My email inbox has been flooded with requests for me to meet with local hospice leaders to hear about the funding crisis and learn how I can support and protect hospice services. Many of these emails have included personal messages detailing how our hospices have provided the most wonderful end of life care and support for loved ones and the deep gratitude you feel towards the staff and services they offer.
Sussex hospices play a vital role locally and I would like to take the opportunity to pay tribute to their crucial work, including St Catherine’s and St Peter and James’ in my constituency, which I have got to know well and supported over the years. There are others nearby too which make a difference to our local families and I know very few of us will have been untouched by their incredible work and dedication.
As you are aware, most hospices were established from charitable and philanthropic donations and are currently, primarily charity-funded and independently run although they receive around a third of their income from statutory funding from the NHS and central Government. I know that it has been an extremely challenging time for the hospice sector over the last few years due to Covid affecting their fundraising, along with the rising cost of living and higher inflation, which has detrimentally impacted all charitable giving, despite widespread public and political support.
As a result, I have wholeheartedly supported our hospices throughout my time as MP for Mid Sussex and will continue to do so now I have been chosen to be the East Grinstead & Uckfield MP; I was proud to stand on a manifesto in the recent election with the specific pledge to continue delivering high-quality palliative care services and supporting children’s and adults’ hospices. We have given hospices support at our business breakfasts to showcase their work and build links with the community and I was proud to be a volunteer supporting the inaugural Shine Bright for St Peter and St James with my daughter last year.
As one of my constituents who have written to me on this subject said ‘Care of the dying is so important for the patient and their relatives, including after care for those left behind. Beds in general wards in already overstretched main hospitals are definitely not the place for end of life/ palliative care.’ This is a message I get continually and every family knows the value of hospices at a time where we need all the support possible.
The Covid pandemic brought this home to so many of us and across the UK, health and care systems, along with government, have been reconsidering their priorities for palliative and end of life care as well as how, and to what extent, the hospice sector can and should be formally integrated into the NHS via an increased funding model without the sector losing its identity and independence.
I am encouraged by the progress that was made in the last Parliament by my Government. It sought to improve access to palliative care services, with Integrated Care Boards (ICBs) having a duty to determine the level of NHS-funded hospice care required locally and ensuring the provision of palliative and end-of-life care services to meet that local need. To hold them accountable, NHS England is including palliative and end of life care in the list of topics for regular performance discussions. However, it is clear there is much more to do in this changed environment. It is worth noting NHS England has commissioned the development of a palliative and end of life care dashboard, bringing together relevant local data in one place. This is already helping commissioners to better understand the palliative and end of life care needs of their local populations and will help ICBs make plans to address and track the improvement of health inequalities. However, I again reiterate there is much more to do.
Meanwhile, the National Institute for Health and Care Research is investing £3 million in a new Palliative and End of Life Care Policy Research Unit to help build the evidence base on palliative and end of life care, as demand increases, to inform policymaking, including a more consistent, national approach and future financial sustainability. During 2023/24, NHS England also invested £25 million in palliative and end of life care services, including children’s hospices, through the Children’s Hospice Grant. It also allocated a further £25 million grant funding for children’s hospices in England for the 2024/25 period.
Here in our constituency, communication with our hospices is ongoing: I met with Giles Tomsett, CEO of St Catherine's on August 1st, plus I will be following up an invite from the CEO of Demelza Hospice Care for children to do the same and my diary already has a confirmed further meeting with St Peter & St James, along with a conversation forthcoming with NHS leads on the asks from Hospice UK as well as the stark issues raised by Giles on behalf of St Catherine's.
I am committed to ensuring palliative care remains a priority during this parliamentary term with a determination to use the opportunity to work with Hospice UK in Westminster. The new Labour Government has stated that it will be considering next steps for hospices over the coming months, and I will be holding them to account on your behalf in ensuring hospices in our community are heard and rightly receive adequate, sustainable funding.
