Male Suicide and International Men’s Day

(Limited Text - Ministerial Extracts only)

Thursday 19th November 2015 Westminster Hall

[The Minister for Community and Social Care (Alistair Burt)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Rosindell. Do I have until half-past 4?

[Andrew Rosindell (in the Chair)]

Yes.

[Alistair Burt]

It is nice to get a reasonable amount of time without being shouted at for spending a bit of time on my feet. I am pleased to be in that position today.

[Philip Davies]

Me too.

[Alistair Burt]

And so is my hon. Friend.

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing the debate and picking the topic. I thank CALM and the other charities that backed the debate, as well as all the colleagues who have spoken. I will come to everyone’s speech in due course, but a couple of colleagues—my hon. Friends the Members for Worcester (Mr Walker) and for Faversham and Mid Kent (Helen Whately)—have been in here for the whole time and have not made a speech. It is sometimes unusual for colleagues to sit and listen because they are interested in the debate, without feeling the need to contribute. We all appreciate their presence. I thank the hon. Member for Liverpool, Wavertree (Luciana Berger) for her comments, which I will come on to. I am only mildly annoyed that she said some of the things I wanted to say, but I can say them again. She either read my mind or had a look at my speech in advance.

I will spend the bulk of my remarks dealing with the suicide element of the debate, but I want to start with International Men’s Day because I recognise its significance and because it is why we are here. I have previously referred to my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley (Philip Davies) as “the Member for grit and oyster”, and he proved that to us once again today. This place is used to rough speeches. If any hon. Member wants to get anything done, say anything mildly controversial or challenge people, there is the chance that they will not only challenge but put some people’s noses out of joint in doing so. My hon. Friend is particularly good at both those things. We all have to take the rough with the smooth—we have all sat in the House of Commons and heard things from both sides that we do not like, but that is all part of it. That is what this place is about and we do not get things done by always going along with the status quo. Today, I heard from my hon. Friend things that I appreciated and things that that I thought were profoundly wrong.

I echo the feelings of those who said today that the purpose of International Men’s Day is to highlight the fact that gender equality is not a zero-sum game. It is not one thing to be gained at the disadvantage of another. The Department of Health’s approach to illnesses and conditions that might specifically affect men or women is that both deserve equal attention and neither is supported at the expense of the other. That is important. There is a strand of that argument on both sides that occasionally expresses itself in challenging ways. The hon. Member for York Central (Rachael Maskell) made brave reference to the row at the University of York to say that it is right and important to think about International Men’s Day, and for a university to censor it and prevent something from happening frankly looks rather silly. There is a lot of stuff in the United States at the moment about the prevention of free speech that is getting into that area. Academic institutions need to be particularly careful about ensuring that they do not shut down debate just because they do not like it. The hon. Lady was quite right to say what she did.

I think our debate today has emphasised that this is not a zero-sum game. There are particular issues on which men are specifically challenged. It is important that they are raised as issues in their own right and that it is not suggested that they have arisen because men have been disadvantaged by women. The underachievement of boys, particularly white, working-class boys, is a real issue that any of us would be concerned about. It does not need to be considered in the context of whether girls are doing better. It is just a fact for those boys, and what can we do about it? My hon. Friend the Member for Shipley was right about that.

The difficulties of family problems, separation and other such matters are particularly hard because the courts have as their primary objective the interests of the child. It is not about the interests of one party or the other; the paramount duty of the court is to have the interests of the child as the basis of what it does. How that is interpreted can be tough in contested situations. The pain felt by men who suffer separation is real. That is not to suggest that pain is not suffered by women in similar circumstances, but the facts are as they are and not to raise them and not to regard them as important would be to miss something. My hon. Friend was also right on that.

As for the issues my hon. Friend raised, some of his challenges to put things on the record were right and some of them, I feel, are wrong, but I am grateful to him for being prepared, as he always is, to confront issues that some others might shy away from. That is what this place is all about.

The hon. Member for Bridgend (Mrs Moon) made a quite excellent speech, again demonstrating to people outside this place that some colleagues here get so immersed in a subject that they really know their business and are able to speak authoritatively on it from years of experience and practice. The hon. Lady gave us an object lesson in that. She was right about language. When she said that the phrase we should use now is not “to commit suicide” but rather “to take one’s own life”, that was not designed to chastise my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley or anyone else. I had a conversation on this subject this week with Jonny Benjamin, who I am pleased to say is here and following the debate closely, because I had also used the former phrase. I did so because it is a common phrase, but it is right to challenge its use, because, exactly as the hon. Lady said, it suggests that to take one’s own life is similar to committing a crime. That was not my intention when I used the phrase and I understood entirely when Jonny suggested that the right wording is “taking one’s own life”. As the hon. Lady said, the feeling of loss experienced by affected families is considerable; that the language used could add to that a sense that their loved one did something criminal had not occurred to me, but on reflection I certainly understood it. Her remark was not meant to chastise anyone. I have corrected my way of looking at the matter as a result of what I was told. That is just sensible sensitivity.

The hon. Lady also mentioned the importance of coroners. In case Members do not know, because I did not know until I took on this job, I can tell them that coroners write to me if they feel that there is something in a case that has a wider governmental impact that relates to my Department. It is an important part of the process that coroners indicate when they feel that they have uncovered something in a particular case that has a wider implication and the Government can do something about. I appreciate the work of coroners and I want to take this opportunity to pay tribute to them and thank them for their thorough work in investigating deaths. It is much appreciated by Government.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Basingstoke (Mrs Miller) spoke about attitudes and the importance of gender equality not being zero-sum game, which I appreciate. I also recognise that my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley quite rightly challenged gender stereotypes in his contribution. My right hon. Friend the Member for Basingstoke mentioned parental leave, which is dealt with by the Department for Education, so we will get an answer to her on that. It is an issue, and it is strange, although perhaps not surprising, that it is handled similarly around Europe and around the world and that men do not take the opportunities that are given to them, but I suspect that that attitude may change over time. I will ensure that the Department for Education gives her an answer.

My right hon. Friend also made reference to living in a multi-generational household. I too live in such a household, but there are only two males in mine. All the rest are women. There is me and Mr Darcy, my darling daughter’s pug. We are the only two blokes in our house, and I depend on him for male company when I get home. Multi-generational houses can be a lot of fun, and I appreciate living in one very much.

I have mentioned the hon. Member for York Central challenging the University of York, but she also made reference to the issues at Bootham Park hospital, in which we are both well versed. I appreciate her work on this and that of my hon. Friend the Member for York Outer (Julian Sturdy). It is a particular situation that has arisen owing to the closure of that hospital because of the risks that she mentioned. It exemplifies the fact that work has to be done as swiftly as possible to replace the facilities that have been lost, and she is entirely right to say that the trust must have a good eye on where people are being treated now and how we can get back to local facilities as soon as possible. She knows that my door is open if she wants to see me when the moment is right, and we are pressing the local authorities to bring forward their plans.

My hon. Friend the Member for Bury North (Mr Nuttall)—may God continue to bless his constituency and all its wonderful people—spoke of the need to challenge stereotypes. He also made reference to something that I want to highlight because it is absolutely central to the problem—the hon. Member for Liverpool, Wavertree also mentioned it. This is what has been so wrong: the acceptance. My hon. Friend gave every impression of being outraged that we have sort of accepted that there is a figure for suicide in this country and a gap between men and women; we have sort of got used to it. He is right, and that will be at the heart of my remarks about how we deal with the matter. He has looked hard at the statistics to examine the gap between men and women and found that it is not only consistent, but widening. I thank him for his work.

I visited the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Derby North (Amanda Solloway) a few months ago to meet a group that she brought together to deal with a variety of mental health issues. She can take my kind regards back to them, because I found the meeting to be very instructive. In her contribution, she spoke of her difficult personal experience and made reference, as several colleagues did, to the issue of men’s feelings about their place in society, their feeling of inadequacy should they admit to any sense of failure, their worry about not fitting in, banter and everything else. That brought to my mind the relatively recent tragedy of Gary Speed, the Welsh international manager, and the impact it had on the sporting community that someone seemingly in full command of his life and everything else could have such things going on to lead him to do what he did. Along with other celebrities and colleagues in the House talking about such things, it is those occasions that wake people up and make us say, “This is a bigger problem than we realised.” That is probably one of the reasons why we are all present today.

My hon. Friend the Member for Derby North and the hon. Member for Liverpool, Wavertree referred to the good that can come from sports clubs, associations and so on. In my constituency I am lucky enough to be a member of a number of organisations—for example, I am president of Biggleswade athletic club and I regularly go to see matches at the football clubs. They are places where people can go, gather together and form associations. Bearing in mind the difficulties we have been discussing, including feelings of loneliness and isolation—for men in particular—the more people can be scooped up by and remain part of groups and organisations the better. They are a vital link. Perhaps women do such things differently from and better than men, but perhaps sports clubs and other such places can do something more for men. In that connection, I commend the work being done at Everton.

My hon. Friend the Member for Derby North commented on asking people how they are and getting the reply, “Fine.” Are they really fine? Most of us leave it at that, because we do not want to get involved in the conversation, but it is important to take such opportunities.

May I make another point? It is a bit personal, but not too harrowing as it turned out. It is an important point. Last year my old school magazine reached me and in the obituaries column was the name of one of my classmates, someone I had also been at university with. I was completely horrified. We had been in touch reasonably regularly over the years, but perhaps not for a year or so. I thought, “My friend has died and I don’t know anything about it.”

In actual fact, fortunately, it turned out to be a mistake. My immediate reaction had been to hit the last number I had for my friend to find out what had happened, and I had discovered that the magazine was wrong. It had shocked me, however, and I remember saying to him, “Do you know what this teaches me? We have a number of friends we haven’t been in touch with for a while—we don’t always know where they are—and we will end up seeing each other’s families at each other’s funerals.”

At my sort of advanced age, if we have not been in touch with friends for a bit—I have a lot of school friends I remember well, even if I have not spoken to them for a while—we might simply miss something. Again, I think blokes do such things worse than women. If it were not for my wife keeping up with friends using Facebook and so on, my social life would be much worse. That is something for men to think about. If we have not been in touch with friends for a bit, we should do it this weekend.

The hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (Dr Monaghan) made reference to Scotland’s suicide strategy, and I was pleased to hear about it. The strategy goes back a long time, to 2002, so it is a long-term strategy to combat the brutal fact that the suicide rate is higher in Scotland than in the rest of the United Kingdom. Any lessons to be learned from a falling rate are important. It is right to focus on what might work.

My hon. Friend the Member for Telford (Lucy Allan), too, talked about the underachievement of boys at school and the particular issues in her constituency. She mentioned Twitter—she need not be worried about being attacked on it, because she has nothing to worry about—and I will speak about social media later. The importance of her remarks, however, was in talking about the issues.

Although the hon. Member for Heywood and Middleton (Liz McInnes) did not make a speech as such, she intervened with particular pertinence, as she always does on such occasions. It is good to see her in her place and taking a strong interest in the debate throughout.

I have a little more to say, given the time and the opportunity. I hope to be pertinent. I want to put on the record some of my own thoughts on the subject—although the hon. Member for Liverpool, Wavertree has anticipated some of my views. I want to see the ambition of our society and of the Government changed in relation to the issue of suicide. Fundamentally, I want our position to be that we challenge the inevitability of suicide. As far as our statistics are concerned, our rates are mid-range for societies such as ours, but that is not good enough.

Do we need to know more? How do our strategies compare with those of others? Have we identified the right drivers, and are our local and national strategies flexible and dynamic enough to respond? Why, in a world where gender equality is encouraged as the norm, must we speak specifically about men because this affects men more than women?

Since I have been in office, I have been much moved by those I have met in relation to suicide. I have met those who help in prevention and counselling, those who work clinically, those who campaign and, most of all, those who have been touched by the tragedy of suicide in some way. I am fortunate. I have not personally been affected through the loss of a close friend or a family member, but I have known others more tangentially who have. I have met people whose children have taken their own lives, and others who have come close to it themselves.

The other day I met Jonny Benjamin, as I said, whose story of having been persuaded against suicide by a stranger on a bridge led to his extraordinary efforts years later to find, successfully, the man who saved him. He is taking a close interest in the debate today. He spends much of his time taking his story, and the issues surrounding it, out there to help others. Other people around the country are also doing such things—I commend their work, and I deeply appreciate what Jonny is doing. The shock and emptiness left by suicide is excruciating to behold, hard to listen to and desperate to feel.

We have a new challenge. What must we do to have the best suicide prevention strategy in the world? To be mid-range is no longer good enough for any of us. With that in mind, I assure the House that mental health is a key priority of the Government, and I set our work in that context. The hon. Member for Liverpool, Wavertree raised that issue. We want to do all we can to build on our momentum and to ensure that people get access to the services they need when they need them. We have done a certain amount towards fulfilling that commitment, and the hon. Lady was generous enough to praise one or two of the things that have been done.

Jonny Benjamin and others have done a great deal of work on making people more aware. His #FindMike campaign has captured many hearts and minds. We have legislated, for the first time, for parity of esteem between mental and physical health, through the Health and Social Care Act 2012. We were the first Government to include access and waiting times for mental health. Last year we gave the NHS more money than ever before for mental health services, with an increase to £11.7 billion, and we have invested more than £120 million to introduce waiting times standards for the first time.

I am conscious that when I say such things, people say, “Well, not in our area.” There is an issue with how the national money appears in local clinical commissioning groups, but we are on to it—there will be better monitoring this year, and we have made it clear that CCGs must use a proportionate amount of an increase that they receive for mental health services. We are watching out for that, because it is a fair criticism.

We have also helped to extend the accessibility of successful talking therapies, in which field we are a world leader. We invested more than £400 million in recent years in the improving access to psychological therapies programme, to ensure access to talking therapies for those who need them. That has led to real improvements in the lives of people with anxiety and depression.

We have also invested more than £33 million in crisis care. We launched the crisis care concordat in 2014, and every local area now has in place a crisis care action plan to support people experiencing a mental health crisis to receive the right help and support when they need it. I welcome the Care Quality Commission report of some months ago, which we commissioned. Although it was a bit tough in places, it provided a sort of baseline for where we do well and where we can do better. I recognise that accident and emergency did not come out well, and we need to strengthen the relationships there. I noticed that police and ambulance services did well when responding to people in crisis, but best of all were the independent and voluntary agencies involved with such people.

There are lessons to be learned, such as the need to build on all that work through street triage and so on. I shall mention that later, but it has been one of the most interesting outcomes. The crisis care concordat is not found universally, and some local areas that I have visited might want a different approach, but there is no doubt that the concordat and what the Government have sought to achieve through it have made a real difference. It is certainly being monitored locally and nationally—the hon. Member for Liverpool, Wavertree is right about that—and I take a keen interest in it. I expect to see the CQC reports improve as times go on, because we want to look at the areas where concerns were found.

One of the ways in which we can better look after people with mental health issues is to recognise that they often have physical issues as well. Sometimes that has been poorly regarded in the past, and it can add to feelings of depression, isolation and not being considered and so play into the issues that we are discussing. It is important to address premature mortality in people with mental illness, and we have committed NHS England to doing so through the NHS mandate,. One way in which we can do that is to look at the person behind the illness and provide treatment and care for the whole person, so that we also address the physical health and social care needs of people with mental illness.

Let me say a brief word about children, because this starts early. I am particularly keen to ensure that we get the right support in place for young people. We have committed to invest an additional £1.25 billion over the life of the Parliament to improve the mental health and wellbeing of children and young people. We know that, for many people, mental illness can manifest itself early in life, and that the first experience of psychosis is often during adolescence. We are using that additional investment to improve awareness of mental health issues in our children and young people and to improve the information and support they receive at school on mental health and wellbeing.

There cannot be enough warning about the dangers of peer pressure and social media and the ways in which they can induce depression and harm among young people at a sensitive age. My hon. Friend the Member for Telford referred to Twitter, and we see that what young people face on Facebook and other social media can be immensely damaging. New technology is a boon, but it has risks and dangers and it is important to talk about that.

May I commend the report issued just this week by the British Youth Council’s youth select committee on young people’s mental health? It made this recommendation:

“Cyberbullying and sites which promote self-harm can have a significant impact on the mental health of young people. Hoping that children will simply stop using social networks is not a solution. We recommend that the Government should facilitate a roundtable for charities, technology companies, young people, and the Government to work together to find creative solutions needed to help young people stay safe online”.

The Government will issue a full response from both my Department and the Department for Education, but I commend the Youth Council and that select committee for the hard work they have put in, which will certainly be taken seriously.

About a month or so ago I got a letter from a young lady not in my constituency—she had written to the Prime Minister. She said:

“I am writing to you to express my ideas on new legislation…The topic I have chosen is extremely personal to me. I have lost a friend to suicide, and I feel as though if he had had a better understanding of his own illness, he would not have felt the need to take his own life. Not only this, I also feel that if the people surrounding him at his time of suffering were better educated on the topic, it would have helped him to feel less alone and unaccepted in today’s society.”

It was a good, brave letter and I hope to see the young lady at an event we are doing to combat stigma. She made the point that the problem starts early, and I am pleased that the Government now have a Minister in the Department for Education, the Under-Secretary of State for Education, my hon. Friend the Member for East Surrey (Mr Gyimah), who is devoted to mental health issues in schools. I appreciate his work. We are working together on that, which demonstrates the Government’s determination to work across Departments on these issues.

Finally—I appreciate the House’s indulgence—I turn to talk about suicide and men.

[Mr Robin Walker]

One issue that we have not touched on much in the debate is homelessness. Men are more likely to be homeless and sleep rough: I think that 87% of rough sleepers are men. A constituent of mine, Hugo Sugg, has talked about how sleeping rough drove him to thoughts of suicide. He now wants to campaign for a better attitude towards youth homelessness and how we encourage people to look at those who are suffering from homelessness, to give them a chance to turn their lives around, working with some of the fantastic charities in this space. Will the Minister join me in paying tribute to the charities and organisations that campaign on homelessness for the job they do in saving men from suicide?

[Alistair Burt]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Those connected with housing increasingly recognise the relationship between housing, mental health issues and suicide. When I was with my hon. Friend the Member for Derby North, I met the lady responsible for the YMCA there and its housing outreach, and she made some pertinent comments. Housing and homelessness are closely connected with the problem we are discussing, and I commend the constituent that my hon. Friend the Member for Worcester mentioned.

We know that men are often reluctant to talk about mental health problems. Many colleagues have referred to men’s attitudes, so I do not think that I need to labour that point. They are reluctant to seek help when they need it. In part, we know that is because some men feel that it may be a form of weakness. We need to assure men that that is not the case, as many colleagues have said. We, along with the charities Mind and Rethink Mental Illness, are seeking to reduce the stigma around mental illness through the Time to Change campaign.

Time to Change aims to empower people to challenge stigma and speak openly about their own mental health experiences—particularly men—and to change public attitudes towards those with mental health problems. The campaign has improved the attitudes of more than 2 million people. However, we know that men can be a particularly hard-to-reach group, and we are looking at further ways to improve reach in that area.

We know, tragically, what the outcome of unacknowledged mental ill health can be for a person. When someone bottles it up—that phrase was used in this Chamber today—their condition can worsen and may, in the worst cases, increase the risk of suicide. As I mentioned earlier, suicide rates in England remain low compared with in other European countries and other UK administrations, but I am concerned, as we all are, to see that rates have been rising in recent years. We anticipated that after the global financial crisis in 2008, and it has been seen in other countries around the world, as the hon. Member for York Central said. We know about that, but it is important that the inevitability of that does not go unchallenged. We can appreciate that such times bring extra pressures, but we need to ask what we can do when we know they are coming.

We know that the recent rise in suicide rates has been driven by an increase in male suicides, which is what led my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley to call for the debate in the first place. The threefold difference between male and female suicide rates has increased further, and we know that is a common experience in other countries around the world. It is right, therefore, that preventing suicide is dominated by efforts to prevent male suicide, but we recognise that this issue affects everyone. Whether men or women, boys or girls, when it happens it is an immense tragedy.

The greater risk of suicide among men is a complex issue. Many of the clinical and social risk factors for suicide are more common in men. Cultural expectations that men will be decisive and strong can make them more vulnerable to psychological factors associated with suicide, such as impulsiveness and humiliation. It is critical that, in addressing those issues, we provide information and support in a way that suits men’s needs and behaviours, and that we provide services that are appropriate for men, which may include moving away from traditional health settings.

What are we doing about it, and what will we do about it? We published the cross-Government suicide prevention strategy for England in 2012, and I am committed to implementing it by working across Government and with our partner organisations in the NHS and other sectors such as transport and the community, voluntary and charitable sectors. I will also be speaking to our partner organisations soon to discuss how we can review and strengthen the national suicide strategy. I want to make it clear that I see that as a dynamic and flexible instrument, not as something that we will do and then I will see how it works and make some decisions in years to come. We are looking at it now. It needs to be reviewed and refreshed now. It is an ongoing process, and I am committed to it.

The objectives of the strategy are to reduce suicide and to support the people bereaved or affected by it. It is right that men are identified in the strategy as a high-risk group for whom our suicide prevention activities should be and are prioritised. The strategy also recognises that schools, social care and the youth justice system have an important contribution to make in suicide prevention by promoting mental wellbeing and identifying underlying issues such as bullying, poor self-image and lack of self-esteem.

As well as having the strategy, we continue to provide financial support for the National Suicide Prevention Alliance, which brings together our key partners across Government and the community, voluntary and charitable sectors with expertise in suicide prevention. I am particularly pleased to say that many of the organisations that campaigned for the debate are members of the NSPA. It has been working with all those organisations to develop its strategy for delivering improvements in suicide prevention, which I welcome. My Department of Health officials are helping with that work. Those organisations make tremendous individual contributions to suicide prevention. The Campaign Against Living Miserably, which was prominent in calling for this debate, works tirelessly to target men specifically, and to support them, so that they feel able to talk about mental health issues. The Department of Health provided financial support to CALM in its early days, and I am proud to see how it has grown in size and profile.

I have had a variety of meetings on the issue since I took office; I have mentioned some already. I went to see the Samaritans bereavement centre in Peckham for World Suicide Prevention Day, and to mark the launch of a new initiative between Cruse Bereavement Care and the Samaritans. I met the British Transport police and saw the extraordinary work they do with Network Rail. I saw some of the triage work going on in Birmingham, including placing a mental health professional in the police control room 24 hours a day to help provide necessary information. I held a meeting on suicide prevention on 29 June, with researchers, the Samaritans, and representatives from areas such as Merseyside, the east of England and the south-west.

We have started to look at something called zero suicide. I have an interest in the concept and ambition of zero suicide. It was pioneered in Detroit by a college acquaintance of mine from many years ago, Ed Coffey, and I am very interested in his work. We can follow part of it, although some things are different in the States and will not be pertinent here. The whole concept of zero suicide—recognising that as an ambition, and challenging the inevitability of suicide—is really important and has very much grabbed my attention. Public Health England also recently published the refreshed “Help is at Hand” document, which provides compassionate support and information to people bereaved by suicide.

I will conclude by saying a little about research and data, as it will cover a number of issues raised by colleagues. One of the key drivers for improving our approach to suicide prevention is investing in research and data. I want us to lead the world in suicide prevention research, and to be at the forefront of service delivery, using the best knowledge and information to provide the best care. We have invested over £1.5 million in suicide and self-harm prevention research since bringing in the national suicide prevention strategy, to inform and target our strategy for reducing suicide rates. I will have a look at whether that is enough, and at what more needs to be done.

The hon. Member for Bridgend mentioned longitudinal studies. We are committed to carrying on the work on that. We have provided the Multicentre Study of Self-harm in England with £300,000 this year. I will very much bear in mind the opportunities that there might be for us to do more.

The zero suicide ambition I mentioned is being piloted in three areas: Merseyside, the south-west and the east of England. Early learning from the pilots has identified some innovative practice, which I am sure will help other areas to develop innovative plans for reducing suicide in their communities. There will be more research that we can work through to find whether it could have applications elsewhere.

[Luciana Berger]

Will that work extend to our prisons, which are a particular area of concern?

[Alistair Burt]

I know the Ministry of Justice is looking closely at the increase in prison and detention suicides. Again, it is not huge, statistically, but any increase is a matter for concern.

The work capability assessment has been mentioned. It started in 2008, which is about the time that the rise in suicides began. The authors of the recent study that has been mentioned have said that they were cautious about making a link or claiming cause and effect, but I have already asked the Department of Health to have a look at that study, because I feel it is important that my Department looks at the matters involved.

This has been a really good and important debate. First, it has put the issues connected to International Men’s Day on the agenda and allowed us to talk about male issues, in a way that is not a zero-sum game. We have been able to make reference to some difficult issues that are not discussed enough, and I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley for that. We have spent the bulk of our time discussing suicide, and Members on both sides of the House have been able to work together and demonstrate a common interest in things that affect us all. The sense I get from everyone is that none of us is prepared to accept the status quo and simply see the statistics accepted—my hon. Friend the Member for Bury North made that point.

These will not be easy issues to tackle. More men commit suicide than women, not because someone is making them do so—it is not anyone’s fault—but that is a fact. What more can we do? What can we learn from overseas and from the work being done in different areas of this country? I am absolutely confident that this House will talk about this issue again. I hope that when we do, we will have learned still more. People and organisations outside the House do such excellent work on this; with the benefit of that work, perhaps our ambition to make this the country with the best suicide prevention strategy in the world can, in time, become a reality.