Sudden Adult Death Syndrome

Andrew Percy Excerpts

Monday 25th March 2013 Westminster Hall

[Steve Rotheram]

All I can tell the hon. Lady is that if I can use a defibrillator, anyone can use one. We had people come into the House to demonstrate what an AED does. I was under the illusion that it was like something out of an episode of “Casualty”: someone picks up two paddles, says, “Stand back—clear,” and applies the shock to the person through that method. It is not like that. An AED is a small computerised unit that talks someone through the process, so believe me, literally anyone can use one. That will destigmatise the use of these devices for certain people who think that if they do it wrong, they will cause further complications.

[Andrew Percy (Brigg and Goole) (Con)]

I declare an interest as a first responder who on a number of occasions has had to attempt resuscitation. Defibrillators are indeed incredibly easy to use. One of the saddest things is turning up at someone’s house and finding people just standing around, worried or frightened that if they attempt cardiopulmonary resuscitation, they will cause more damage. Actually, the training that is necessary is minimal. I therefore commend not only the e-petition, but the words of the hon. Gentleman up to now. This is something that is very simple. It is so sad to turn up two or three minutes in and find that people have not started CPR, at which point the chance of survival is so much less.

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[Andrew Percy (Brigg and Goole) (Con)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton (Steve Rotheram) and everybody who signed the e-petition on securing this debate; 100,000 signatures is an incredible amount to reach. I pay tribute to everybody who signed. It is good to have the Minister and the shadow Secretary of State here. I am happier seeing the shadow Secretary of State here than I was to see him attend a college in Goole recently. As welcome as he is, normally, perhaps he can stay here in future; that would be more beneficial. Alas.[Interruption.] That was a back-handed compliment, by the way.

I also want to pay tribute to the OK Foundation and the British Heart Foundation for the work that they do in raising awareness. It is fantastic to hear about the work that has been undertaken in Liverpool. I do not necessarily agree that where Liverpool leads, the country always follows, or indeed that Liverpool always leads, but on this occasion I pay tribute to what has been achieved on the wrong side of the Pennines.

I intervened on the hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton and talked about the work that I do with the Yorkshire ambulance service as a community first responder. I want to talk about that and how that has got me alive to the issue and really changed my views. It has made me quite passionate. Becoming a first responder has been the thing that I have been most proud of in my life. I am prouder of that than getting elected to this place. Before that, my proudest achievement was passing my driving test on the sixth or seventh occasion. Being a first responder has become the thing that I am most proud of.

I set up a scheme covering Goole, Hook and Airmyn: only three of the 75 communities that I represent, sadly. We did not have a scheme there. We had terrible ambulance response rates. I met the ambulance service and it set me a challenge to do something about it, so we set up a scheme. We have 10 volunteers. My staff in the Goole constituency office have all been trained and they provide cover during the day as first responders. In the evening, members of the community provide cover. We have all become good friends. We are all from different walks of life in the town. They cover evenings and I cover weekends, along with one of my councillors, who lives just round the corner.

I pay tribute to all the volunteers who put themselves forward for first responding in my constituency, both with Yorkshire ambulance service and in the Lincolnshire part of my constituency through LIVES, the Lincolnshire Integrated Voluntary Emergency Service. The volunteers do a fantastic job. They get no publicity for it, which perhaps we as MPs get. They deserve all credit for the lives that they save and the impact that they have. I have seen the impact in my short time doing such work. We set up the scheme about six months ago. We never expected to be as busy in our community as we have ended up being, having attended about 45 calls in our first four months, which is significant.

I want to talk about the training to prove how easy it is. We did our training as first responders over a weekend. It was two full days. The training included oxygen therapy and training for the other types of incidents that we attend. The CPR and defibrillator training took place on the first day. We practised scenarios and it was incredibly simple and easy. It is as simple as the hon. Gentleman said. The defibrillators spoke to us. The first thing they say is, “Tear open packages. Place one pad upper left.” I do not like hearing that now. It strikes fear into me, having had to use them. They talk people through the procedure and the training really is simple. I came away from that training thinking to myself, “How on earth can people not know how to do this?” It is staggering that we require people to be trained in all kinds of other things in their work environment. People have to learn the inside-out of all sorts of health and safety legislation for various jobs, but we do not teach people something as simple as starting chest compressions on somebody. As the hon. Gentleman said in his speech, people fear that they can do more harm than good, but if someone is in cardiac arrest, people can do no more harm than that.

So, we got our scheme up and running and we had our weekend of training. We do ongoing training every month. We have just had a weekend at the Hull York medical school in Hull going through various scenarios to try to enhance our skills, but that is an add-on to the basic training. I thought that we would not get many calls to begin with, but we were very busy. One of the first calls that I attended was a cardiac arrest, which, sadly, was at the furthest point of the three-mile radius that we cover. I got there first, within about six or seven minutes. Even though we had done all our training, I thought that six or seven minutes would be all right. It was a pretty terrifying drive on the way there for my first cardiac arrest.

I turned up in my first responder uniform and all of a sudden everyone was looking at me. However, the training kicks in and straight away I was doing chest compressions, getting the defibrillator up, getting the oxygen going and barking instructions at people to get what was needed from the bag. I thought, “If I can do this, anybody can.” It was the confidence gained from that weekend of training that led to my trying to resuscitate somebody. Unfortunately, it was not successful. I drove away that night, got home and thought about it. It had taken me a few minutes to get there. When I arrived, people were already there. A neighbour had tried to start CPR, but of course that was done through instructions over the telephone. The gentleman was not old and I thought to myself, “If only somebody had been there to start instantly. Why don’t we all know this?” I became passionate about it. Most of our calls tend to be for heart attacks, diabetics and strokes, which can end in a slightly more positive outcome.

The second cardiac arrest that I attended was in a nursing home. A responder from the neighbouring scheme and I were the first people on the scene. On that particular occasion, nursing home staff had not commenced CPR, for whatever reason, and I thought, “Well, why—in nursing homes?” There are so many calls—just on Saturday night, my phone went at 2.30 am about a cardiac arrest at a nursing home in Goole—and they increasingly tend to be from nursing homes. I thought, “Why do we not have a defibrillator in every nursing home?” I notice that the state of Texas passed a law in 2009 to require a defibrillator in every nursing home.

The Minister obviously cannot respond about the curriculum, although I am sure that she will pass such comments on to the relevant Minister, but she could do something about nursing homes. One of my requests is that she simply requires every nursing home, at its own expense—for heaven’s sake, most of them are private organisations—to have on site a defibrillator, which costs less than £1,000, including for the training.

I live two doors away from a nursing home in my village. As a result of reading about what we have been doing locally, the parish council is proactively trying to get a defibrillator in the nursing home for general community use. That is something that we can achieve simply and without great cost to the taxpayer. The same goes for assisted living centres or sheltered housing complexes, where we should require there to be defibrillators.

I have to say—playing a little to the gallery—that, since I started first responding, I have become such an admirer of our ambulance crews and their work. I am playing to the gallery, but of course we are not allowed to refer to people in the Public Gallery. I have seen how busy those guys are. They are constantly called out and they are called out more and more, for which they do not necessarily get credit. They are the true last emergency service: when all else fails, the ambulance service is called on. They sometimes struggle to respond to all the calls in our areas, and there is no doubt that we must do something about that. Demand on our ambulance crews for service is increasing every year, and we must follow through on that with proper resources so that we do not end up with their taking too long to get to a cardiac arrest or other emergencies.

As a result of that work and becoming quite passionate about it, I started to think about the role in schools. The hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton said that 270 young people die of sudden cardiac arrest every year. I worked in government in the United States about 10 or 12 years ago, when we put through the legislature of New Jersey a requirement for a defibrillator to be placed in every school in the state. That happened, and a several other states followed suit, but that was back in 2000, and here we are in 2013, debating this issue in the House—probably for the first time in a long while—with no requirement in this country. Frankly, that seems bonkers to me.

I talked to the East Midlands ambulance service, which covers the other part of my constituency, a few weeks ago after having seen the ITV programme about sudden cardiac arrest and life-saving skills in Norway, and we put in a bid to the local council. Just this morning, my local North Lincolnshire council considered my grant application for defibrillators, and I am told that it has approved the bid to put one in all secondary schools in the north Lincolnshire part of my constituency and in the schools in that of my hon. Friend the Member for Cleethorpes (Martin Vickers). Indeed, it will go further: the council portfolio holder rang me this afternoon to say that it will guarantee a defibrillator in every secondary school, not just those in my constituency and that of my hon. Friend, and that will happen soon.

[Karen Lumley (Redditch) (Con)]

May I pay tribute to my constituents Robert and Maggie Underwood, who lost their daughter to SADS? They have managed to raise £18,000 to put defibrillators in 15 of my schools in Redditch.

[Andrew Percy]

I, too, congratulate my hon. Friend’s constituents. I always think that it is a bit easier for us, as MPs, to bang the drum and to get people behind us, but it is fantastic for residents to do so and to raise such an amount of money, so I pay tribute to them as well. A lot of that is going on around the country, but frankly there needs to be more.

Our bid in north Lincolnshire was also to ask schools to filter training down to young people, as part of the deal of their accepting a defibrillator paid for from the grant, so it does not only relate to use on school sites. I hope that if there is a cardiac arrest—not that I hope for one, but if there is—a young person from north Lincolnshire with that training will be there, so that they can put their training into use, although I would prefer them not to have to do so. The Scunthorpe Telegraph, the local newspaper, rang me today to say that it is quite keen to get behind that and might want to run a campaign about it, so I shall wait to hear more. We can try to use the National Citizen Service to filter down that training.

[Stephen Twigg]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on his excellent speech. He mentioned the Scunthorpe Telegraph, and does he agree that the media have a crucial role? Will he join my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Walton (Steve Rotheram) and me in praising the brilliant work done by the Liverpool Echo with the OK Foundation?

[Andrew Percy]

Members of Parliament are never backward in coming forward to praise their local newspapers, not least in the hope that it guarantees them a friendly quote next week, but the hon. Gentleman makes an important point. Newspapers can be part of our going out to challenge—I do not want to say “shame”—businesses. I am a Conservative and I love businesses, but businesses make profits and do so on the back of their workers, to whom they have responsibility. [Interruption.] Well, I think that I am a Conservative. Of course, I am; or just the Brigg and Goole party these days, perhaps. [Interruption.] Well, I am certainly not a Liberal Democrat—no offence to my hon. Friend the Member for Southport (John Pugh)—because my views on Europe count me out.

Newspapers have a responsibility to go to businesses and challenge them, particularly big businesses. I understand that defibrillators would be expensive for smaller ones and those employing only one or two people, but we should ask big businesses, “What are you doing for the welfare of your workers? Where are your defibrillators?” Newspapers such as the Liverpool Echo and the Scunthorpe Telegraph have an important role to play in that.

[Anna Soubry]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend, and I congratulate him on his excellent speech, which follows another excellent one. Does he agree that there is a good argument that we can build an Olympic legacy based on the great volunteers who took part in the games by considering whether we can use some of the skills that they helped to bring to the games, and take those skills into the issues of training people and campaigning for defibrillators, which he has identified?

[Andrew Percy]

Indeed. My way to address the problem is to have a multi-faceted approach. In many ways, it has to come from the bottom up. We need people in communities to say, “I will be trained and I am happy to filter down that training, and I am even happy to knock on some doors to raise some money to get defibrillators in our communities.” A lot of parish councils have money in the bank, so we should go to them as well. We need a bottom-up approach through volunteers and the Olympic legacy, as the Minister says, but there is also a role for the Government to say to nursing homes and schools, “We want and expect you to provide a defibrillator, which is relatively cheap,” and of course to say the same to businesses. Is it not true corporatism to bring all three of those elements together? As I have said, there is a role for businesses in looking after the welfare of their workers in that way.

Goole high school has a pilot this year in which everyone in year 11 has been funded to go through the National Citizen Service. I have suggested to the head teacher that, as part of the community payback for that, all those young people should be trained in CPR this summer. Therefore, 100 or 200 young people in that community in Goole will leave at the end of the summer having received training, which is 200 more advocates for the whole issue and potentially 200 more life-savers.

[Julie Hilling (Bolton West) (Lab)]

Although it is a good idea to provide emergency life-saving skills within the National Citizen Service, does the hon. Gentleman not agree that if we legislated for every school leaver to learn CPR, we would make a huge difference?

[Andrew Percy]

I would be quite happy to see that happen. We can leave it to schools to decide how to deliver such learning, but even if we cannot put it in the national curriculum, we should say to schools that they should look to offer such training as an add-on.

I was clearly going to say something about Wisconsin next, as it is written here on a note, but it has gone out of my head. Something jolly good is happening in Wisconsin, which we should look at and perhaps copy if indeed it is a good thing.

Another way to address the matter is through teacher training programmes. Again, that is in the gift of Government and is relatively inexpensive to do. Simply put, we should require teachers, as part of their teacher training, to go through a morning of CPR training.

I end my contribution where I began, by congratulating the hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton on securing the debate. I congratulate, too, all those who have taken part in the debate through the e-petition and who support this campaign. This is a matter of life and death, and a matter where not just minutes but seconds count. We all have a responsibility to do what we can to ensure that we improve the appalling rates of survival for out-of-hospital cardiac arrest in this country.

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[Grahame M. Morris (Easington) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Amess.

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Walton (Steve Rotheram) on securing this debate. It is a privilege to follow my hon. Friend the Member for West Lancashire (Rosie Cooper) and other Members who have made constructive contributions. Compared with some other debates that I have been involved with in recent weeks and months, the unanimity today is a refreshing change.

I pay tribute not only to my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Walton and the other Members who are in Westminster Hall today, but to the people—more than 110,000 of them—who signed the online petition that was set up by the Oliver King Foundation. Indeed, I pay tribute to the King family, Jake Morrison and all those who have been instrumental in taking forward the campaign. I also thank the Minister for agreeing to meet campaigners; that is very important. It shows the public interest in and the importance of the issues that we are debating today.

As you might be able to tell from my accent, Mr Amess, I am not actually from Merseyside, Liverpool or the north-west.

[Andrew Percy]

No?

[Grahame M. Morris]

Well, I am fifth-generation from that area actually, so I have a connection with it. However, I am from the north-east and I know that many colleagues from the north-east and from across the whole country are concerned and share the aims of the OK Foundation, so I hope the Minister will support the campaign to provide defibrillators in all public buildings.

My hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Walton referred to the protection that we enjoy here in the Palace of Westminster. I tried to find out precisely how many defibrillators there are in the Palace. There are notices about them at the end of every corridor, including my corridor, and I found that there are actually 16 defibrillators in the Palace. Somebody here obviously knows the importance of early defibrillation in the event of a cardiac arrest, and they are to be complimented for that. The general public should enjoy a similar level of protection.

This is a matter of life and death. As my hon. Friend said, an estimated 60,000 out-of-hospital cardiac arrests occur each year and, incredibly, of the 30,000 cases attended by medical professionals, fewer than one in five of the people affected receive the life-saving intervention they need following a survivable cardiac arrest. I did not realise until I looked at the numbers involved quite how mind-boggling they are. There are nearly 100,000 deaths each year in the UK due to cardiac arrest, which is more than 250 a day, making it one of the UK’s biggest killers.

Hon. Members have already mentioned the British Heart Foundation’s high-profile “Staying Alive” campaign and information film on hands-only CPR. The House will be relieved to know, Mr Amess, that I shall not attempt to sing it or repeat it, but that was a successful campaign. It is reported that in November 28 lives were saved by people who learnt how to administer CPR from the advert headed up the footballer Vinnie Jones, or were inspired by it to take further lessons and coaching, and I imagine that that number is even higher today.

I was surprised by the UK’s record on emergency life-support skills. A British Red Cross survey found that only 7% of people in the UK have first aid skills, compared with 80% of people in Scandinavian countries and a similar figure in Germany. I was surprised, because in the area where I grew up and have always lived, there was quite a strong tradition with the St John Ambulance, and so on, so I expected the figures to be higher, but perhaps it is a function of the society in which we live. That is a major omission and I hope that the Minister takes note of it.

A further survey of public support carried out by the British Heart Foundation found that 73%—almost three quarters—of schoolchildren wanted to learn how to resuscitate someone and give first aid, and more than three quarters of teachers and parents agreed that it would be a good thing to be taught in schools. I hope that the Minister will speak with her counterparts in the Department for Education and press for these life-saving first aid skills to be a core part of the national curriculum, to ensure that all young people leave school equipped with the ability to save a life. That would be really worthwhile.

We know that time matters when cardiac arrest occurs. For every minute that passes following a cardiac arrest and before CPR is administered, the chances of survival are reduced by around 10%. Although CPR can buy more time, defibrillation is the only effective treatment for cardiac arrest caused by ventricular fibrillation, where the heart quivers and stops pumping blood around the body. The British Heart Foundation has found that, for every minute that passes without defibrillation, chances of survival decrease by 14%. We have heard how CPR can improve the chances of survival. We have also heard about research that shows that applying a controlled shock within the first five minutes of collapse provides the best chance of survival. It is therefore essential that defibrillators are readily available, particularly in places where there is higher incidence of cardiac arrest or where it might be difficult for emergency services to arrive quickly.

I applaud the efforts of one of my local newspapers, The Northern Echo, which has been running the “A Chance to Live” campaign in my region, promoting the use of defibrillators in public places, particularly gymnasiums, where there is a greater risk of cardiac arrest occurring both before and after strenuous effort. I am pleased to note—we did a bit of a survey—that all the local authority and council-run gyms in the north-east have defibrillators and staff trained to use them. It has been reported, however, that 80% of private gyms do not have some form of life-saving equipment available; it does not seem to matter whether it is a small gym or one of the larger, more up-market leisure gyms. When challenged about the lack of defibrillators in their gyms, Bannatynes, headquartered in Darlington, issued a statement explaining that they did not have defibrillators because

“they are a specialist piece of medical equipment, which should only be operated by a qualified medical professional.”

I do not know if hon. Members have any contact with Duncan Bannatyne, or if he will get a copy of this debate, but having heard the comprehensive, complete and compelling case advanced by my hon. Friend, it is clear that it is not necessary to have comprehensive training to use a defibrillator. I hope that in the course of this debate we can put to bed this misconception.

As we have heard, modern defibrillators are designed to be used by untrained members of the public; they provide audio and visual instructions to the user and the machines will automatically diagnose the patient and deliver an electric shock only if it is necessary. To provide a medical opinion, as we have the Minister here, in my area in County Durham, Dr Harry Byrne, vice chairman of NHS Darlington clinical commissioning group, has described defibrillators as the

“single greatest advance in out of hospital cardiac assistance since the invention of chest compressions or CPR…You don’t have to be a trained first aider to use one. You just pull it out of the box and follow the instructions step by step. It even tells you what to do”,

as we have heard, from my hon. Friend and the hon. Member for Brigg and Goole (Andrew Percy).

A defibrillator is an essential life-saving piece of equipment and I hope defibrillators will become common, not just in schools, but in workplaces, too. Hon. Members have suggested that they should be in shopping centres and nursing homes. They should be in community buildings as well. Certainly, though, they should be in schools. I agree with my hon. Friend that they should be as common as fire extinguishers and smoke alarms. I hope that the Minister supports these measures and will be proactive in protecting the public and ensuring that everyone, no matter where they live and work, has the best chance of surviving cardiac arrest.

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[Julie Hilling (Bolton West) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Walton (Steve Rotheram) on securing this important debate. I also congratulate the OK Foundation, as well as all the other small charities and groups of families and friends of people who have been saved or, sadly, lost their lives, on all the work they do in campaigning and fundraising for defibrillators and for life-saving skills to be taught in schools. I also congratulate charities such as the British Heart Foundation, the Arrhythmia Alliance, the Red Cross and St John Ambulance service for campaigning on the issue.

Each year 150,000 people die in incidents where their lives could be saved if only someone knew what to do, and 30,000 people have a cardiac arrest outside hospital. Many of those people could be saved if bystanders knew what to do, if someone started CPR immediately and if there was a defibrillator available. I want to talk about the chain of survival and the importance of someone starting CPR.

With every minute that passes in a cardiac arrest the chance of survival falls by 10%. CPR increases the chance of survival and prolongs the time a person remains in a shockable condition. If a defibrillator is used to administer a shock the survival rate increases to 50%. On “Casualty” it looks as if CPR makes people suddenly awaken and sit up. Of course, it does not. CPR simply keeps blood and oxygen pumping around the body, which means that the heart can still be shocked back into a rhythm. All the time someone is not breathing, and their heart is not pumping, part of their body and brain is dying. CPR keeps people alive and keeps them going until they can be shocked and can get to hospital.

Teaching emergency life skills in schools and the community is

“a no brainer, it’s just common sense”.

Those are not my words, but the words of Dr Andy Lockey of the Resuscitation Council. He and another 124,665 people have called on the Government to put emergency life support skills in the curriculum for all schools. With just two hours a year we could make every school leaver a life-saver. Those two hours a year could save some of the 150,000 people a year who die in situations where their lives could be saved.

The country looked on in horror just over a year ago, when Fabrice Muamba was playing for Bolton Wanderers against Tottenham and suffered a cardiac arrest. Fabrice was lucky, because he had his cardiac arrest in a public place where there were trained first aiders; because the paramedics were knowledgeable enough to give him immediate CPR on the pitch, so that his brain was saved; and because the medics did not give up, but worked on him for 78 minutes until his heart restarted. Just because he was with people who knew what to do, he survived. Fabrice is campaigning for emergency life support skills to be taught in schools, and for defibrillators to be available in public places. He joined those of us who took the British Heart Foundation’s petition, which was signed by the 124,665 people, to Downing street.

My sister’s friend Malcolm McCormick was also lucky. In April last year he went to school to pick up his grandchildren, and keeled over—effectively dead, not breathing, with his heart not beating. Malcolm was lucky because one of the people waiting to collect their children was a retained firefighter, who gave him CPR; because once a month another firefighter volunteers in the school tuck shop, and it was his Friday to work, so he came out and took control of the situation; and because a defibrillator was available, and he was rushed to a specialist hospital. Malcolm left hospital three days later with very sore ribs; but he was alive, with his brain intact. Four months later he was fit enough to be a games maker at the Paralympics.

[Andrew Percy]

Earlier I failed to mention the role of retained firefighters. An initiative by Humberside fire and rescue service is starting this month; retained firefighters in some east Yorkshire communities will respond to the issues that the hon. Lady is outlining. Does she agree that we need a broader debate about what the emergency services do? Perhaps there is a role for members of the fire service. There are some in the fire service who will not allow vehicles with defibrillators fitted to be dispatched or used in relevant situations, although they are standing there while there are no ambulances nearby. We must address that.

[Julie Hilling]

I agree that we need to maximise the use of knowledge and equipment in the community. I will talk later about the consortium in Bolton, in which the agencies are working together on getting defibrillators in place, and teaching people ELS.

There are many inspiring stories of people who have saved lives, many of whom are young people. I have talked about them several times in Parliament, but I want now to mention a young woman I met a couple of weeks ago. I was honoured to meet 15-year-old Samantha Hobbs with her parents when she came for a meeting with an Education Minister, which, sadly was cancelled, but can hopefully be rescheduled. One morning last year, Samantha woke to hear her father on the telephone to the emergency services, telling them that he thought her mum was already dead. Samantha did not hesitate. Even though her mum felt cold to the touch, she started CPR. Of course, CPR is very tiring and after a few minutes she was exhausted, so she showed her father what to do and coached him to take over, although he had never had any training. Thanks to Samantha her mum survived and is alive today; she came to Parliament with her daughter. She is alive because Samantha learned life-saving skills at her swimming club. They are campaigning for all children to be taught how to save a life.

I have been working hard to get ELS included in the national curriculum. I even introduced a ten-minute rule Bill to ask the Government to do it, but they are stubbornly resisting that common-sense move; so I am trying to ensure that every young person leaving school in my constituency and throughout Bolton leaves school a life-saver. The work is being done with the North West ambulance service, Bolton Wanderers community trust, Greater Manchester fire and rescue service, Bolton council, the British Heart Foundation and the Arrhythmia Alliance. We are enabling all schools to teach ELS, providing training in the community and campaigning for defibrillators in public places. The campaign has been wonderfully supported by The Bolton News, which has been running a campaign alongside it. We are making progress, but it would be so much better if the Government would take action.

Why cannot defibrillators be made compulsory, like fire extinguishers? Far too many companies and organisations are worried about the consequences of having a defibrillator. No one has ever successfully been sued for attempting to save someone’s life. As so many hon. Members have said, a defibrillator cannot be used on a person unless they are in a shockable condition. It tells the user what to do: where to put the pads and whether a shock can be administered. Companies, businesses and community groups should be far more worried about how they would feel about someone dying, when if they had only invested in a defibrillator and someone had known what to do, they could have saved them.

Will the Minister talk to her colleagues in the Department for Education about making the teaching of ELS compulsory? Will she ensure that health authorities provide teaching of those skills to the public? Will she work with colleagues to legislate for defibrillators in public places? The Government could save 150,000 lives a year. I cannot imagine anything worse than seeing a loved one collapse, and finding out afterwards that I could have saved them if I had known what to do. I have, I hope, made sure that that will not happen to me; I have become a Heartstart tutor. However, we need to give all people the skills, confidence and tools to save lives. As a firefighter in my area said, “When someone’s heart stops, they are dead. You can’t make them any deader, but you could save their life.”

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[Andy Burnham]

The right hon. Gentleman is absolutely spot on, because we see incredible activity across all four nations of the United Kingdom in the wake of those tragedies. Communities are pulling together, raising funds and donating defibrillators to schools and sports clubs, which brings me to my main point: leadership is now needed at national level to co-ordinate that activity and to bring clarity to the whole situation so that the public know where to find a defibrillator and how to use one. I hope I can persuade the Government to work with Opposition Front Benchers on that. There is no politics involved here; this is about saving lives where we can and doing things to make human progress in this country. Other countries are more focused than we have been, and because of that they are saving more lives.

My feeling is that provision is too random at the moment—it is happening in some places and not in others—and we need clarity on policy at a national level so that we can piggyback on all those local campaigns to make progress. I do not think there is a funding issue, because communities will find the money to put these things in the right places, but we must know where they need to go.

It is crucial to understand that, with the best will in the world, the ambulance service is often unable to make a difference for the people who sadly fall in a busy shopping centre, railway station or sports ground. Why? Because they are unable to get there within the Government target time of eight minutes, which is too late. As my hon. Friend the Member for Bolton West said, it is about that chain of survival; it is about equipping people with the knowledge and the kit at local level to start making a difference so that, when the professionals arrive, there is somebody there to save. That is what we have to do.

If we look at the statistics, 12 young people, as my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Walton said, die from sudden cardiac arrest in the UK every week. We underplay that problem. Until recently, the Department of Health NHS Choices website stated that the figure was 12 young people a year. The figure was corrected after it was pointed out to the Department, but it is important that the problem is not underestimated.

The clinching fact for why we should do more is that across the world, survival rates are very variable. According to the British Heart Foundation, in this country between 2% and 12% of people who suffer a sudden cardiac arrest survive, which is way too low. Elsewhere, in Seattle, as has been said, 50% of people survive, and in Japan, a public access campaign for AEDs has resulted in an immediate increase in rates of survival with minimum neurological impairment for out-of-hospital cardiac arrests.

The evidence is absolutely clear, so what about policy? What did we do while we were in Government? We must be honest. I am not here to say that we did everything right, but we did something. On the back of the focus on heart services, we introduced the national defibrillator programme in the middle of the last decade. It made a modest amount of funds available to purchase defibrillators to give to local organisations. However, I think that a mistake was made. As the programme was wound down, responsibility was passed to ambulance services.

There are two ways of looking at that. On the one hand, ambulance services have been doing brilliant work ever since as they have taken on the responsibility to improve communities’ capacity to respond. It is fantastic to see representatives of the ambulance service here today. I have certainly been impressed by what I have seen in the north-west. The team there is working with communities across the region to build their capacity to respond. The ambulance service has done good work, but national focus on the issue was lost when responsibility was passed down to the ambulance services, and we must acknowledge that.

That brings me to the crux of what I wanted to say, particularly to the Minister. I think that, between us, we can develop a set of simple policy calls that could make a difference and save lives. I will identify three in particular. As hon. Members have said, there is a compelling case for putting emergency life skills on the national curriculum and for making time available, perhaps as part of the personal, social, health and economic education component, to provide training for all young people. No young person should leave school without knowing how to provide CPR and use a defibrillator, because it is not all about defibrillators or CPR—the two together are important. If we train young people in those skills, as my hon. Friend the Member for Bassetlaw said, they will go home and talk to others about them.

I have seen what the British Heart Foundation does in schools. The courses that it delivers for young children are outstanding. It would be easy to add such courses to the national curriculum. My children tell me all the things that they are doing in school: the things that they are learning to make in home economics, and the kings and queens that they know about. It is odd that we do not ensure that every young person in this country leaves school at 16 knowing how to save a life. What more basic skill could we give them during their school years?

[Andrew Percy]

On the right hon. Gentleman’s attack on kings and queens, as a former history teacher, I attach importance to learning about them. An easy way to do what he suggests without crowding the curriculum too much would be simply to require all PE teachers to have the training, so that they can disseminate it as part of PE, which is required all the way through school. It would be a simple way to teach it without crowding the curriculum.

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[Anna Soubry]

That, again, is a good point. Clearly, one size does not fit all. Every area has different needs.

[Andrew Percy]

The problem with looking to the ambulance services is that they do not have the money to provide defibrillators to each of their communities. I would also question whether they necessarily know their communities all that intimately, being organisers, as they are, on large, regional scales.

We have discussed areas of responsibility outside those of the Minister’s Department, but will she undertake to look at the situation of nursing homes, particularly in Texas? Will her officials contact the health department in Texas to see what impact there has been as a result of requiring defibrillators in nursing homes? Then we can come to an evidence-based decision on the matter.

[Anna Soubry]

My hon. Friend’s point is, again, good and well made. I am glad that we worked out which part of the United States it was that something good could be said about in this respect. I am more than happy to take his point away, as one of the many ideas that hon. Members have suggested in this debate, and see whether we can consider in any way, be it making provision mandatory or issuing guidance to nursing homes and other institutions—[Interruption.] I think my hon. Friend the Member for Brigg and Goole said that he was going to send it to me. I will be interested in anything that ever comes across my desk. I will give it due consideration and pass it on, if necessary, to those who have responsibility for nursing homes in the Department of Health. As I said, it is a good idea.

One could argue that only a limited number of hon. Members have participated in today’s debate. We should stop here for a moment, because all the Members who have spoken have come from the standpoint of having experienced someone—normally a child—dying suddenly from a heart attack. That touches people in a raw way, because it involves a child. Mercifully, out of all the horrors and badness invariably comes something good, which is a point raised by the right hon. Member for Belfast North (Mr Dodds). Hon. Members have raised many examples of the good that has come out of the terrible and tragic loss of a young life.

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[Anna Soubry]

I have given my reasons for why I do not believe legislation, at the present time, is the answer. I agree with the hon. Lady that a lot of the matter depends on luck. Certain areas seem to offer a better service than others because of some unfortunate tragedy that has befallen them. With the Oliver King Foundation and many other charities that we have heard about today, people have come together and raised money to install defibrillators or to ensure that school children receive the right sort of training.

We heard examples of the work of mayors. The hon. Member for Barrow and Furness (John Woodcock) talked about the work of the mayor in his constituency, and the hon. Member for West Lancashire (Rosie Cooper) spoke about the work that had been done in her constituency by the mayor. She also mentioned the death of a young man and the work that his family has done as a result to ensure that other youngsters did not suffer a similar fate, and that the things that should be in place were there.

[Andrew Percy]

Again on legislation, I agree with the Minister’s point that we want a mixed approach to the matter, but if we expect communities to take charge of the matter themselves, we must understand that some communities do not have the capacity to do so. They might not be able to raise money quite as easily as more middle-class and better-off areas can. Some communities might be slightly better organised because they have a parish council speaking for them. We must bear in mind that not every community will have the resources or the individuals who feel confident enough to raise money for such provision.

[Anna Soubry]

My hon. Friend’s point is another well made point.

I will return to where this debate started—the subject of sudden adult death syndrome. Starting with screening, often when there has been a case of a sudden cardiac arrest, many people say, “Screening will have a big impact in the future.” As the right hon. Member for Leigh will know, the UK National Screening Committee, an independent expert body that advises Ministers about all aspects of screening, assesses the evidence for screening against a set of internationally recognised criteria. No doubt that is why the right hon. Gentleman listened to and followed its advice, which is that, while screening has a potential to save lives, it is not a foolproof process. The footballer Fabrice Muamba suffered cardiac arrest, and many of us will remember what happened to him at the game. We have heard many people describe the amazing medical assistance that he was given—I cannot remember for how long he was unconscious, but it was an incredibly long time—and that young man has made a remarkable recovery. However, I am told that he had received several screening tests throughout his career.

In 2008, the UK NSC reviewed the evidence for screening for the most common cause of sudden death in those under the age of 30, hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, including looking at athletes and young people who participated in sport. A number of the cases that we have heard today involved, invariably, young men or boys who died while playing sport, notably football. The UK NSC concluded that the evidence did not support the introduction of screening. Sudden cardiac death is a complex condition and is difficult to detect through screening; there is no single test that can detect all the conditions, nor is it possible to say which abnormalities will lead to sudden cardiac death. However, in line with its three-yearly review policy, the UK NSC is again reviewing the evidence. This time the review will go further than only looking at the evidence for screening for HCM and will cover screening for the major causes of sudden cardiac death in young people between the ages of 12 and 39. The review will take into account the most up-to-date international evidence, including evidence from Italy, where screening is currently offered to athletes between the ages of 12 and 35.

There will be an opportunity to participate in the review process later this year, when a copy of the latest review will be open for public consultation on the UK NSC’s website. No doubt, a number of the organisations and charities that we have heard about today will take part in that consultation. I am told that although screening is not routinely available in England, work to prevent premature death from cardiovascular disease is a priority, as it should be.

On 5 March, the cardiovascular disease outcomes strategy—not exactly words that trip off the tongue—was published. It sets out a range of actions to reduce premature mortality for those with, or at risk of, cardiovascular disease. The NHS Commissioning Board will work with the Resuscitation Council, the British Heart Foundation and others to promote the site mapping and registration of defibrillators, and to look at ways of increasing the numbers trained in using them. I pay tribute to the foundation, which a number of hon. Members have mentioned, and rightly so, as we are all grateful for its work in, for example, placing defibrillators in Liverpool primary schools. That is, no doubt, because of the outstanding work of the Oliver King Foundation.

Ambulance trusts have had responsibility for the provision of defibrillators since 2005, and in my view they are best placed to know what is needed in their local area. However, it is important to recognise that defibrillators help only in a minority of cases. The majority of out-of-hospital heart attacks—up to 80%—happen in the home. Bystander CPR doubles survival rates, but it is only attempted in 20% to 30% of cases. It is clear that although defibrillators play an important part, we have to bear in mind, as I said, that 80% of heart attacks, if they do not happen in hospital, happen at home, and I absolutely concede that there is a real need for an increase in the amount of people trained in CPR, because we know that that also plays a hugely important part in ensuring that people who have a heart attack survive it.

When there is a sudden cardiac death, we need to take action to ensure that potentially affected family members are identified and offered counselling and testing to see if they are also at risk. We know that that does not always happen. There are continuing discussions with the chief coroner for England to determine how coroners’ services might help in the identification of potentially affected family members, so that more lives can be saved. The national clinical director for heart disease, Professor Gray, will work with all relevant stakeholders to develop and spread good practice around sudden cardiac death.

In conclusion, I will wait to see the latest recommendation from the UK NSC, following its latest review of evidence. The national clinical director for heart disease will continue to promote good practice and awareness around sudden cardiac death. However, as I have said before—forgive me for repeating myself—I will ensure that I speak to the relevant Minister at the Department for Education about all the arguments that have been advanced today for training in CPR and life-saving techniques to be part of the national curriculum. It is my understanding that that particular part of it is under review, and I will impress on him or her how strongly Members have spoken today.

Again, I thank everybody, especially those who signed the petition, for bringing the debate into this place and, effectively, for shining a spotlight on the matter. I hope that hon. Members will take the issue to their local press, as I am sure they will, and that the national press might also look at it. It is absolutely right that the more we ventilate it, the better the situation will be.