The Minister for Health and Secondary Care (Will Quince)
I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Darlington (Peter Gibson) for securing this important debate. I thank him especially for sharing the experience of his constituent Mark Bell, and the challenging events leading up to the devasting loss of his much-loved son Luke to neuroblastoma. I am pleased that Mark and Carol could be here for this debate. As a parent who has sadly lost a child myself, I send my heartfelt condolences to Mark and his family. No parent should have to go through what his family have; I know that it is a void that can never be filled. I am full of admiration for Mark and his family: as my hon. Friend pointed out, following their tragic loss, they established their charity, the Team Luke Foundation, to help other parents in a similar situation. I commend and applaud its important work in raising awareness of neuroblastoma and supporting parents in accessing the information and advice that they need.
My hon. Friend also referenced the letter to my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister from the hon. Member for Batley and Spen (Kim Leadbeater) about her constituent Beau. I too would like to extend my deep condolences to the family of brave and beautiful Beau, who also lost her life to neuroblastoma. My thoughts are also very much with Shirley and her family. I would like to assure my hon. Friend and all families who are affected by cancer that one of my and the Government’s top priorities is speeding up the diagnosis and improving the treatment of cancer, including neuroblastoma.
Working together with our colleagues in the national health service, the Government have three priorities for cancer care. The first is to recover from the pandemic and the backlog. The second is to get better at early diagnosis, which my hon. Friend made a very eloquent and articulate case for, and to get better treatment using the tools and technologies available to us. The third is to invest in research and innovation, because we know that things such as genomics and AI have the potential to transform our experience of cancer as a society. With my hon. Friend’s permission, I will focus on diagnosis and research.
Let me turn first to early diagnosis. Cancer services, including those for children, are an absolute priority for the NHS—I know that and have seen it at first hand. The NHS is working to raise further awareness of the symptoms of cancer, lower the threshold for referral by GPs and accelerate access to diagnoses and treatment. The NHS long-term plan for cancer aims for three quarters of cancers to be diagnosed at stage 1 or 2. NHS England launched operational delivery networks in June 2021 to enable clinicians to lead and improve cancer pathways for children and young people.
We are also making interventions to diagnose cancer early. NHS England has announced that it is expanding direct access to diagnostic scans across all GP practices, which will cut waiting times and, importantly, speed up diagnosis for patients. Non-specific symptom pathways are transforming the way that people with symptoms not specific to one cancer, such as weight loss or fatigue, are diagnosed or have cancer ruled out. This gives GPs a much-needed referral route, while speeding up and streamlining the process so that, where needed, people can start their treatment sooner. Thankfully, the majority of people referred will be given the all-clear. It is crucial that people who are diagnosed start their treatment promptly, while giving peace of mind to those who do not have cancer.
We have previously discussed this, but I hope my hon. Friend will be pleased to hear that the Department has committed an additional £8 billion over the next two years to increase our capacity for elective activity and for adult and children’s cancer services.
Community diagnostic centres have played a huge role in recovering the cancer backlog. We have 108 community diagnostic centres open and operational as of today, and our aim is to open 160 by 2025, but I want to go much faster. So far, we have delivered over 4 million additional vital tests and checks since 2021, including for cancer. Testing and diagnosing early means we can provide the right treatment on time, which is why, as my hon. Friend said, it is so important.
The NHS continues to do groundbreaking research to improve treatment for children with neuroblastoma. Supported by the National Institute for Health and Care Research and Great Ormond Street, it has identified a new drug target for children with neuroblastoma, with the hope that new, less intrusive therapies will be developed by targeting a developmental cell type that exists only in neuroblastoma tumours after a child is born. This team of scientists and doctors at Great Ormond Street and University College London has been awarded a £519,000 Wellcome Trust innovator award to continue its ground- breaking research using image-guided surgery for childhood cancers—that is specifically for neuroblastoma.
The NIHR has also awarded funding to support the development of a treatment decision aid for parents of children with neuroblastoma that has sadly relapsed. The study will consist of two phases and aims to develop an intervention to support parents who are having to make multiple different treatment decisions after their child has relapsed. I will gladly meet my hon. Friend and the NIHR to see what further steps we can take to boost research into neuroblastoma.
My hon. Friend referenced the letter that the hon. Member for Batley and Spen sent to my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister regarding the bivalent vaccine trial, which is not currently available in the United Kingdom. UK clinicians and researchers are hesitant about the US trial of bivalent vaccines for children in remission with neuroblastoma, because it has no comparator group to enable measurement of the treatment’s effectiveness and effect. I also understand that the trial involves very intensive and invasive post-treatment monitoring. Nevertheless, I know discussions are ongoing in the international community, including here in the United Kingdom, on the optimal trial design that will generate the high-quality evidence needed to understand the real efficacy of the bivalent vaccine in this group of patients.
Again, I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Darlington for bringing this hugely important matter to the House and, importantly, for sharing Luke’s story. I thank Luke’s family for the work they are doing, not just in raising awareness, which of course is hugely important, but in the support they are giving to families in similar positions. I am pleased to assure my hon. Friend that, together with groundbreaking research supported by the NIHR and the continued efforts of the NHS in recovering cancer services, the treatment of neuroblastoma and all other cancers remains an absolute top priority for not just me but this Government.
Let me conclude by saying that my hon. Friend asked three specific questions, and my answer to all three is: yes, yes and yes.
Finally, I ask you to indulge me on something, Madam Deputy Speaker. Without embarrassing the Whip on duty—Whips rarely get a mention—let me say that I understand my good friend, my hon. Friend the Member for North Cornwall (Scott Mann), is marrying his partner Nicola this weekend. I wish him all the very best for a wonderful day and them a very happy future together. [Hon. Members: “Hear, hear.”]
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)
I am sure that the whole House will join the Minister and me in sending our congratulations and best wishes to the hon. Gentleman and his fiancée and family for a wonderful wedding at the weekend—we hope the sun shines for them.
I also thank the House for a very constructive debate. I have said before that I do wish that people who watch our proceedings would pay more attention to these kinds of debates, where we are discussing a matter of great importance and sensitivity, and where the House can welcome the family of a little boy such as Luke, and let them know that we, as a whole Parliament, are working for them and that this place is not only about loud and aggressive argument.
Question put and agreed to.