Children with Serious Neurological Conditions

Adam Jogee Excerpts

Thursday 20th November 2025 Commons Chamber

[James Asser]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. That is the thrust of this issue. There are multiple agencies involved, but if one is failing in an area or there is a gap, it creates huge problems. It is about being parent-sensitive and child-sensitive, looking at where the gaps are and ensuring that we have the necessary facilities, support and access available speedily where they are needed.

[Adam Jogee (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. May I put to him the importance of communication? He has just touched on the many cases of families going to a million and one different agencies to seek support. More often than not, when there is a need for those agencies to speak to each other and then get back to the families who are trying to support their children, those agencies are missing in action. Improved communication across the piece has never been needed more than now.

[James Asser]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. Communications are a key part of the point I was making about interconnectivity. Parents are required to repeat the diagnosis so many times. Agencies need to be talking to each other and sharing information to make life easier for the families and carers of children.

A joined-up approach can help relieve the pressure. Within that, it is vital that parents—and grandparents, where that is the case—are recognised as genuine partners in decisions about their child’s care. Their experience, insights and wishes should carry appropriate weight from the outset, and reflect the deep understanding they hold of their child’s day-to-day needs. In addition, families have emphasised the importance of improving access to paediatric neurorehabilitation, which is uneven across the country.

For children with long-term neurological conditions, timely access to specialist rehabilitation can significantly improve outcomes, independence and quality of life. Reducing the overall burden on families, emotionally, practically and financially, should remain a guiding principle. Strengthening the pathways for second opinions, mediation, ethics involvement, transfer options and rehabilitation would all help to support families during their most vulnerable moments.

I want to recognise the work of the Tafida Raqeeb Foundation and similar organisations. Their experience with families in the most difficult circumstances offers valuable insight, and their contributions can help inform the foundations of a more supportive framework, one that ensures parental involvement, early resolution of disputes, safe transfer options and improved rehabilitation, all centred on the welfare of the child—much as my hon. Friend the Member for Bexleyheath and Crayford (Daniel Francis) suggested when he spoke about involving families.

Finally, I pay tribute to the extraordinary resilience of the families: the parents who become carers overnight; the siblings who grow up with remarkable empathy; and, above all, the children themselves, who show courage that humbles us all. Their strength inspires us, but it also reminds us that our systems must match their resilience with compassion, clarity and consistency.

We do not require radical restructuring to make progress; what is needed is better co-ordination, commitment and recognition that caring for children with serious neurological conditions is a whole-family, whole-system challenge. In honour of the children we have lost, in support of those still fighting and in solidarity with every family navigating these profound challenges, I believe we can continue to do better.

Myalgic Encephalomyelitis

Adam Jogee Excerpts

Wednesday 19th November 2025 Westminster Hall

[Adam Dance]

I agree. It is really important that the Government provide more support for ME, because it affects the lives of a lot of people.

[Adam Jogee (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Lab)]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way, from one Adam to another. I want to give a shout out to ME Group Staffordshire, which does wonderful work in supporting my constituents and people in the surrounding areas, and does so much to challenge the stigma that many people living with ME face on a daily basis, as the hon. Gentleman talked about. As the Minister looks to provide the support that we are all calling for today, I hope that she will consider extending it to those groups and communities that support people with ME, including some of my constituents.

[Adam Dance]

I agree that we need lots more support groups across the country. It is really good that the hon. Member has one in his constituency.

Iona’s school offered her no help; indeed, it told her that she would fail all her GCSEs. She went to her GP and other doctors many times but was told that she was “anxious and did not know it”, that she “did not want to go to school”, that she “was depressed” or even that “nothing was wrong” with her at all. Anyone who knew Iona knew that that was ridiculous. She is a positive, determined, intelligent and hard-working person, and it is only because of her determination that she finally received support—she got it only because she and her family kept pushing for it. People should not have to be medics or administrative experts to get the support that they need.

Even after Iona received some support, limited knowledge meant that she was told to do graded exercise therapy, which did her more harm than good. Eventually, the Somerset ME service provided helpful advice and medical letters that unlocked support in education and from the council. However, that service is a short-term service that cannot provide medical care, and Iona has often found that GPs do not understand the nature of the service. Today, she still receives little or no medical help.

It is great that the NHS has rolled out training on ME, but people such as Iona who have ME and who have lost trust in the health system need to know how we can monitor the uptake of that training to change attitudes and reduce stigma among the medical profession. That is so important, yet more broadly the ME delivery plan lacks clear accountability structures, has no proper way to measure impact and has no clear deadline to meet. I hope that the Minister can respond to those concerns today.

Greater funding and support for research are also vital. Germany has pledged €500 million to research ME and find a cure for it. It is time that this country also stepped up and showed the same ambition. We owe Iona and all those with ME at least that much. In fact, Iona herself wants to contribute to such research and is now at university, studying hard after achieving fantastic results at school. People with ME are not asking for much; they just want to be believed and to receive the support they deserve. It is about time they got that support.

Postural Tachycardia Syndrome

Adam Jogee Excerpts

Tuesday 14th October 2025 Westminster Hall

[Cat Smith]

I very much agree.

[Adam Jogee (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on her knee exercises this morning in giving way to us all. May I give voice to my constituent Eva from Newcastle-under-Lyme? She has been in touch with me after I met her at a coffee morning recently. Her concerns are on early diagnosis, access to services and the fact that she is stuck on a waiting list down here in London and has been for a very long time indeed. The situation simply is not good enough, and I look forward to hearing from the Minister what action we will see—and sooner rather than later.

[Cat Smith]

There is a particular crisis in London, which I will address later in my speech and which my hon. Friend might be very interested in.

Children’s Health

Adam Jogee Excerpts

Thursday 10th July 2025 Commons Chamber

[Dr Opher]

I totally agree—indeed, my hon. Friend pre-empts some of my remarks.

Another proposal in the 10-year plan involves the investment, through Sports England, of £250 million into such opportunities for children. The Starlight Children’s Foundation promotes play and exercise, and I am a particular fan of adventure playgrounds in urban areas, which allow children to cut loose, particularly after school, expend energy, and have fun in a safe setting.

I am also working with colleagues on access to nature. It is incredibly important that every child has access to nature, so that they can explore nature and have that type of exercise. I also stress that 50% of children have active travel—bike or walking—to get themselves to school. Let us increase that; let us try to get more children cycling and walking to school, as that will increase their fitness.

Dental care is also in the 10-year plan. I am delighted to see that supervised brushing is already there, and also that fluoride varnish will be applied by people to prevent dental caries from occurring. I will give a quick shout-out on asthma prevention, which is key and all about air quality. I know some young people who, since the ultra low emission zone scheme was introduced, have stopped using their inhalers because pollution has gone down. That is something we must emphasise.

[Adam Jogee (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Lab)]

On air quality, will my hon. Friend join me in paying tribute to the Stop the Stink campaigners in Newcastle-under-Lyme, who fought so hard to clean the air around schools such as St Mary’s primary school on Silverdale Road? Their work helped to make the lungs of our young people that bit healthier.

[Dr Opher]

Absolutely, and I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention. He is right: clean air is one way to address our five most preventable health risks, and we must do more on that.

[Adam Jogee]

Will my hon. Friend join me in calling on the Government to adopt World Health Organisation levels for particulate matter 2.5?

[Dr Opher]

I am afraid that is not my special area, but it sounds like a good idea and I thank my hon. Friend. Because we cannot see clean air, we do not realise what it is doing, but people genuinely need their inhalers less, and particularly for young people with asthma that is incredibly important.

I want to talk quickly about early years support. In Gloucestershire, an organisation called Home-Start involves volunteers going into the homes of women who have just given birth to support them. Interestingly, women who have had that support often go on to be volunteers. It is a fantastic organisation. This week I was delighted that the successor to Sure Start, Best Start family hubs, is coming back. Sure Start was one of the most glorious things that the Blair Government did, and it affected the health of young people enormously. I am pleased that childcare is getting much more funding. Furthermore, as set out in the 10-year plan, Healthy Start will be restarted in 2026-27, providing money to pregnant women and children aged one to four whose families are in financial difficulty, helping those who are less well off.

Mental healthcare is in a bit of a crisis. Some 25% of young people have mental health issues. We spend only 10% of NHS funds on mental health, but it contributes to over 20% of morbidity. About a million people are on the child and adolescent mental health service waiting list at the moment, and I know that Ministers are doing all that they can to bring that down. To prevent poor mental health, we need to look at exercise, as I have mentioned, and at music in schools, which is proven to reduce rates of mental ill health. I am backing the National Education Union campaign to get rid of SATs, which cause enormous tension and stress in young people.

On treatment, I am delighted that we will have mental health support teams in every school—I understand that 60% will be in place by next April, and 100% by the end of this Parliament. We will have 8,500 more mental health workers and a whole-school approach. I particularly endorse the mental health first aid training that has happened in some Stroud schools, and I have also been looking at the Young Futures hubs.

With the massive CAMHS waiting list—in my area, people sometimes have to wait for two years—and the sudden increase in neurodiversity, we need to look at schemes that use creative and social prescriptions to deal with those children while they are on the waiting list. Given the right support, I reckon a lot of them will not need specialist psychiatric assessment. I am chair of the beyond pills all-party parliamentary group. Are hon. Members aware that one in eight 12 to 17-year-olds have been put on a selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor antidepressant? That is scandalous.

This year, I hosted a roundtable at the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health. Children are generally waiting longer than adults for care, which we must turn around. As I said, there are often long waiting lists for mental healthcare. Sadly, Harry, the son of my constituent, Louise Turner, had a sarcoma and died at the end of last year. She reports that the nursing staff and doctors were fantastic, but there was a lack of facilities, such that sometimes they would turn up for chemotherapy but there was no bed for Harry, so they had to go away and come back the next day. Going forward, we must ensure that that does not happen.

What is the solution? We need to get paediatric care out of the hospital and into the community. We need to get hot paediatrics—feverish kids—seen in the community, potentially by paediatricians or well-trained GPs. Furthermore, during GP training, which I have carried out for about 25 years, it is essential that every single doctor who becomes a GP has time in a paediatric assessment unit. The main feedback from the roundtable at the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health was that we must involve children in designing paediatric services, otherwise they will not work.

--- Later in debate ---

[Leigh Ingham (Stafford) (Lab)]

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud (Dr Opher) for securing this debate. Like many colleagues in this House, I stood for election on a promise to help raise the healthiest generation of children in our country’s history—a bold ambition, but a worthy one. In order to get there, we need to look beyond the doctor’s office or the dinner table.

One of the most powerful and often overlooked tools that we have is physical activity—sports and play, and the chance to be outside. When sports and play are a part of a child’s daily life, they become a training ground not just for the body, but for life. In Stafford and across our villages, I have seen brilliant teachers and community workers help children to build the skills and confidence they need to stay engaged. One young constituent, Tane, spoke honestly to me about what he sees among his peers: rising mental health struggles, too much time online and a worrying dip in resilience. He is right, because when children do not get the opportunity to move and play, it affects their wellbeing and education, but also their future.

Where else but in sport do children learn how to lose with grace, win with kindness and keep going when things get tough? But not all children have parents who can afford to pay for clubs, kits or transport. For many, school is the only place where they will ever get to be part of a team or even discover a sport they love. That is why PE should never be seen as optional; it must be a core part of every school week. I welcome the Government’s renewed support for school sport partnerships, and their commitment to equality between girls and boys in sport, but we can go further. That means multi-year funding settlements that schools can count on, and a clear ambition that every child, no matter their background, has access to sport and play.

In Stafford, I have been campaigning for more inclusive public play places. Families of disabled and neurodivergent children tell me they avoid parks because they have nothing that their children can safely enjoy. Campaigners have spoken powerfully about this, as Christine McGuinness did only yesterday. Play is not a luxury; it is essential for children’s development, their health and their joy.

[Adam Jogee]

I am grateful to my constituency neighbour for giving way. For every Christine in Stafford, there is a Christine in Newcastle-under-Lyme too, and one uniting point that my hon. Friend and I will no doubt put to our colleagues at Staffordshire county council is for them to play their part, and to play their part fast.

[Leigh Ingham]

I am already on record as criticising Staffordshire county council today, so I will hold off in this debate—although it could be better at everything.

My commitment to play is why I co-sponsored the amendment to the Planning and Infrastructure Bill, in the name of my hon. Friend the Member for Bournemouth East (Tom Hayes), that seeks to provide in law for sufficient play opportunities, especially inclusive play opportunities. I call on the Government to invest in potential, and to give every child the opportunity to grow up healthy, confident and, importantly, resilient—ready not just for school, but for life.

Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill

Adam Jogee Excerpts

Report stage
Friday 13th June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Gregory Stafford]

My right hon. Friend is entirely correct.

The Royal College of Physicians has said:

“Medicines prescribed and administered in assisted dying must be regulated for safety and efficacy for this use.”

If that is a requirement of the Royal College of Physicians, we in the House should take it seriously and put it into the Bill.

I will now draw my remarks to a close, but I should say that I also support amendment 99, which would require a report on the drug’s effects before Parliament approves the regulation, as well as a number of the other amendments, which hopefully would remove the wide-ranging Henry VIII powers currently in the Bill. In the light of all that I have said, I remain deeply sceptical as to whether the Bill, in its current state, provides the robust, protective and operationally sound framework that such a profound societal change deserves.

[Adam Jogee (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Lab)]

I am grateful to you, Madam Deputy Speaker, for giving me my first opportunity to speak in the Chamber on this most important of issues. As I do so, I think of all those who were killed in the horrendous plane crash in India yesterday. I think of their families, their friends and the lives they have left behind. May their collective and individual memories be a blessing.

I rise to speak to amendment 42, tabled in my name and those of more than 60 colleagues from the majority of parties in the House, representing constituencies in all four nations of our United Kingdom. It would remove the automatic commencement of the Bill’s provisions in England. It is a safeguard, good and proper.

As it stands, the entire assisted dying process will commence automatically in England four years after the Bill is passed. Notwithstanding some of the comments we have heard, that will happen regardless of how far along the plans and preparations are—plans for the manufacturing and supply of the drugs that will be used to end the life of anyone who chooses this step; for the identification and training of those on the panel; for the impact on the national health service in England and Wales and its budgets; and all the rest.

Colleagues will know that, as the Bill was originally drafted, the process would have commenced two years after it was passed. I welcome the fact that my hon. Friend the Member for Spen Valley (Kim Leadbeater) amended that period from two years to four. That was a genuinely welcome acknowledgment that such a serious and consequential change to every aspect of our country, from our healthcare system to our legal system, should not, must not and cannot be rushed. Therein lies the basis of my amendment. If this change is going to happen, let us do it properly. Let us not impose a timeframe that puts us in a bind—one that means we are driven by timing over purpose, and the pressure that comes with a ticking clock, rather than by the need to do it properly.

People living in Newcastle-under-Lyme and York Outer, in Buckingham and Bletchley and Pembrokeshire, are counting on us parliamentarians—those of us who are concerned about assisted dying and those who passionately support it. The Bill’s supporters have won every single vote, apart from on this issue in Committee. Our people are counting on us to make sure, if the Bill passes, that it is a success, that it will be consistent and, most importantly, that it will be safe. If the Bill passes, it will introduce assisted dying in the biggest jurisdiction yet by population. These are uncharted waters; this will not be like anything else. The last thing we should do is rush this process.

In Committee, the hon. Member for Richmond Park (Sarah Olney), who spoke excellently earlier today, tabled an amendment to remove the automatic commencement deadline for Wales. It provided that assisted dying could be rolled out only once Welsh Ministers deemed that everything was ready for a safe roll-out. The Committee voted by a majority to give that extra safeguard to the people of Wales. If it was good enough for the people of Wales in Committee, it is good enough for the people of England today. We face a situation in which assisted dying may proceed in England months or even years before it does in Wales. The provisions and systems may look different. The process of organising the English system to meet the arbitrary four-year deadline would almost certainly lead to rushed decision making.

My hon. Friend the Member for Spen Valley has sought to remedy the disparity, but her solution is not to extend to my constituents in England the safeguard that the members of the Bill Committee—members that she appointed—voted for. No, her remedy is to allow for automatic commencement to happen in Wales as well, removing the safeguard that the Committee voted for. The answer is not to fast-track the roll-out of assisted dying in both England and Wales, potentially putting the lives of some of the most vulnerable at even greater risk due to rushed decisions that are not fully thought through.

I have not been on these Benches for very long, but I know that arguing for the automatic commencement of legislation is generally, in the kindest interpretation, unusual. For legislation of this magnitude it is, I am afraid to say, reckless, and reinstating automatic roll-out in Wales when the Committee explicitly voted against it borders on the undemocratic.

[Dame Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

I visited the Isle of Man and met the sponsor of the Bill there. The House of Keys, which has only 24 Members, took three years to get to this point, and the sponsor of the Bill thinks it will take at least five years to implement the Bill in that much smaller jurisdiction.

[Adam Jogee]

My hon. Friend makes a very good point.

[Sir John Hayes]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Adam Jogee]

I will take one intervention from the other side of the House, and then I will continue.

[Sir John Hayes]

The hon. Gentleman is fast becoming one of my favourites on the Government Benches, among many competitors. The point that he makes is fundamental. If we are going to do this right, we have to do it thoroughly and with independent analysis. Had the hon. Member for Spen Valley (Kim Leadbeater) engaged in pre-legislative scrutiny and thorough analysis before introducing the Bill, we may have ironed these matters out in the first place.

[Adam Jogee]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his intervention—it teaches me not to take them. I also thank him for helping my street cred this morning. He raises an important point.

Members of this House have been told that this Bill—it is this Bill we are voting on, not the principle—was rigorously tested and refined in Committee. However, we are now seeing efforts to undermine the decisions of that same Committee. Amendments 94 and 95 serve the singular purpose of undoing amendments introduced in Committee to improve the Bill and make it a safer and more conventional piece of legislation, but their implications go beyond just that: they challenge the basic tenets of our democracy.

One of the key roles at the heart of our democratic system is the role of the or a Minister of the Crown. It is our Ministers who prepare the groundwork for legislation to be enacted successfully, and amendments 94 and 95 would completely do away with that core ministerial function. They would see the responsibility for ensuring the roll-out of assisted dying in Wales—the power that we the people entrust to our Ministers and democracy—taken away from them. [Interruption.]

Conscious of your cough, Madam Deputy Speaker, I shall quickly move towards the end of my remarks—I have taken half of them out already. In my view, Ministers should be able to lead the roll-out of assisted dying in Wales, just as they should in England. It is Ministers, not the supporters of the Bill, who will be responsible for delivering these seismic changes to our health and legal systems, so it is only right that they decide when the provisions become law. Amendment 42 would put England back on an even footing with Wales.

Getting this right is literally a matter of life and death. It makes sense to avoid any possible pressure on decision making and decision makers and, at the very least, allow Ministers to enact legislation with the usual constitutional powers. One death because of a rushed decision would be one too many and should give us all food for thought. I do not want it on my conscience that our collective sticking to an arbitrary deadline led to a death or deaths that may otherwise have not taken place. We must recognise that we can prevent any such situation, and we can prevent that with our vote today. To do so, we must remove the deadline for automatic commencement in England and uphold it in Wales. I urge Members to support my amendment 42 and to vote against amendments 94 and 95.

[Tom Gordon (Harrogate and Knaresborough) (LD)]

I rise to speak to amendment 3 in my name, which would do the exact opposite of the amendments of the hon. Member for Newcastle-under-Lyme (Adam Jogee)—in fact, it would see the commencement period reduced from four years to three years. As a member of the Bill Committee, when we had the initial conversation about increasing the commencement period from two years to four years, I was the only person to speak against it, and I pushed it to a vote.

What frustrates me about the situation we are in is that, in effect, we are acknowledging that the reason we are here and debating this Bill is that the status quo is not acceptable. People are pushed to taking decisions that they should not be and having to go to foreign countries to have opportunities overseas. Those of us who support the Bill are broadly in agreement on those principles. A number of things frustrate me about the four-year period, principally that the people in office—the Government of the day—will not necessarily be here to implement it. I am really hesitant about supporting a Bill when we do not know who would see through those details.

Amendment 3 would reduce the threshold back down to three years, which would still be more than most jurisdictions around the world. Countries have implemented assisted dying legislation after as short a time as six months, 12 months or 18 months, so three years would still be a substantial increase compared with other countries. We are not innovators or leaders in this field: there is no reason why we cannot take best practice and learn from and speak to colleagues around the world. I believe that this Bill has the strongest safeguards of any, which is why I think an implementation period of three years would more than meet the requirements.

Oral Answers to Questions

Adam Jogee Excerpts

Tuesday 6th May 2025 Commons Chamber

[Karin Smyth]

I am sorry for the experience that my hon. Friend’s constituent has had, and he highlights a really important aspect of the patient journey through the system. I want him and the House to be assured that we are looking at the entire patient journey, both into hospital and between hospitals. We are determined to improve patient experience and quality of care, and to get back the patient satisfaction that was squandered by the last Government.

[Adam Jogee (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Lab)]

13. What steps he is taking to tackle hospital backlogs.

[The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Wes Streeting)]

Reducing hospital backlogs is a key priority in this Government’s plan for change, as the 18-week standard for elective care has not been met for almost a decade. Our elective reform plan sets out how we will return to that standard by the end of this Parliament, through a combination of investment and reform. Since July, the waiting list has reduced by over 219,000 and we have delivered an extra 3 million appointments, exceeding our manifesto pledge and doing it earlier than planned.

[Adam Jogee]

I am grateful to the Secretary of State for his answer and for the progress made, but there is still more to do. My constituent in Newcastle-under-Lyme has recently been recovering from brain surgery at the Royal Stoke university hospital. However, she has faced multiple setbacks due to failures in the duty of care, including scalding injuries and a severely mishandled admission process. She is now receiving the correct care, but she had to wait many months to be admitted to the correct ward, and has been given limited time for rehabilitative treatment. Does the Secretary of State agree that to tackle backlogs, our hospitals must have the resources they need to provide the right care the first time round, so that patients are given the time and support to fully and effectively recover?

[Wes Streeting]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his question, and horrified to hear about his constituent’s experience. This Government will never brush problems under the carpet or pretend that things are better than they are, and I know that for all the progress we have made in the past 10 months, there is still so much more to do. When we publish our 10-year plan for health, we must ensure that quality and safety are at the heart of every patient interaction. My hon. Friend is right about the need for investment. That is why we are investing £26 billion in the NHS and social care, and why it is so disappointing that the Opposition parties voted against it.

Oral Answers to Questions

Adam Jogee Excerpts

Tuesday 11th February 2025 Commons Chamber

The Secretary of State was asked—

[Adam Jogee (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Lab)]

1. What steps he has taken to improve access to patient care for people with Parkinson’s disease in Newcastle-under-Lyme constituency.

[Mr Speaker]

I welcome the Minister to her place.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Ashley Dalton)]

I thank my hon. Friend for his continued support for people with Parkinson’s disease, a condition that I know is close to his family. This Government inherited long waits for neurology services, with only 53.4% of patients, including those with Parkinson’s, waiting less than 18 weeks for a referral in June. Our elective reform plan will free up over 1 million appointments each year for those who really need them, including patients with Parkinson’s, and NHS England’s Getting It Right First Time programme continues to work with 27 specialised centres in England, including at University Hospitals of North Midlands.

[Adam Jogee]

I thank the Minister for her answer and congratulate her on her appointment. Will she join me in paying tribute to my constituent Julie Hibbs, from Bradwell in Newcastle-under-Lyme, who has long campaigned for support for people with Parkinson’s, like her? Will the Minister meet me and Julie to discuss the merits of adding Parkinson’s to the medical exemption list, and to discuss how we ensure that those with Parkinson’s get the support they need and deserve?

[Ashley Dalton]

I am happy to meet my hon. Friend and his constituent to discuss all of those matters of concern—I look forward to doing so as soon as my diary will allow.

National Cancer Plan

Adam Jogee Excerpts

Tuesday 4th February 2025 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Gwynne]

Absolutely. Things are advancing so quickly in technology and innovation. It is quite remarkable that science fiction is becoming science fact. We are obviously interested in minimally invasive therapies, and they will form part of the plan. That is why we are consulting. That is the purpose of this exercise: so that we can look at what technologies are here today, what the emerging technologies are and how they will shift the dial on some cancers.

[Adam Jogee (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Lab)]

The House will know that my family, like many others in Newcastle-under-Lyme, has been impacted by cancer in recent times, so I thank the Minister for his statement and his personal commitment to getting this right. On World Cancer Day, I join him in paying tribute to the charities he mentioned in his statement, and particularly my constituents Mary and Colin, who raise so much money every year for Macmillan. Health inequalities in some of our poorest communities and our ethnic minority communities play a big role in cancer being diagnosed. Can the Minister tell me and my constituents in Newcastle-under-Lyme how we will tackle those health inequalities alongside this national cancer plan?

[Andrew Gwynne]

My hon. Friend makes a very good point, and it relates to not just cancer but a whole range of conditions, including cardiovascular disease, strokes and so many others—it is the same areas that have the worst outcomes, because there are endemic health inequalities that we have not shifted the dial on for decades. Life expectancy is much lower, and healthy life expectancy is much worse, than in less deprived areas. It is part of our health mission to drive forward better health outcomes for people living in the poorest areas, and our national cancer plan will be a key part of that.

Hospice and Palliative Care

Adam Jogee Excerpts

Monday 13th January 2025 Commons Chamber

[Sorcha Eastwood (Lagan Valley) (Alliance)]

I thank the hon. Member for Wimbledon (Mr Kohler) for bringing this matter to the House. I also pay tribute to the hon. Member for Spen Valley (Kim Leadbeater) for how she has conducted the debate on assisted dying, which we have all talked about so much and which most hon. Members have mentioned today. Regardless of people’s opinion on the matter, during the debate on the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill everyone agreed that we need to discuss palliative care. We need to ensure such care is delivered equitably, not just locally; as a lot of hon. Members have said, delivery is not only about hospices but about palliation.

I do not have a hospice in my constituency of Lagan Valley, but some of my constituents have been moved to the Southern Area hospice and the Marie Curie hospice. As well as that, we have the wonderful Daisy Lodge—a facility used as a hospice but also as somewhere for people to go to get respite. This is about supporting people to live well. I think it was the hon. Member for Vauxhall and Camberwell Green (Florence Eshalomi) who said during the debate on the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill that before we die, we have to live well. That should really be at the forefront of what we are talking about today whenever we are capturing the spirit of asking how we can help people to live the lives they should be living, in a way that is not impacted by inequality through a loss of services.

One of the issues mentioned during that debate was cancer; I know a lot about that as my husband has cancer. I want to make it clear that most people want to be able to die at home. For some, that is very achievable and doable. However, haematological neoplasms often prohibit many people who suffer from blood cancer from being able to die at home. We heard from the hon. Member for Farnham and Bordon (Gregory Stafford) about issues to do with the workforce. With cancer, there is sometimes a real onus on haematologists because so much of the treatment is do with “the bloods”: how they are performing in terms of chemotherapy, radiotherapy and otherwise. In 2019, the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee raised the issue of workforce with the British Society for Haematology and the Royal College of Pathologists. I was concerned about that at the time, but I am not sure we are much further on with that now so I remain concerned to this day.

I am also concerned about the impact of the national insurance contribution increase. I was the only Northern Irish MP to propose an amendment to the National Insurance Contributions (Secondary Class 1 Contributions) Bill to try to exclude Northern Ireland from the increase; unfortunately, that was unsuccessful. The increase creates an unfair further divide between people who provide community and voluntary services, and those who provide statutory state services.

It is incumbent on all of us to keep talking about dying well. We have a good Irish tradition of wakes; we really get into the spirit of helping people through loss, bereavement and grief. We can continue to do that only if we have strong, well-funded hospices.

[Adam Jogee (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Lab)]

I was in the hon. Lady’s constituency yesterday, so I know well the points she makes and I thank her for letting me visit. She talks about dying well. Will she join me in paying tribute to the Douglas Macmillan hospice, in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent South (Dr Gardner), which does so much to provide care and compassion to many people in Newcastle-under-Lyme and across north Staffordshire, as it seeks to ensure that people do indeed die well?

[Sorcha Eastwood]

I thank the hon. Member for his contribution and of course I will join him in that.

In closing, I want us to keep talking about living and dying well because we cannot shy away from that debate. We owe it to our constituents, not just mine in Lagan Valley but those across the UK, to ensure that we get this right.

Oral Answers to Questions

Adam Jogee Excerpts

Tuesday 7th January 2025 Commons Chamber

[Wes Streeting]

We are determined to improve children and young people’s experience of both mental and physical health services, and we are determined to do more to ensure that mental health and paediatric waits are put under the spotlight and given the same attention as the overall elective backlog. I am sure we will have more to say about that when we publish the 10-year plan.

[Adam Jogee (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Lab)]

T2. I pay tribute to my constituents Sheila and Joe Ward, who have long campaigned for vaccine-injured people and bereaved families following the death of their husband and father. The vaccine damage payment scheme has received 16,824 claims. When can people who are still mourning the loss of loved ones expect to receive the compensation that they deserve?

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Andrew Gwynne)]

In September the Secretary of State and I met the families of people who had suffered harm following the covid-19 vaccination, including my hon. Friend’s constituent Sheila Ward, and they raised the need for reform of the vaccination damage scheme. We listened closely to their descriptions of what they had been through and agreed to look at a number of options, noting that cross-cutting Government decisions might be necessary. We are also working with the NHS Business Services Authority to improve claimants’ experiences of the scheme, and to ensure that claims are processed quickly.