MPs doubtful over public health commitment

Wednesday, 2 November 2011 9:43 AM

By Alex Stevenson Follow @alex__stevenson

Plans to create a new body overseeing public health in England will only succeed if the organisation is able to "speak truth unto power", MPs have said.

A report from the health committee published today said ministers had to face "uncomfortable questions" if they are to improve health and wellbeing.

It called for Public Health England, the body which the coalition government proposes setting up, to be completely independent from the government.

MPs said that more clarity is needed about who will be in charge in a public health emergency like a flu pandemic.

The report also said directors of public health in each locality should be a chief officer of the local authority, who has a statutory duty to address the local public health agenda in full.

"Successive governments have spoken of the importance of improving health protection,
reducing health inequalities, and raising levels of health and wellbeing across the nation," committee chair Stephen Dorrell said.

"It is an aspiration which we all share, but delivering the aspiration often involves facing
uncomfortable questions which it is easier to avoid.

"Those questions are likely to become even more difficult at a time when the NHS faces
an unprecedented financial challenge."

The report also called into question the government's 'health premium', which is supposed to focus funding on specific, often deprived, areas with very poor public health.

MPs said this approach targeted resources towards areas which had made the greatest progress with their public health challenges.

The Department of Health said the government had prioritised public health by placing a duty on all parts of the health system to reduce health inequalities for the first time ever.

"It is why we will be ringfencing the public health budget for the first time from 2013, to ensure that money for programmes like cancer awareness are protected," a spokesperson said.

"And it's why we are working with communities and business and through our responsibility deal which has allowed us to go further and faster on issues like reducing calories than we could have done through cumbersome regulation."

Last month the Office for National Statistics announced that Britain's health inequalities had widened further, with men in Glasgow living on average 13.5 years less than those living in Kensington and Chelsea.

Writing for politics.co.uk today, the Fabian Society's general secretary Andrew Harrop argued that Labour's public health efforts were "a heroic effort at running up a down escalator".

He suggested widening health inequalities raised serious concerns for the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), which plans on increasing the state pension age to 66.

"The DWP may not like to hear it but its next wave of reforms will be a non-starter, unless the formula for increasing state pension age is firmly anchored on prior improvements to healthy life expectancy in poor communities," Mr Harrop argued.

"The prospect of savings to the massive pensions bill should be an incentive for all wings of government to work together to prioritise closing the health gap."

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• health
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• obesity
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• public health
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• stephen dorrell