UK Mortality Rates

Debate between Baroness Garden of Frognal and Lord Evans of Rainow

Thursday 12th January 2023 Grand Committee

[Lord Evans of Rainow (Con) (Maiden Speech)]

My Lords, it is a great honour to be here to make the final contribution to this debate. I thank all your Lordships for your kind words of welcome. As a newly appointed Lords Whip, it falls to me to respond on behalf of His Majesty’s Government to this interesting debate. As your Lordships have all noted, this happens also to be my maiden speech.

If I may, I will now turn to the customary part of a maiden speech. I must thank noble Lords for the great welcome they have given me to this place. I also thank Black Rod, the Clerk of the Parliaments, the doorkeepers and police, and particularly my supporters: my noble friends Lord Davies of Gower and Lady Williams of Trafford. We are all very lucky to have such outstanding public services in this place. Needless to say, I am most grateful to my wife Cheryl and my children, George, Tom and Sophie, who have been very supportive in my political and business career. Unfortunately, that has meant I have not always been around in Rainow as often as I would have liked. For things such as homework, sea cadets, rugby, horse-riding and ballet, I have not always been there to support them. But Rainow is of course an idyllic, ancient and rural community; it is a wonderful place to live and work, and to bring up a family.

On a personal note, I am the product of a working-class family, born in a post-war south Manchester council estate. I attended a local comprehensive school, which I left with few qualifications to stack shelves in a local supermarket. However, I developed a passion for politics and an aspiration for business development. I studied at night school for 10 years to get qualified during that period. Working in the technology, aviation and hospitality sectors in senior business development roles, I was able to earn a good living and provide for my family. I hope and believe that my business background will add value to this place. Change is a constant and it is something we need to get right if Great Britain is to prosper in an increasingly competitive and uncertain world.

Turning now to the debate, I am pleased to respond to noble Lords who have contributed on this important issue and thank the noble Lord, Lord Sikka, for securing this debate. I pay tribute to the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health for its report, which explores whether there is a link between the Government’s action to reduce national debt and women’s stalling mortality rates. It concludes that the causal effect “remains unclear” but it raises important policy issues regarding gender differences in work and health, as well as health disparities more broadly.

As set out by the Chancellor in his Autumn Statement and reiterated in the Prime Minister’s address, the Government are committed to reducing the national debt. This is a top priority but noble Lords will agree that a better future is one where our economy grows. It leads to better opportunities for all, particularly in work. We are improving job opportunities for women and ensuring that when women are in work, they are paid equally to men. We achieve this through a range of initiatives including our Great Britain-wide network of jobcentres, the job entry targeted support and restart scheme and DWP’s new progression offer for those already in work. We are committed to working with businesses to accelerate progress and make workplaces fairer. This is enabled by our ground-breaking pay transparency pilot, a number of new returners programmes and our task force on women-led high-growth enterprises.

Turning specifically to women’s health, we know that work and health are inextricably linked. Improving health improves wealth, with long-term ill health a leading cause of economic inactivity. Therefore, as well as addressing women’s access to work, we must ensure women have equal access to healthcare that addresses their specific needs. Although women in the UK on average live longer than men, women spend a significantly greater proportion of their lives in ill health and disability when compared with men. Greater focus must be placed on women-specific health issues such as miscarriage or menopause, and much progress must be made to ensure that women are better represented in vital clinical trials.

The Government are absolutely committed to improving women’s health outcomes. Our recent call for evidence received over 100,000 responses, which informed the first ever government-led Women’s Health Strategy for England. This approach marked a reset in the way the Government are looking at women’s health. The strategy set out how we can improve the way the health and care system listens to women’s voices and boost health outcomes for women and girls.

The final point from the report I want to address is the assessment of the disparities in mortality trends. There are stark disparities in how long people live and how long they live in good health across England. The Government remain committed to the ambition set out in the levelling-up White Paper to improve healthy life expectancy by five years by 2035. As a significant proportion of ill health is preventable, as the noble Lord mentioned, we are focusing on the major conditions which contribute to early mortality and reduce years of good health, as well as on factors such as smoking, poor diet, and alcohol, which disproportionately impact some communities. For instance, we have funded 220,000 blood pressure monitors for people diagnosed with uncontrolled high blood pressure, to empower people to monitor their own health.

We are also modernising NHS health checks, which prevent heart disease, stroke, type 2 diabetes and some cases of dementia and kidney disease, including developing a digital version to increase participation. The Government recognise how important it is to protect and promote the job opportunities and health of the British people, particularly the most vulnerable. The measures I have outlined today will help do that and I look forward to working with noble Lords across this House to share progress and improve the outcomes for women and girls.

I will attempt to answer as many questions as I can in the time available, but if I am unable to do so, please forgive me: I will write after this meeting. The noble Lord, Lord Sikka, asked me to explain why the Government have chosen to squeeze lower and middle-income families. We have announced further support for next year, designed to target the most vulnerable households. This cost of living support is worth £26 billion in 2023-24, in addition to the benefits uprating worth £11 billion to those of working age and the households of disabled people. I might also add that the Government increased the personal allowance to take some of the lowest paid out of tax altogether, while at the same time removing the personal allowance for the highest paid.

The right reverend Prelate the Bishop of London asked about health equality in the White Paper. The Government are committed to supporting individuals to live healthier lives and at the heart of this is improving access to and levelling up healthcare across the country. No decisions have been taken in relation to the White Paper, but we will publish further information on addressing health disparities in due course. I congratulate the right reverend Prelate on the faith work that she has done. I too do that in my own parish of Rainow, walking from church to church, but there are a lot of hills and valleys in the way and you have to be committed to do it.

The noble Lord, Lord Patel, asked what plans and policies the Government will put in place to reduce inequalities. The Department of Health and Social Care is investing £170 million in essential services in the 1,001 days of the Best Start for Life period. We have funded 220,000 blood pressure monitors; we are also modernising NHS checks to drive prevention of heart disease, stroke and type 2 diabetes.

The noble Baroness, Lady Wheeler, and the noble Lord, Lord Davies, asked whether the Government will comment on excess deaths. A detailed assessment is not yet available but it is likely that a combination of factors has contributed to the ONS measure of excess mortality, including high flu prevalence at the moment, ongoing challenges post pandemic, Covid-19 and health conditions such as heart disease and diabetes. As I say, I will write further to noble Lords after the meeting.

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Baroness Garden of Frognal) (LD)]

My Lords, the disadvantage of the Minister making his maiden speech at the end of the debate is that there is nobody to welcome him at the end of it, so I shall just exceed my brief and congratulate him on an excellent maiden speech. I welcome him most warmly to the House.