I was about to say exactly the same thing, Mr Deputy Speaker, but I do not think that my hon. Friend the Member for Solihull (Julian Knight) was in the Chamber when someone made what I agree was a very similar point. I will merely say that, undoubtedly—I think that Members in all parts of the House will agree with this—the scheme will have to be administered somehow. It is not going to run itself. Someone, somewhere, will be required to run it, either someone new who has been brought in or someone who is currently doing another job in the hospital.
I do not know whether, as part of her preparation for the Bill, the hon. Member for Burnley ascertained how many national health service trusts in England might have to alter their price structures—that is, increase their parking charges to avoid falling foul of the income generation principle—if the number of exempted carers were to be as significant as it appears. I do not know whether she proposes to scrap the principle of not running a scheme at a loss, as required by the 2006 guidance from the Department of Health. The NHS Confederation, which is the membership body for some 500 organisations that plan, commission and provide NHS services, says:
“NHS principles and Government policy are clear that healthcare is funded through taxation, not through patient charges. Surpluses from parking charges should only be a by-product of covering costs and managing space fairly.”
Most trusts make it clear that the income they receive from car parking charges goes towards covering the maintenance of the car park: for instance, the security, facilities and staff. To be specific, we are talking about the ongoing costs of anything from lighting to CCTV, footpath and cycle path maintenance, car park surfacing, and the employment of enforcement and security staff. If there is any money left over—and some trusts have no surplus from their car parking—it must, in accordance with the guidance, be used to improve local health services.
The Government have already been active in ensuring that information about parking is made very clear to members of the public, and I think it perfectly fair and reasonable to require trusts to ensure that that information is clearly visible on websites and in patient information in, for instance, letters. Patients are entitled to the reassurance of knowing that the purpose of the car park charge is not to provide the NHS with an additional, excessive income stream, but to provide for the car park in the first place. Charges, therefore, are used primarily to cover the running costs of the car park, and if there is a surplus, it cannot be used for other pet projects.
I referred earlier to the 2009 NHS car parking impact assessment. The then Labour Government commissioned the detailed, 61-page assessment of the costs of introducing free car parking. It concluded:
“On the available evidence there is scope for this policy to have both a positive and negative impact, both for older people and the disabled.”
Despite that rather mixed finding, Labour’s 2010 manifesto pledged to scrap hospital car parking charges. Five years later, however, at the time of this year’s May general election, Labour appeared to reverse its view, and to decide that the policy was now unworkable. I look forward to hearing from the shadow Minister later whether that is still the position of the official Opposition. In fact, the Bill runs contrary to the principle that individual trusts feel that it is right to set parking charges according to their own financial situations. Only yesterday it was reported that the Oxford Health NHS Foundation Trust was consulting on the introduction of parking charges at its community hospitals.
What are hospital car parking charges actually paying for? That is a perfectly legitimate question for people to ask. It is reasonable to say that visitors and patients do not generally have a great deal of choice when it comes to parking at a hospital. There is usually just one car park operator, and patients, staff and visitors are therefore a captive audience. In some town centres, one might be fortunate enough to have the choice of a cheaper place in which to park, but for hospitals there is no market incentive to keep costs under control.
In December 2010, the British Parking Association, which is the largest professional association in Europe representing parking and traffic management organisations, released a charter of best practice for parking in hospital car parks. Understandably, given the large number of disabled users, it set high standards. The Charter for Hospital Parking stated that hospital parking operators should provide
“good lighting, high standards of maintenance for structures and surfaces, payment systems and equipment that are easy to use and understand, signs that are clear and easy to understand”
and
“clearly marked parking bays.”
Patients and visitors will understandably want a safe and secure environment in which to park when they go to their local hospital, or, potentially, a hospital that is out of their immediate area if they are receiving specialist treatment. As Carers UK points out, attending hospital can be a stressful experience for patients and visitors. The last thing they want is to have their car broken into, or to spend 20 minutes driving round in circles because entrances and exits are not marked properly, or to be
stuck facing a ticket machine that does not work with the threat of an unfair penalty charge looming. Patients, and their carers, visitors and staff, will quite reasonably expect a properly maintained car park with proper lighting and adequate security, along the lines of what is set out in the charter, whether the purpose is to guide a daytime visitor with proper and effective signage or to protect the doctor or nurse who gets into the car at 3 am in the dark after a long shift.
The charter also states:
“Parking charges can help to pay for maintenance and management services, and prevent these from becoming a drain on healthcare budgets. Therefore, we encourage NHS Trusts and car park operators who manage hospital car parks to sign up to this charter and to abide by its letter and spirit.”
So far, 24 hospital trusts have signed up to the charter.