Suicide

Lord Dobbs Excerpts

Tuesday 8th September 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bethell (Con)]

The noble and right reverend Lord is entirely right that suicide is an awful form of death. Each one is worth regret, but the numbers are more complicated than he suggests, as the definitions of suicides and the coroner’s assignment of the suicide definition has changed in the period he describes. While we are all concerned about society, I am not sure I entirely agree with his sombre analysis of society’s values. I have a more optimistic outlook than he perhaps does. The Government’s suicide prevention programme entirely addresses the concerns of individuals and is, I believe, having a powerful effect.

[Lord Dobbs (Con)]

Recently published figures show an alarming, significant increase in suicides among young people, even boys and girls aged 10. Those were pre-Covid statistics. Those statistics are heartbreaking and, I think we all agree, inexcusable. Does my noble friend believe that the social media companies are really owning up to their responsibilities in combating abuse and bullying online? Are we owning up to our responsibilities in schools to educate children about the safe use of social media and to pass on to them the wisdom and support they need?

[Lord Bethell (Con)]

My noble friend is entirely right to raise concerns about the role of social media in rising suicide rates among young people. We are doing an enormous amount to protect young people, incentivising every school to identify a senior lead for mental health, creating new mental health support teams and piloting a four-week waiting time to allow swifter access to specialist NHS care. We are also taking on the social media companies and demanding that they step up to their responsibilities.

Covid-19: Response

Lord Dobbs Excerpts

Monday 27th July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bethell [V]]

My Lords, we can undoubtedly do better in the area of hygiene. The guidance is very clear on what types of detergents work and how they should best be administered. I pay tribute to the cleaning staff in the NHS, who have worked incredibly hard during the epidemic, putting themselves at risk; they have done a very good job. None the less, our view is that the greatest challenge is to change the behaviours of the British public. Work still needs to be done to persuade all of us to wash our hands more and to maintain cleaner personal hygiene. Transmission of the disease happens most often through manual contact—touching the face and shaking hands. That can only be challenged by washing hands.

[Lord Dobbs (Con) [V]]

My Lords, Public Health England has been including in its death totals those who once had Covid, recovered, but have since died from other causes. So, if you once had the virus but no longer have it, and get hit by a bus, you still get listed as a Covid casualty. How can Ministers and others reach sensible policy decisions when the basic statistics provided to them seem so flawed? Has this bizarre practice now stopped? Have Public Health England offered any justification for it?

[Lord Bethell [V]]

The Secretary of State has asked Public Health England to review the logging of death statistics; we await the review’s results.

Covid-19: Personal Protective Equipment

Lord Dobbs Excerpts

Thursday 16th July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bethell [V]]

My Lords, it is a reality that the cost of PPE has gone through the roof. There is nothing that I or the Government can do about that. It is something we are going to have to live with and budget for: it is part of the new reality. As to the procurement of PPE, as the noble Baroness knows, within the care sector it was previously the arrangement that local providers would source their own PPE. The Government have stepped in to bring resilience and confidence to that supply chain and to offer alternative sources of supply to local care homes. We have moved emphatically and sought to bring both affordability and resilience to the supply chain.

[Lord Dobbs (Con) [V]]

My Lords, I was going to ask my noble friend about private sector provision of PPE, but I shall move on to something which may be even more significant—the hopeful news of developments in Oxford scientists identifying a vaccine against Covid. Is my noble friend able to offer any update on that news? Can he set out what role the private sector has in the development and, we hope, eventual manufacture of any such vaccine?

Personal Protective Equipment

Lord Dobbs Excerpts

Wednesday 24th June 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bethell [V]]

The noble Baroness is entirely right to emphasise the importance of getting home care workers adequate supplies. The expectation is that the majority of social care providers, including home care providers, would continue to access PPE via their normal wholesale suppliers, but we are rapidly overhauling the way in which PPE is delivered to care homes and domestic care supplies, including through emergency dispatches via the pilot e-portal and the national supply disruption response.

[Lord Dobbs (Con)]

My Lords, it is not simply stockpiling but the ability to supply PPE as and when needed that is so important. Will my noble friend join me in welcoming and congratulating the private sector—firms up and down the country, big and small—which provided such tremendous support in meeting our recent PPE demands, demands not always recognised by Public Health England at the time? Can he assure us that we have learned the lessons and that we can rely on the experience, initiative and abilities of the private sector? Is he able to tell us that in future he expects, if he cannot guarantee, that all future PPE demands will be available from firms in Britain, rather than relying on sources from other, perhaps less reliable, countries?

[Lord Bethell [V]]

My noble friend Lord Dobbs is entirely right: British companies have done an amazing job of stepping up to this challenge. I pay testament to Survitec, Bollé, Jaguar Land Rover, Don & Low and Burberry, which have all made huge contributions, and to the 350 firms we are currently negotiating with to create a new domestic supply. Nearly 2 billion items of PPE have been supplied through UK-based manufacturers. The moment when we are exclusively and entirely dependent on UK supply is some way off, but this provides a critical cushion and helps to build resilience for these important products.

Covid-19

Lord Dobbs Excerpts

Thursday 23rd April 2020 Lords Chamber

[The Deputy Speaker]

Lord Woolf. No? Lord Dobbs.

[Lord Dobbs (Con)]

Minister, are prisoners in our prison system participating in the manufacture of PPE? Does the crisis not represent an opportunity for many prisoners to not only contribute but move towards some rehabilitation?

[Lord Bethell]

My noble friend Lord Dobbs is right that there seems to be an opportunity, but I have to be candid with him. Our need for PPE runs into hundreds of millions of items. We have delivered more than 1 billion pieces of PPE since Covid began. I am afraid to say that the manufacturing abilities of Her Majesty’s prisons do not reach to that kind of level.

Covid-19: Extent of Infection

Lord Dobbs Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd April 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bethell]

I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Sheehan, for a very clear Question. I can reassure her on three points. First, front-line staff in the NHS and in care homes are eligible for test on request and we will be opening lines so that they can phone and book their own testing shortly. Secondly, I commend and thank those private research labs already contributing enormously to our testing regime. Thirdly, mass testing is one of the options that we are looking at: the Cabinet Office is devising plans for the medium term and will be publishing them shortly.

[Lord Dobbs (Con)]

First, I very sincerely thank my noble friend for his tireless work during this crisis. Did he by any chance see the BBC report yesterday under the headline “Deaths at 20-year high”? Digging into that needlessly sensationalist headline, intriguingly it reported that the apparent increase was one-third linked to the virus but two-thirds linked to non-virus cases. We all understand that there is an inevitable impact on others while we direct our focus towards the coronavirus, but have the Government undertaken any study of the estimated increase in the number of deaths of non-virus patients during the economic lockdown, and, if so, will they publish its conclusions?

[Lord Bethell]

My noble friend Lord Dobbs is entirely right to put his finger on this important matter. The CMO was clear from the very beginning that Britain’s mortality rate came as much from Covid as from non-Covid deaths. We review this situation regularly and thoroughly, and we will be glad to update the House at a future date. We are very conscious of the threat of which my noble friend speaks.

National Health Service: Bullying

Lord Dobbs Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd July 2019 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Blackwood of North Oxford]

I thank the noble Baroness for that proposal; I shall certainly look into it. A number of measures have been put in place to enable a safe space for whistleblowers to come forward, including a number of regulations ensuring that they are protected and that non-disclosure agreements do not inhibit them from coming forward, but I will certainly consider her proposal.

[Lord Dobbs (Con)]

My Lords, does my noble friend accept that the rights that we all enjoy with the National Health Service also come with commensurate responsibilities: the responsibilities of patients not to abuse staff and to turn up to their appointments, and the responsibilities of staff to ensure that the National Health Service is being used honestly and responsibly? Does she agree that the BMA’s recent announcement that charging health tourists is “fundamentally racist” is not only bonkers but financially disgraceful, and deeply damaging to the people and the patients the National Health Service was set up to protect?

[Baroness Blackwood of North Oxford]

I certainly agree that charging those who come from other countries and use the National Health Service is perfectly sensible and appropriate, and by no means racist. I also believe that, as the call for action on bullying says, it should be perfectly straightforward to get out messages on safety from senior leaders and staff voices. It should be a positive message about how it is a natural extension of the social contract between the NHS and those who use it.

Hospices: Impact of NHS Pay Increases

Lord Dobbs Excerpts

Monday 18th June 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord O'Shaughnessy]

I can reassure the noble Lord that we are looking at that. Hospices work closely with local CCGs, which provide around 30% of their funding. We estimate that around 9,000 nurses work in hospices, and clearly we want to make sure that that number not only stays level but increases so that we can start to deliver the choice that we have committed to in palliative care for people.

[Lord Dobbs (Con)]

My Lords, the hospice movement helps over 200,000 patients every year, and they help not only the patients who are at that point in their lives but their relatives, leaving them with fantastic and positive experiences rather than the alternative which is available. The hospice movement is largely funded by the private sector—

[Noble Lords]

Question!

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Dobbs]

I will quickly get to that—I have a very important question. The hospice movement is largely funded by the private sector—by public subscription, not by central government. Can my noble friend use his great skills, of which we are all admirers, to make sure that nothing that the Government do undermines the hospice sector and that we find ever more imaginative and successful ways to support such a vital role?

[Lord O'Shaughnessy]

I will certainly do everything that I can. I agree that hospices are a fantastic example of the kind of mixed economy that this country does so well, with philanthropic and public contributions, and we must make sure that both those continue.

NHS: Charitable Donations

Lord Dobbs Excerpts

Thursday 22nd February 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord O’Shaughnessy]

That is precisely the point. Any of us who have spent time in hospital will know that those charities are well advertised. As I say, they have £400 million of income, which I think makes them second only to cancer research in terms of income for health charities. I agree that they are a real asset to our health system.

[Lord Dobbs (Con)]

My Lords, I have a great deal of sympathy with what the noble Lord, Lord Brooke, said, because he talked about the National Health Service being a right but also said that we have individual responsibilities. Is it not time to put much greater scrutiny on the issues of not only missed appointments but the abuse of health tourism and the Friday night nightmares of people who turn up at A&E not sick but overindulged, and expect the taxpayer to help them out?

[Lord O’Shaughnessy]

My noble friend is quite right—we of course have a responsibility to use this precious resource responsibly. On health tourism, we have introduced a number of changes to recoup the amount of money spent on non-UK citizens who have not contributed to the tax system. We have made good progress on that. I take his point on alcohol, which we are dealing with in a couple of ways. One is obviously by taxing alcohol through the tax system but we also have to do much more preventive work so that people drink less.

NHS: Working Conditions

Lord Dobbs Excerpts

Wednesday 5th July 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord O'Shaughnessy]

As the noble Lord knows, we have talked about one of the reasons for the drop-off in nurses coming from the European Union; it is because of the stricter language testing. Stricter language testing was brought in for reasons of patient safety and was supported by the noble Lord when the regulations went through in 2015. Indeed, I think there was cross-party support for that. As for anti-EU rhetoric, I do not recognise that in anything that we have said. We absolutely value the contribution of anyone who is living and working here in the UK, and indeed have made a very generous offer to solve this problem as part of the talks for leaving the European Union. As for recruitment, of course we want to recruit as widely as possible. We want the brightest and the best to be here, and that is an absolutely core part of any immigration strategy.

[Lord Dobbs (Con)]

My Lords, are we not in danger of missing an important point in this discussion? Simon Stevens, the head of the NHS in England, recently talked about the abuse of the system by those who selfishly and drunkenly turn up at A&E on a Friday evening expecting the NHS to bail them out. There is the abuse of health tourism, and indeed abuse by those who simply fail to turn up their appointment. Is there not an abuse here that is costing hundreds of millions, if not billions, of pounds to the NHS, disrupting the service for those who really need it? Should we not be doing more to crack down on this abuse?

[Lord O'Shaughnessy]

I completely agree with my noble friend. That is one reason why we are taking steps to deal with health tourism and to ensure that people who not only abuse the system but actually abuse NHS staff, which unfortunately is far too prevalent, are properly prosecuted.