Vince Cable

The local health service - the Borough's Primary Care Trust - has agreed to postpone and widen public consultation on a key paper - the Ethical Framework for Priority Setting - after MPs and others protested that a framework for vital policy choices were being adopted without proper involvement by local voluntary organisations and the public.

Vincent Cable MP said that "all kinds of important choices, notably about what kind of drugs are available - for cancer treatment, for example - are made by local NHS officials and their Board, who have only very tenuous accountability to the public. The fact that these people are of high quality does not detract from the problem that there is a postcode lottery over treatment and the public have little say in it. This paper provides an opportunity for an informed public discussion."

Vincent Cable said that he had recently had to take up "some heartbreaking cases of people who are being denied drugs which affect the quality of life of residents with terminal conditions. Recent surveys have shown that the UK has the worst survival rate for cancer and the lowest use of new drugs in Europe; the decisions are mainly made nationally but the local NHS has some discretion. The same is true of drugs that can affect the quality of life of people with Alzheimer's - who are currently denied drugs like Aricept in most parts of Britain - and elderly people with deteriorating eye conditions called Macular Degeneration. Most people are intelligent enough to understand that there has to be some rationing of scare resources but I want the public, and particularly the voluntary sector, involved in the making the choices, not sidelined by bureaucracy."