apparent design feature in the system leads to frustration and resentment in our communities at best and impacts on diagnosis and treatment at worst. We have seen this pattern play out too many times in our area.
It’s time to change the approach. The acceleration at Northstowe is an ideal opportunity to pilot, if somewhat belatedly, a new model of pre-investment in GP and other primary care services for those areas where we know significant growth is going to occur. We need to provide the NHS with the levers to commission new services for when they are needed, and not after.
Northstowe is far from the only place that would benefit from getting this right. In my constituency alone there are significant developments coming or already underway at West Cambourne and Bourn Airfield, as well as Wintringham and Monksfield on the edge of St Neots. Many other places in Cambridgeshire and beyond would also benefit.
Labour has shown its ambitions for housing growth in its proposals for planning reforms.
It’s well past time for national government to join up that thinking with planning for health services. Mr Pennycook and Mr Streeting should talk.
