Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Andrew Selous and Maria Caulfield

Tuesday 19th April 2022 Commons Chamber

[Maria Caulfield]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his question. There has been no national removal of ear wax services, which can still be commissioned locally. NICE guidance is clear on the types of services that should be commissioned. Traditional methods of manual ear syringing are no longer offered for safety reasons, but electronic irrigation and microsuction should be being offered. If his local CCG is not commissioning such services, I am happy to meet him and them to discuss why not.

[Andrew Selous (South West Bedfordshire) (Con)]

GPs provided the service for decades. We all understand why the NICE guidance means that they no longer offer syringing, but there is a gap in that many clinical commissioning groups are not offering alternative services. We are talking about people with dementia or receiving end-of-life care who literally cannot hear and are going deaf. The Minister must be direct with CCGs on this issue.

[Maria Caulfield]

My hon. Friend is right that there must be consistency across the country in how those procedures are commissioned. After today’s questions I will take this up with officials to see why that is not happening consistently across the country.

Fibrodysplasia Ossificans Progressiva

Debate between Andrew Selous and Maria Caulfield

Monday 6th December 2021 Westminster Hall

[Maria Caulfield]

Absolutely. I would be very happy to do that. Part of this will probably be the co-ordination of what funding, help and support there is for researchers, and then bringing the researchers together.

I reassure those who signed the petition that the NIHR does not ringfence funds for research. The fund is open to everyone, whether they have one of the most common diseases in the country or one of the rarest. The £1 billion research fund is available to all, and funding applications are available for any aspect of human health. When applications come forward, they are subject to peer review, so research colleagues look at it and judge it, with awards being made on the basis of clinical need—clearly, today we have heard of a clinical need that exists—the value to healthcare services, value for money and scientific quality, so there is no barrier to people applying for the funding.

Since 2010, the Medical Research Council has contributed funding to three projects underpinning relevance to FOP and underlying conditions as well—a total of £6.6 million. Outside those studies, UKRI and NIHR have also looked at supporting musculoskeletal health, which, although not directly FOP-specific, will have relevance to that condition.

[Andrew Selous]

I just want to take the Minister back to a point she made a moment ago about the trials for new drugs being limited to a very small number of people because FOP is a rare disease. I wonder what the solution to that is. Do we try to get people with FOP all the way around the world to participate in a trial? I am not sure how many people would be needed for a trial for it to be validated by the Minister’s Department. There were 107 in the trial that I mentioned, which I presume is too small. I wonder how we overcome that when in each individual country there are only a very small number of people to do the trials on.

[Maria Caulfield]

Absolutely. Just to be clear, it is not the Government who would validate the trials; it would be the scientific community. If it is drug-related, the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency would go on to change licences if it found a treatment that was applicable to FOP. In many conditions with such low numbers, often there are global studies, and the funding would not be restricted to a UK-based study. If it was part of a global study, I am sure that that would be acceptable. That is why it would be helpful to meet so that the support and mentorship available to researchers who are thinking of applying for funding could bottom out some of those issues.

I want to reassure colleagues who raised concerns that rare diseases are being pushed up the agenda. The rare diseases framework that was published in January is the first of its kind, and should reassure parents and children with FOP that this is an absolute priority. For too long, rare diseases, because numbers are low, have not had the significance, priority and attention that more common diseases with lots of campaigners and patients have had. The framework will push this to the top of the agenda.

The second reassurance I can give is that funding is available; there is £1 billion per year for clinical research across the board. Just because it is a rare disease does not exclude FOP from these funds. From a practical point of view, it does make research harder, as my hon. Friend the Member for South West Bedfordshire (Andrew Selous) highlighted. However, this does not mean that FOP researchers cannot apply for these funds; there are other criteria that are applied to low-volume scenarios.

Thirdly, I want to reassure Members that clinical research is happening. There are one or two studies that have taken off in this area; often that is the catalyst that needs to happen. I am hearing from colleagues across the House, who have constituents who are affected, that there is a desire to do more research. Very often, this desire is what is needed more than anything to find the researchers who want to do the research and have research questions—whether those are about diagnosis, treatment, or, ultimately, a cure. The funding is there to help support that, and there is practical help and support to bring those studies to fruition. Let me reassure colleagues that, as the Minister, I believe that research is the answer to many of the questions that have been asked today. I am very aware of how distressing this condition is, and the impact that it has on both the quantity and quality of a young person’s life. The Government are committed to ensuring that all rare diseases get better access to the resources that are there. With particular regard to FOP, I am sure that we can work with colleagues across the House to deliver answers to some of the questions they have asked today.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Andrew Selous and Maria Caulfield

Tuesday 23rd November 2021 Commons Chamber

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

Women who have suffered are being helped and supported through the difficult choices that they are having to make. The Government have set up eight specialist mesh centres across the country to provide them with the specialist treatment that they need. Our priority is patient safety, preventing anything like this from happening again, and supporting women who have been affected. There is no evidence that a redress system would improve patient safety or improve the outcome for those women.

[Andrew Selous (South West Bedfordshire) (Con)]

T8. As ear syringing is no longer being undertaken in local surgeries, and as self-care does not work for many people, will the Government make sure that microsuction is at least available in every primary care network area? Otherwise, we are leaving people to go deaf.

[Maria Caulfield]

Local commissioners are responsible for meeting the health needs of their local population and should continue to ensure appropriate access to ear wax services. However, should a CCG not routinely commission ear wax removal or the suction method that my hon. Friend refers to, a patient can request an individual funding request. I am happy to help my hon. Friend if that is not happening locally.

Prisons (Interference with Wireless Telegraphy) Bill

Debate between Andrew Selous and Maria Caulfield

Committee Debate: 1st sitting: House of Commons
Wednesday 9th May 2018 Public Bill Committees

[Maria Caulfield (Lewes) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Moon. Your wise guidance to us in our deliberations on the Bill will be much welcomed. I also welcome members of the Committee and thank them for their support in getting the Bill to this stage. It was clear on Second Reading that the Bill has cross-party support, so I hope that we will be able to complete our proceedings relatively swiftly, while still giving the Bill appropriate scrutiny.

As hon. Members know, mobile phone technology in particular is constantly evolving. The Bill is designed to ensure that legislation keeps pace with developments and provides the means to combat the serious problems posed by illicit mobile phones in prisons. Illicit mobile phone use is linked to the supply of drugs and other contraband, serious organised crime and evasion of public protection monitoring, bringing further harm to the victims of crime.

The scale of the issue faced in our prisons is stark. In 2016, nearly 20,000 mobile phone and SIM cards—54 a day—were found in prisons in England and Wales. Although it is not a new problem, the scale of it has been increasing steadily, as in 2013 only about 7,000 mobile phones and SIM cards were found. To help combat this increasing challenge more effectively, clause 1 and its associated schedule make several changes to the Prisons (Interference with Wireless Telegraphy) Act 2012.

As technology has developed, public communications providers such as mobile phone operators have been at the forefront of those developments. The changes in this Bill are designed to ensure that their specialist knowledge and expertise can be used to improve the effectiveness of activity to combat the use of illegal mobiles in prisons, young offenders institutions, secure training centres and secure colleges. Importantly, the Bill will ensure that there is a clear line of accountability for the activity set down in primary legislation.

I believe that this change is necessary to ensure that public communications providers can take appropriate direct action to interfere with wireless telegraphy to prevent the illegal use of mobile phones in prisons. Under the 2012 Act, mobile phone operators can act only as agents of the governors of individual institutions, rather than in their own right. Making this change means that the latest technological advances will be available to combat illegal mobile phones, governed by a clear legal framework.

The changes in clause 1 provide for the Secretary of State to authorise a public communications provider to interfere with wireless telegraphy in prisons in England and Wales. That is in addition to the existing authorisation that can be given to governors under the 2012 Act to interfere with wireless telegraphy in their institutions. Of course, it is important to ensure that this activity is subject to the right safeguards to prevent inappropriate use. To that end, consequential changes are made in the schedule to the Bill, which amends sections 2 to 4 of the 2012 Act. Section 2 of that Act is amended so that the safeguards that already apply to authorised governors will also apply to authorised public communications providers.

Like an authorised governor, any authorised public communications provider will have to comply with the directions given to them by the Secretary of State. Those directions must include requirements to pass on information concerning interference activity, as well as circumstances in which the use of equipment must be modified or stopped. That will help to ensure that there will not be disproportionate interference with wireless telegraphy outside the relevant institution.

Section 3 of the 2012 Act governs the retention and disclosure of information obtained following interference. Section 3 provides that information must be destroyed after three months, unless the governor authorises its retention on specific grounds. Where that information is retained, the governor must review its continued retention at three-monthly intervals and must destroy the information if retention is no longer required. Responsibility for deciding about retention and disclosure will continue to rest with the governor of the relevant institution. Because relevant information may have been obtained by a public communications provider, section 3 of the 2012 Act will be amended to clarify which governor will be responsible for decisions about retention and disclosure in such cases.

Clause 2(1) sets out the short title of the Bill, and subsection (2) states:

“This Act comes into force on such day as the Secretary of State may appoint by regulations made by statutory instrument.”

That is a standard procedure to provide for commencement by regulations if commencement provisions are not placed in a Bill. Clause 2(3) and (4) mirrors provisions in the 2012 Act concerning the Bill’s territorial extent, and the possibility of extending its provisions to the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man in the future. All those provisions are standard and, I hope, uncontroversial.

[Andrew Selous (South West Bedfordshire) (Con)]

I will not detain the Committee long, but I want to add my wholehearted support to my hon. Friend in introducing this important Bill. Having had the privilege of being the Minister responsible for prisons, probation and rehabilitation for two years, I am particularly aware of how necessary these provisions are.

We very much want prisoners to use telephones legitimately, and to stay in touch with their families and children in the approved manner and under the control of the prison authorities. That is a good thing that we want to encourage, and nothing in the Bill will prevent that. However, we must also be aware that prisoners have used mobile phones to carry on a life of crime in a truly shocking and appalling way, to the extent that they may as well not even have been in prison. Murders have been arranged and organised from within prisons, and drugs rings and even arms importation schemes have carried on because prisoners have had the use of illegal mobile phones.

There is also the issue of the intimidation of victims by perpetrators who have been sent to prison. When someone has been sent to prison, at least for that period of time the victim should not be afraid of being confronted by the person who attacked or raped them or whatever. Such intimidation is truly shocking, and the Bill will go a long way towards preventing it.

I remember that there are some prisons—HMP Brixton, for example—where people live right next to the prison wall. If memory serves me right, HMP Cardiff is another example of a built-up area where people live right next to the prison. In the past, mobile phone companies were obviously wary about that, and Members of Parliament would not want their constituents who live lawfully next to a prison to have their mobile phone usage interfered with. I believe the Ministry of Justice and my hon. Friend the Member for Lewes have come up with a solution that means that that will not be a problem, and that we will not affect the legal use of mobile phones by law-abiding constituents who happen to live next to but outside a prison. Perhaps my hon. Friend or the Minister will provide clarification on that point.

I offer my wholehearted support to this important Bill. We want phones to be used to help prisoners stay in touch with their families, because we know that that aids rehabilitation and helps to reduce crime, which is a good thing. However, phones are absolutely not to be used for ongoing criminal purposes, and that is why I support the Bill so strongly.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Andrew Selous and Maria Caulfield

Tuesday 14th June 2016 Commons Chamber

[Maria Caulfield (Lewes) (Con)]

12. What steps are being taken to improve safety and reduce violence at HM Prison Lewes.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Andrew Selous)]

Improving safety is a top priority and the governor at Her Majesty’s Prison Lewes has put plans in place to address safety issues, including the provision of additional training for staff to better support vulnerable prisoners. Nationally, a violence reduction taskforce has been created to support and challenge establishments with a high rate of violence. An additional £10 million has been allocated to those prisons facing the greatest safety challenges.

[Maria Caulfield]

I am sure the Minister has seen the recent independent report which highlights significant security issues not just for inmates, but for prison officers. Will he give his assurance that he will look at the findings in that report and at its recommendations?

[Andrew Selous]

Yes, I can absolutely give my hon. Friend that assurance, and I believe that she is visiting the prison shortly. We will learn from every report. There is currently a police, coroner, and prisons and probation ombudsman report on a recent incident at HMP Lewes. We will learn from that, and we will continue to make improvements in this important area.

--- Later in debate ---

[Maria Caulfield (Lewes) (Con)]

T2. Roughly 20% of prisoners have spent some time in care. I have met some young care leavers in my constituency and prison is often seen as an attractive option because it provides a roof over their heads and a hot meal each day. What measures are this Government taking to ensure that care leavers have better options in life than prison?

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Andrew Selous)]

I thank my hon. Friend for raising that very important issue. The Government have asked Sir Martin Narey to review residential care for looked-after children, and some of his recommendations will touch on the criminal justice system. The care and supervision of young offenders in custody is not good enough, which is why the Government have asked Charlie Taylor, a former chief executive of the National College for Teaching and Leadership, to lead a review of the whole of the youth justice system, and that final report will be out shortly.