Cannabis: Medicinal Use

Debate between Baroness Williams of Trafford and Baroness Hayman

Monday 16th July 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

It is of course up to PCCs to decide the policy priorities for their local areas, and of course those will be different in different areas depending on the prevalence of drug use. The noble Lord is right that the numbers have dropped, but—and I see this, depressingly, in Manchester—the use of synthetic cannabinoids is rife in some cities.

[Baroness Hayman (CB)]

My Lords, I am afraid that I am still confused, even after the noble Baroness’s answer to the noble Lord, Lord Forsyth. As I understand what the noble Lord, Lord Rennard, said, if a family wants to be one of those permitted to use cannabis-based medicines in this country, it must prove efficacy, but because they are not already scheduled and licensed for such use, in order to do so the family must go abroad to take those medicines. The noble Baroness herself said in her answer that it was quite inappropriate that families should have to go abroad.

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

There are two things here—and this will be third time lucky, maybe. If a family has to go abroad to get medicines, we still would wish to be sure of a medicine’s safety. So it is absolutely right that we would go through a process based on medical evidence on the safety of a drug. What we have seen in the last few weeks has actually been a short-term fix to what we need to sort out: the long-term problem and the solution of providing the appropriate drugs to these children for their conditions.

Home Office: Immigration

Debate between Baroness Williams of Trafford and Baroness Hayman

Monday 18th June 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

On a number of occasions over the past couple of weeks, I have described the types of decision-making in UKVI that we are seeking to improve. That includes improving the training and mentoring programmes for new caseworkers, as well as the wider assurance process, which my noble friend would expect us to do. The assurance process follows the three lines of defence and at each stage of an assessment there is scrutiny of the effectiveness of the decision-making process.

[Baroness Hayman (CB)]

My Lords, last week’s announcement of the changes in the tier 2 visa regime for NHS staff was urgently necessary and much appreciated. Will the Minister now look at some of the bureaucratic processes of the Home Office which are still causing problems, particularly for general practitioners already working in this country, and providing valuable services to patients, when their continued service is at risk? Will she also take the opportunity to confirm that the Department of Health and the NHS have a clear code of conduct on international recruitment to prevent unethical recruitment from developing countries, a concern which has been raised in the House?

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

I thank the noble Baroness for that question. In and of itself, the fact that doctors and nurses have been taken out of the cap will improve the bureaucratic processes and help decisions to be made more quickly. As to those doctors and nurses who are not in the occupation shortage list, the sponsor still has to go through the resident labour market test. I expect this to go more smoothly and to free up the numbers within the cap for other occupations.

NHS: Overseas Doctors

Debate between Baroness Williams of Trafford and Baroness Hayman

Tuesday 8th May 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hayman]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government how many overseas doctors recruited to work in the National Health Service have been refused visas to enter the United Kingdom in the last 12 months.

[The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Williams of Trafford) (Con)]

My Lords, no application for a medical practitioner role that is on the shortage occupation list, which is based on advice from the independent Migration Advisory Committee, has been refused a tier 2 skilled work visa. The Home Office publishes regular visa statistics. However, the Home Office visa case working system does not capture the profession of the applicant. That information is captured on the tier 2 visa application form, and to provide it would require a manual check of our records.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Hayman (CB)]

I am grateful to the Minister for the detail there but it does not actually answer my Question. I have some figures from NHS Employers, which says it knows of at least 400 cases of qualified doctors from overseas who have been offered jobs in the NHS but not been allowed in because of the lack of being in a designated shortage occupation and the pressure on tier 2 visas. When the NHS is short of thousands of doctors, applications from EEA doctors are diminishing and the NHS is actively recruiting overseas, what possible logic can there be for the doctors whom it has recruited then to be turned back and denied visas by the Home Office? Last week the leaders of 12 medical colleges, the BMA and NHS Employers wrote to the Home Secretary asking him to take action to end this ridiculous and indefensible situation that damages patients. Will the Government act now?

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

My Lords, there were quite a few points in that question. The noble Baroness’s first point was that there are 400 cases of doctors overseas who have been denied visas because they are not on the shortage occupation list. Therein lies the point: the shortage occupation list is arrived at with advice from the Migration Advisory Committee regarding those occupations that cannot fill the demand within the NHS. If we expand some of the doctor numbers that are not on the shortage occupation list, we are in danger of pushing out some of those other professions that we do need and that are on the shortage occupation list. We need to think about this in the round.