Loneliness Strategy

Baroness Meacher Excerpts

Wednesday 23rd March 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

The noble Lord is right. Community and volunteer groups of all shapes and sizes play an important role. Since April 2020, we have continued to grow the membership of the Tackling Loneliness Network to over 150 members. Last year, we published our Tackling Loneliness Network action plan, setting out actions that members of the network committed to take to tackle loneliness during the pandemic. We will continue to review that and see how that work can be furthered.

[Baroness Meacher (CB)]

There can be no more lonely experience than that of CFS/ME sufferers, for whom crushing fatigue is just one of a long list of symptoms that interfere with—and I would say prevent—normal social interactions. NICE recently issued guidelines for CFS/ME sufferers. Will the Minister agree to contact NICE to see if it would consider adding a section on loneliness for these particular sufferers—as I understand it, it did not include that issue within its guidelines?

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

I shall follow up that point with my honourable friend Nigel Huddleston and colleagues at the Department of Health. The noble Baroness is right: we know that people with long-term health conditions are significantly more likely to report feeling lonely. Through our loneliness funding, we have supported groups that work with people with disabilities and long-term health conditions to support them to feel more connected, including Mencap, the National Autistic Society, the British Deaf Association and the RNIB, to name just a few. I will follow up the point that she makes about NICE as well.