NHS 10-Year Plan

Baroness Morgan of Drefelin Excerpts

Wednesday 9th July 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Blake of Leeds (Lab)]

As someone who has been involved in the plan, I start by saying to the noble Baroness that although it might echo things that have happened in the past, there is an enormous difference now. There is a depth of collaboration, bringing people together and recognising the different cultures in organisations. Of the 200 bodies that are going to be dismantled, Healthwatch is one; it has been very positive and has contributed to the future plan for how this is all going to look. There has been a step change in how we get out and work with people. It is a very ambitious plan, which I am pleased about. I am also very optimistic, because, quite frankly, too many professionals have gone too close to the edge and they realise what is on the other side if we do not all pull together and do something about this.

We are disappointed about the BMA decision to strike. The majority of resident doctors did not vote to strike, and threatening strike action that could harm patients will set back progress. I assure the noble Baroness that no one on these Benches is welcoming the strike. The basic truth is that, thanks to this Government, resident doctors have received a 28.9% pay rise compared to three years ago, and the highest pay award in the entire public sector this year. The Secretary of State met the BMA yesterday. Although he has made it very clear that the Government cannot go further on pay than we already have this year, he has offered to work with resident doctors to resolve issues they might face around working conditions. It will, of course, be down to their managers to work with staff to come up with a plan to deal with the action that is being proposed.

[Baroness Morgan of Drefelin (Lab)]

My Lords, I add my welcome for this 10-year plan. I also welcome my noble friend to her position and send my best wishes to the Minister, the noble Baroness, Lady Merron; I hope she recovers very quickly.

Like the noble Lord, Lord Scriven, I can see some echoes—or important themes—that the 10-year plan picks up. I was particularly interested to think about how the themes in the 10-year plan will dovetail with what I hope will be a new cancer plan that will come out in the autumn. I am particularly interested in how, for example, prompt diagnosis will be promoted. Are we going to think about stratified screening, with faster diagnosis targets, or faster access to clinical trials for patients with cancer, or speeding up access to modern medicine so that we can have those cutting-edge treatments widely available?

All that is set out in the 10-year plan and the investment—particularly the capital investment, which I welcome—leads me to believe that I can feel very optimistic about what is coming down the track in the autumn. I hope the Minister can give me some assurance. After all, one in two of us may go on to develop cancer in our lifetime, and that is an awful lot of the population.

[Baroness Blake of Leeds (Lab)]

I thank my noble friend for her interest. Of course, the 10-year health plan sets out how we will fight cancer on all fronts. She is quite right that the national cancer plan is going to be published later this year, setting out in detail how we will increase survival rates through early diagnosis and access to better-quality treatment, and how we move forward with care in the community to help with lives beyond cancer. There is a great deal of detail behind this; I cannot go into it now, but I am happy to discuss it.

Social Cohesion and Community during Periods of Change

Baroness Morgan of Drefelin Excerpts

Friday 6th December 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Morgan of Drefelin (Lab)]

My Lords, wow—what a thought-provoking debate, and we are not even half way through. I thank the most reverend Primate for securing this debate. I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Sharma, on what was an outstanding and sobering maiden speech. I look forward to hearing when there might be more time to discuss the issues he raised. It was also lovely to be reminded of the legacy of Baroness Kinnock. What a lovely debate so far.

I want to focus on something of quite a practical nature: the role of volunteering in bringing communities together, especially at times of change and in this time of global uncertainty. I declare an interest as the chair of the National Council for Voluntary Organisations—the NCVO. It is the largest membership organisation for the voluntary sector in England and speaks up on behalf of 16,000 members, from the very largest charities down to very small local community groups. We know that these organisations are often at the heart and soul of our communities. Like the noble Baroness, Lady Bottomley, by communities, I mean communities in the widest sense—communities of interest, communities of concern and communities that bring together those with shared values, not just communities rooted in place.

Resilience for our charities and for our communities go hand in hand. Local charities are deeply rooted in our towns and villages, as we know. They create spaces for us to connect and support local causes. As we have heard, during the pandemic, after the invasion of Ukraine and, as the most reverend Primate said, following the summer riots, we saw how crucial it was for people to come out on to the streets to support their communities and tidy up—to do those very basic things, and hold each other in creating a sense of hope. The contributions of communities and volunteers extend beyond crisis, although they are perhaps most visible in crisis; they represent the spirit of citizenship, which, as we have already heard, is so vital.

Volunteering is a cornerstone of civic participation. Research from 2023 showed that children who volunteer are more likely to become active voters, even if they come from homes where politics is not a big topic around the kitchen table. Who cannot have been encouraged to hear on the radio only recently about the Scouts going out delivering Christmas cards and doing all the things that young groups do with such incredible enthusiasm?

Unfortunately, formal volunteering is in decline. The Department for Culture, Media and Sport’s Community Life Survey showed a drop in monthly volunteering from one in four people in 2019-20 to one in six people in 2021-22. That is a significant change. Pro Bono Economics highlights a longer-term downward trend, with a decline of over 10% in formal volunteering since 2015. This is worrying for small grass-roots charities which depend heavily on volunteers, as well as for the larger, more famous groups. Recent data from the VCSE Data and Insights National Observatory at Nottingham Trent University shows that six out of 10 charities are struggling to recruit volunteers.

We have an opportunity to turn that round, with the right approach to policy-making. The NCVO’s Time Well Spent survey gives us some insights as to why fewer people are volunteering and what might help to reverse the trend. Flexibility is key. Many non-volunteers said that they would be more likely to volunteer if opportunities were more flexible. Satisfaction is lower among disabled volunteers, those from deprived areas and people from minority backgrounds. This suggests we can make volunteering more inclusive. Financial concerns also play a role, especially among young volunteers, with only half feeling confident that their expenses would be reimbursed. We know from the Community Life Survey that people from deprived areas are less likely to volunteer with the high cost of living playing heavily on their minds. This could be something that the Government need to worry about getting worse.

Despite these challenges, there is a lot of untapped potential, as 62% of people who have not volunteered in the last three years said that they could be encouraged to volunteer. There is a huge opportunity for government to support the voluntary sector. I would like the Minister and those he collaborates with in government to think about a few policy areas.

I am not expecting any rabbits out of the hat today, but the first thing we should look at is the right to request paid leave for volunteering. I have worked with many blue-chip companies around the UK that want to support their staff to volunteer, so let us make this something really easy for people to request. That would allow more people to give their time without putting too much pressure on business and public services.

Secondly, we should look at amending Section 50 of the Employment Rights Act, to ensure that reasonable time off for trustee duties could be allowed. We do this for school governors, who already get time off under this legislation. Trustees could play a vital role in improving the levels of volunteering. They are the ones who lead charities; let us give them, as we do school governors, some time off to do that vital job. There are currently 100,000 trustee vacancies, so that could be improved with positive policy thinking.

Thirdly, we need to ensure that everyone—and this is a big one—claiming benefits can volunteer without fearing they will lose their benefits. Volunteering should not be seen as something that undermines a person’s availability to work. It is not something that means that they are less likely to find their way back into work. Volunteering can build confidence and experience, and allow people to make a valuable contribution to the community. Let us think about that in a positive way.

Policy decisions can, I am sure, have an impact on volunteering. Volunteering is essential to safeguarding our social cohesion; as we have heard, it is the glue that keeps our communities together. So, volunteering is vital for the future of our communities. We need to turn the decline around and I am absolutely positive that, with the commitment of this Labour Government, that can be done, to draw on their collaborations across government and to think of volunteering as a positive, not a challenge, to our communities. Thank you.