Ban on Fracking for Shale Gas Bill

Debate between Alan Brown and Maria Caulfield

Wednesday 19th October 2022 Commons Chamber

[Alan Brown]

That is a good question, but it is more one for the Secretary of State. It is clear that he is in favour of it and is imposing his will on the rest of his party.

[Maria Caulfield]

I gently say to Opposition Members that many of us—as we have heard from a number of colleagues in the Chamber—do not support fracking, and if the Opposition want to win hearts and minds, the way to do it is not through political games and stunts such as this, which would introduce a Bill. There is no way that we can support the Opposition taking control of the Order Paper. If they want to be serious about fracking, let us have a serious debate on fracking. When the Government bring forward the motion, we will be able to vote, whether we support fracking or not. The way to do this is not to hijack the Order Paper and play political games with legislation.

[Alan Brown]

I have news for the hon. Member: if she votes for the amendment, she will be voting for the principle of fracking, no matter how she dresses it up.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Alan Brown and Maria Caulfield

Tuesday 19th July 2022 Commons Chamber

[Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)]

22. If he will make an estimate with Cabinet colleagues of the amount of unusable PPE procured by Government since the outbreak of covid-19.

[The Minister of State, Department for Health and Social Care (Maria Caulfield)]

Around 3% of PPE that the Department purchased was unusable. We are working to dispose of this unusable stock in the most environmentally friendly way.

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[Maria Caulfield]

I am very interested to hear from the hon. Lady, because according to The Herald on Sunday recently, half a billion pounds-worth of procurement in Scotland during the pandemic did not go through the usual scrutiny process. I would be very interested to hear her update on that.

[Alan Brown]

The Public Accounts Committee found that there is £4 billion-worth of unusable, substandard PPE in storage, which is due to be incinerated, which is hardly environmentally friendly. While cronies and donors were fast-tracked, this substandard PPE put frontline workers’ lives at risk by preventing them from accessing the right equipment. How much of that £4 billion will be recovered, and what other actions are being pursued against these so-called suppliers?

[Maria Caulfield]

To put this in context, I make no apologies for all the efforts that were made to secure PPE for frontline staff. We delivered more than 21.5 billion items of PPE to keep frontline staff safe during a time when we had a dangerous virus that no one knew anything about, we had no vaccine and there was a global push on the market resources. Those products that we procured that did not meet the standards for health and social care were used in other avenues. For example, we donated masks to transport operators and to schools, so that we could reopen the economy and to help them to keep safe.

Cumberlege Report

Debate between Alan Brown and Maria Caulfield

Thursday 3rd February 2022 Westminster Hall

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

I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Member for Elmet and Rothwell (Alec Shelbrooke) on securing this important debate on Baroness Cumberlege’s review. I was not present for the debate six months ago, so I cannot comment on many of the points that were raised then, but I am keen to update hon. and right hon. Members across the Chamber on the progress that has been made, because I am passionate about improving outcomes for the affected women. Not only do I have a huge amount of respect for Baroness Cumberlege, with whom I am working extremely closely on the results of her report, but she is a constituent of mine. I assure hon. and right hon. Members that she is holding my feet to the fire on all her recommendations.

The findings of the review laid bare the consequences of a healthcare system that has failed to listen and has disregarded the experiences of women. We have heard that movingly in many of today’s contributions, and in many debates in the House, on issues such as painful hysteroscopies, the delay in diagnosis for endometriosis or polycystic ovary syndrome, or women being ignored for years while experiencing symptoms of the menopause. There is a running theme.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May) is exactly right that women often call for change on these issues for many years before their voices are heard. That is why I am pleased that we have England’s first ever women’s health strategy; we set out the vision document before Christmas and we will set out the full strategy very soon. It includes the appointment of a women’s health ambassador, who will look specifically at the issues and priorities in the strategy. We are recruiting at the moment and should have someone in post very soon. That is to make sure that women’s voices are not just heard but acted upon, so that in years to come we are not in a position where women and the MPs representing them are saying, “We have spoken every six months, but the situation hasn’t changed.” I reassure colleagues that I take all these points very seriously.

[Alan Brown]

It is good to hear the Minister’s commitment to listening to women’s voices. Will she listen to these women and, in particular, her constituent Baroness Cumberlege about the need to provide redress for the women who have been harmed by these drugs?

[Maria Caulfield]

I will come to that point. The Government have apologised on behalf of the health and care sector for the time it took to listen and respond. We are doing more than apologising: we are changing the healthcare system so that it responds to women in a much better way.

As the hon. Gentleman has just raised the issue of redress, I will touch on it now. It is not just these cases where it is often difficult for patients to get redress and compensation. I gave evidence to the Health and Social Care Committee this week on the issue of clinical negligence. This week, we announced a fixed recoverable costs scheme, meaning that, for low-value claims, we can speed up the claims process, reduce legal costs and ensure that, whatever clinical negligence they have experienced, patients are able to get compensation as quickly as possible. The findings of the Cumberlege report highlight mesh, Primodos and sodium valproate. However, across the board, it is very difficult for patients to get redress, regardless of the clinical negligence they have suffered.

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[Maria Caulfield]

If I touch on the points in my response, hopefully I will be able to reassure colleagues on the progress being made.

[Alan Brown]

The point is that Baroness Cumberlege says the Government have an ethical duty to consider redress, so what does the Minister say to her constituents about that ethical duty that should be placed on the Government?

[Maria Caulfield]

I have addressed the points about redress, which is available. We are reforming the process of clinical negligence to make it easier for patients to get compensation without the need to go to court, and we are having some success in that. There is a very different system in place now compared with when many of these ladies were affected.

The patient safety commissioner was mentioned by some colleagues. The consultation proposed details for setting up the commissioner’s role. Baroness Cumberlege is on the recruitment panel for that position and will keep a close eye on the role of the commissioner. The advert and recruitment process is now up and running, and we expect to appoint someone very soon. I reassure colleagues that that appointment will be in place: the recruitment process has started, Baroness Cumberlege is on the panel to appoint the commissioner, and that commissioner will be independent—a point made by my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidenhead—of the Department of Health and Social Care, which will of course work closely with them. The commissioner will be able to scrutinise both the NHS and the Department itself.

On recommendation 5, about specialist mesh services, eight specialist centres are now operating in England, where women who have been affected by mesh implants can access treatment and mesh removal. A ninth is being set up in Bristol at the moment. I remain very open to colleagues’ experience of those mesh services. Women have the option to choose which centre they go to, but I recognise that that might involve great distances from where they live.

If women are not being referred to the centres, however, or if their experience of the centres is that their needs are not being met, I am keen to hear about that, because the whole point of setting the centres up was to ensure help for those women who have experienced mesh implants that have caused huge trauma—I take on board everyone’s points—to them, changing their lives and that of their families forever. If that is not working, the women’s health ambassador, the patient safety commissioner and I will look at that, because that was the whole point of setting up such services.

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[Maria Caulfield]

I absolutely take that point—that is the crux of the matter. For too long in the health service, there was no duty of candour. The health service did not acknowledge when mistakes were made. That is changing; there is now a duty to declare when a mistake has happened. There is also support for staff. I cannot remember who mentioned the whistleblower on Primodos, but there is protection for whistleblowers now. There are freedom to speak up guardians to support whistleblowers in the workplace, and the Care Quality Commission is happy to take notification from patients and staff if there are worries about unsafe patient care. That will trigger an unannounced inspection to look at the data. It is all about creating a culture of learning in the NHS, rather than one of blame that pits patients against clinicians—that is what we want to change. That is how we learn from the mistakes of the past and prevent mistakes in the future.

[Alan Brown]

I thank the Minister for taking one more intervention. She talks about blame and not pitting patients against doctors or the NHS. Is that not the whole point of the redress agency that was recommended, to take away that adversarial approach?

[Maria Caulfield]

That is why we introduced NHS Resolution to facilitate a quicker method of getting compensation to those who have been harmed through clinical negligence. I encourage hon. Members to look at the work of NHS Resolution. We are doing more to ensure a better experience for patients, but we are fundamentally committed to ensuring that those who have been harmed get the support they need.

Chris Gibb Report: Improvements to Southern Railway

Debate between Alan Brown and Maria Caulfield

Tuesday 4th July 2017 Commons Chamber

[Maria Caulfield]

I am not sure that the hon. Gentleman has actually read the report. The appendix sets out both the short-term and long-term infrastructure projects, all the way to 2020. If he wants answers to those questions, I suggest that he reads the report.

[Alan Brown]

I am asking for answers from the Government, and I expect Ministers or the Secretary of State to give them to me. The Government announced a £300 million package to be delivered over two years. I am asking what is going to happen and whether the programme is on track, because we are a quarter of the way through the time period already.

The Gibb report also called for a review of little-used stations that have, it claims, too many services, which seems incredible against a backdrop of nearly 59,000 fully or partially cancelled trains in 2016. That is an issue that the Department for Transport could have identified earlier, and it should be resolved.

In terms of industrial relations—a subject that has formed the cornerstone of the debate so far—I am pleased to see that Gibb did say that negotiations must be entered into. Again, I repeat calls from other Opposition Members to the Secretary of State to show leadership and try to lead those negotiations. I disagree with Gibb’s negative comments about collective bargaining, and I do not think that that should have been within the remit of the report. His suggestion that discussions about driver-only operation could have a roll-back effect on other services that are already driver-only operation is a conclusion too far for me.

We have to be clear about the fact that safety is a key issue. The Gibb report confirms that narrow platforms at Gatwick cause overcrowding, and that the lack of station shelters elsewhere is an issue for passengers accessing trains. It is therefore fair for me, looking at this from the outside, to say that DOO can be seen as a problem for staff, because at the end of the day the staff have to deal with the consequences if an incident arises due to overcrowding or when people alight from trains. I would also say to the Secretary of State that this is a serious dereliction of duty, given that the Government are picking up a £38 million tab for lost revenues, as well as setting aside £15 million in compensation for passengers. Think what that £15 million could have done in infrastructure upgrades if there had been proper forward planning.

In Scotland, there has been far wider national scrutiny of the Abellio ScotRail Alliance, which operates Scotland’s trains. It came into being in April 2015, and I must say that it came in as a living wage employer right away, which is to be applauded. However, we must also acknowledge that its early performance was below contractual levels. The Scottish Government took the lead by intervening, and a performance improvement plan was agreed. Since then, 181 of the 249 actions have been completed, and a further 180 action points have now been agreed. The plan has been reviewed by the Office of Rail and Road, which found it to be robust and deliverable, but challenging. Punctuality on ScotRail is now at 90%, and it has been ahead of the UK average for four years.

Looking ahead, the Scottish Government are now exploring a public sector bid for ScotRail when there is a franchise break. On public sector bids, the UK Government have demonstrated, with the east coast main line, that public sector services are not only viable, but profitable for the taxman. The refusal of the Government to acknowledge this in the rush to reprivatise the east coast main line is frankly shocking. The franchise has raised £1 billion, and 2015 was rated as the best year in its history. It shows that public sector franchises can lead the way over private sector ones. [Interruption.] The hon. Member for Hove (Peter Kyle) is just delaying me further. To be fair, he made an intervention earlier that was frankly a speech, so I presume he will cut out some of his own speech. Additionally, the UK now has a franchise system that allows state-run bids from foreign countries, yet the Government still refuse to allow public sector bids. There is absolutely no logic to such a conclusion.

Finally, as was mentioned earlier, there has been some industrial action involving ScotRail in Scotland. The Scottish Government were willing to meet the unions, and they ultimately agreed a deal that the unions and the Abellio ScotRail Alliance have signed off. [Laughter.] That is actually what should be happening, so instead of laughing about it, the Transport Secretary should show leadership and face up to being willing to speak to the unions and getting around the table with them.

To conclude, I hope that the Gibb report will show how these matters can be progressed with GTR. In truth, the Scottish Government have shown what can be done by showing a different attitude north of the border, and I suggest that the Transport Secretary should think about that as well.