Covid-Secure Borders

Claire Coutinho Excerpts

Tuesday 15th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Claire Coutinho (East Surrey) (Con)]

The right hon. Gentleman talks about a tougher border policy to keep out variants. Can he explain why the delta variant is present in Australia?

[Nick Thomas-Symonds]

Because nobody can provide 100% protection against anything—[Hon. Members: “Oh!”] Conservative Members jeer, but it is about time they took a bit of responsibility for the failure of their Government. They argue with me about comprehensive hotel quarantine, but not one of them had the courage to vote against it in the Lobby in February. They have completely failed to put in place every possible measure that they should have implemented. That is a comprehensive failure.

Between 6 January, when the third national lockdown in England began, and the end of April, 1.59 million people flew into the UK. Only a tiny percentage underwent hotel quarantine. Most damaging of all was the abject failure to add India to the red list in time. Even if the Government had refused to introduce hotel quarantine, which they should have done, it was clear that more countries needed to be added to the red list. Pakistan and Bangladesh were added on 9 April, yet the Prime Minister waited 14 more days before adding India. Civil Aviation Authority figures suggest that at least 20,000 passengers who might have been infected with the delta variant arrived from India between 2 and 23 April—a staggering number. It is unbelievably reckless that on his list of priorities, the Prime Minister put having his photograph taken with Prime Minister Modi ahead of protecting jobs and the safety of this country. Nobody is blaming people who travelled when they were permitted to do so. The blame lies with the UK Government for their unjustifiable delay.

Last night at the Dispatch Box, the Health Secretary claimed that he took a decision based on the evidence available to him at the time. On 1 April—the day before he says he took the decision—India recorded the highest one-day spike in 2021. It was hardly a secret; it was on newspaper front pages. Cases were surging, and there it was—publicly available—but it seems it did not prompt him to act. It has also been reported that on the same day, Ministers knew about the delta variant being discovered in the UK, but that did not prompt him to act either. The Government must now publish the risk assessments that were done on India by the Joint Biosecurity Centre, so that we may have maximum transparency on exactly how that disastrous decision to delay was made.

Last night, I heard the Health Secretary claim that we on the Labour Benches called for India to be added to the red list with the benefit of hindsight. What nonsense! If the Conservatives had listened to us on the Labour Benches and voted with us, protections would have been in place from February. I have the Hansard, and the Health Secretary can check the facts in Hansard, if he wants to. Let us hear no more about hindsight. We want Ministers to show some judgment and foresight.

Oral Answers to Questions

Claire Coutinho Excerpts

Tuesday 13th April 2021 Commons Chamber

[Ms Dorries]

I would like first to convey my most sincere sympathies to anyone who has suffered as a consequence of taking sodium valproate during pregnancy. It remains still the only drug that some women who suffer from epilepsy can take to control their epilepsy. As set out in the recent written ministerial statement, the Government will carefully consider the recommendations and make a full response to the whole report later this year.

[Claire Coutinho (East Surrey) (Con)]

What progress his Department has made on increasing the recruitment of nurses to the NHS.

[The Minister for Care (Helen Whately)]

NHS nurses have gone above and beyond throughout the pandemic. We are committed to increasing the number of nurses in the NHS by 50,000 over this Parliament through improving retention and increasing domestic supply and international recruitment, and we are on track to do that. The number of nurses in the NHS is at an all-time high of 301,491 full-time equivalent nurses employed in NHS trusts and CCGs.

[Claire Coutinho [V]]

We all know how hard our NHS nurses have had to work in the past year, many without a break and, for those with international origins, without seeing their families either. As public focus inevitably turns towards the NHS backlog, can Ministers assure me that they will work with NHS England to protect staff holidays and enable and encourage NHS staff to get the rest and recuperation they need?

Covid-19

Claire Coutinho Excerpts

Monday 22nd February 2021 Commons Chamber

[Claire Coutinho (East Surrey) (Con)]

Tomorrow marks 11 months since the Prime Minister first set out restrictions on our daily life here in Britain, so I welcome the road map he set out today, particularly for the hope it will give people that life will be able to return to normal and the ambition we have for June and July that there will be no restrictions on social contact. He has set out a sensible and pragmatic approach. I also welcome in particular the priority given to schools.

The past year has been extraordinarily difficult, but it has also seen the best of my communities in East Surrey. I would like to pay tribute to some of their work. First, the Tandridge Voluntary Action group, which I met recently, set up a befriending contact system for people, with over 100 friendships across the constituency. Those friendships have been lifelines for people who otherwise would have experienced severe loneliness throughout the pandemic, and I know from talking to the volunteers that it has brought much happiness to both sides of the friendships.

I would also like to point out some people who have gone above and beyond in my constituency. Geoff Ledden has been running a community group to provide skincare for nurses packages to our local hospital, East Surrey Hospital, which means that, at the end of a long day at work, nurses have been able to use some welcome skincare products to deal with the daily trauma to the skin of using PPE. That is just one example; there are so many across East Surrey.

I also pay tribute to the brilliant work of the national vaccination programme, from the scientists in Oxford to Kate Bingham—with her brilliant venture capital experience, and unpaid for her role, she has secured us one of the best vaccine packages across the board—the health care officials, the officials in DHSC and the Ministers involved as well as all the volunteers on the ground. We have used our local community centres with great aplomb in East Surrey, from the Westway centre to the Centenary Hall in Smallfield, and we have had an army of volunteers supporting health care professionals to ensure that we can roll out the vaccine. Surrey Heartlands CCG has administered 250,000 vaccine doses so far, with 95% of over-70s given at least one jab to date. That is a tremendous record, which I am so proud of.

NHS staff—many of whom I seem to be related to, but I also have many in my constituency because of East Surrey Hospital—have had a tremendous, relentless year of hard work. I hope that in the months ahead, as we try to look forward to dealing with the NHS backlog, we also support the need for them to have some rest and recuperation.

Botulinum Toxin and Cosmetic Fillers (Children) Bill

Claire Coutinho Excerpts

2nd reading & 2nd reading: House of Commons
Friday 16th October 2020 Commons Chamber

[Claire Coutinho (East Surrey) (Con)]

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Sevenoaks (Laura Trott) for bringing forward this important Bill. I am privileged to have her as a geographical neighbour and friend. I know that her background, particularly in education policy, and now from serving on the Select Committee on Health and Social Care, means she is always focused on the wellbeing of young people, and I see that shine through in her work here.

As a child, even in the kindest possible terms I would have been described as “unfortunate”. My hon. Friend the Member for South Suffolk (James Cartlidge) talked about his minus 7 eyesight, but I can raise that—to minus 11. My bottle glass glasses that I had by the age of five were surrounded by very fetching plastic rainbow frames. I accompanied them with a pudding bowl haircut and a dress sense that was “interesting”, to say the least. But as a child I did not have to contend with social media, and I seriously worry about young people now having to do so. I am lucky that the photographs of me during that period are not online and not widely shared, and I do not have to contend with facing up to some of the shortcomings of my appearance.

[Fay Jones]

My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. She is also a dear friend of mine, as is my hon. Friend the Member for Sevenoaks (Laura Trott). I have seen the photos she is talking about and if I were her, I would be happy to share them—she was a very cute child.

[Claire Coutinho]

That is most generous.

[Sally-Ann Hart (Hastings and Rye) (Con)]

I have not seen those photos, but I am sure they are beautiful, because every child is gorgeous. Does my hon. Friend agree that for any child to think that they need to have botox or cosmetic procedures is so wrong and so sad, and it is an indictment of the society we find ourselves in today?

[Claire Coutinho]

I thank my hon. Friend for that point, because it is the crucial one. Growing up not having to contend with social media, I did not focus on these things—I did not think about them. I loved maths and reading, and I rarely thought about the way I looked, but that is not so for the children of the current generation.

[Anthony Mangnall]

We are, in one respect, the last generation to have lived in a time without social media. We recognise the difference between before and after social media, so we at least have a sense of depth and perspective about the impact it has on our life. Does my hon. Friend accept that there is a rapidly increasing problem of people going on to social media at such a young age and that not understanding a world without it is going to have much longer implications down the line?

[Claire Coutinho]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. The long-lasting implications do not just relate to the way people feel about the way they look; there is a wider sense of anxiety about their social connections and their sense of self-esteem, so that point is well made.

Last week, I was happy to visit a wonderful school in Lingfield in my constituency, where I spoke to a bunch of 10 and 11-year-olds. They asked fantastic questions, about not only my work in Parliament, but everything ranging from where I might go if I had a flying car to my favourite book characters.

[Anthony Mangnall]

Where would my hon. Friend go?

[Claire Coutinho]

Well, I thought I would quite like to go to Antarctica. I was told that it would be rather cold, so I said I would wear a very big jumper. It struck me when I was looking at those children that in a couple of years’ time, when they are 13 or 14, the questions might be slightly different. Women in the House will recognise the questioning that we have all experienced, which is sometimes very personal to our looks, our diet, our wardrobe and how we get ready in the morning. That focus on how we look, which seeps into our thinking as we grow older, is unfortunate and sad.

[Jane Stevenson]

Does my hon. Friend agree that many magazines and newspapers perpetuate that by attacking Members in the House as well as other people in the public eye? Young people see that as something important. Does she also agree that building children’s confidence, through a range of methods, about the fact that they are good at several things—it is not all about how they look—is incredibly important?

[Claire Coutinho]

I completely agree with my hon. Friend. It is worrying when our sense of self-worth relies on the way we look, so what she suggests is welcome.

[Simon Baynes]

Going back to the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Bosworth (Dr Evans), not only is this an issue about how people look but the fact that the look can be changed on social media. There is double trouble: it is how someone looks, and there are other people who are altering images falsely or superficially, which is something that we should bear in mind.

[Claire Coutinho]

That is a really important point, because when people undergo these medical procedures sometimes the look that they are trying to achieve is a lie, because they are using filters and other social media applications. When someone has filler in their face they do not look like the filter shows them they might look.

[Dr Luke Evans]

On the subject of social media filters, is my hon. Friend aware of evidence from Girlguiding that three quarters of young girls will not consider posting an image without it being doctored? What impact does she think that has on perpetuating the cycle of bad body image?

[Claire Coutinho]

I was not aware of that fact, but it is a truly horrific statistic. We should all consider carefully what it might mean for our young people if they feel that lack of confidence in their own personal image. It is incredibly sad, and very much feeds into this debate.

It is commendable that the Bill tackles the risks that could affect people if they are given fillers by a medical practitioner who is unregulated. We heard from my hon. Friend the Member for Sevenoaks about a young lady who might have lost her lips. The risk of scarring, nerve damage and, in some cases, blindness has not been conveyed to people who are trying to access these procedures. I would therefore welcome a regulated sector.

[David Johnston (Wantage) (Con)]

Is my hon. Friend aware that during lockdown, although clinics were supposed to be closed, Save Face received 179 complaints—

[David Johnston]

Is my hon. Friend aware that during lockdown, although clinics were supposed to be closed, Save Face received 179 complaints from people who had undergone procedures, 80 of which were about illicit, botched procedures that resulted in swelling, bruising and uneven lips. Does she agree that that underlines the problems in the industry and why it needs more regulation?

[Claire Coutinho]

That exactly underlines why this industry needs more regulation. We need to be worried not just about the potential for physical scarring but about the financial risk. A couple of Members have touched on the practitioners’ lack of insurance, which I hope can be considered when we introduce regulations. Their lack of public liability insurance means that the consumer often bears the financial risk of anything that goes wrong.

[James Cartlidge]

To go back to the point that my hon. Friend the Member for Bosworth (Dr Evans) made, having insurance in place might remove some of the cost that is falling on the NHS and therefore on the Exchequer.

[Claire Coutinho]

That is an excellent point.

We should not be allowing our young people to face these risks—not only the medical and financial risk, but the psychological risk. It is damaging for a person to go for a cosmetic procedure that they think will fundamentally change their life and then for something to go wrong or for them to realise that that was not the thing that was going to make them happy in the first place. I am very happy that we will hopefully be able to address all those things through this Bill.

There are medical procedures that young people need, such as cosmetic procedures because they have some sort of facial disfigurement, for example, or procedures for migraines, bladder dysfunction, face and eyelid twitching or excessive sweating. They would still be allowed under this Bill, so no one should be worried that they would not be able to get the medical help they need.

Returning to the point about social media, we have all seen the deeply worrying statistics showing how the young people of our age are different from our generation, when we were young. Young people now are more anxious and depressed and have a lower sense of self-worth, and that starts in their early teens because of how social media helps them to see themselves and their standing in the world. The availability of these procedures, particularly if they are unregulated, will make people question themselves more and think, “Maybe I should go and make a change. Maybe I should change my face, my jawline, my nose, my lips.” The ability to access unregulated procedures almost forces the question in a very damaging way.

People have talked about the effect on boys and girls—both sexes undergo these procedures. The unrealistic images on social media lead to a very damaging cycle by setting up a view of beauty that boys take on and girls then want to live up to. I have seen the results of scientific experiments in which young children are presented with a range of images and are asked which are the beautiful ones. They are now starting to pick out the ones that are cosmetically enhanced. That is incredibly damaging.

[Anthony Mangnall]

Hello, Madam Deputy Speaker. My hon. Friend is making a very important point. What does she think about the industry taking the appropriate steps to ensure that it is in tune with the thinking of this House and that, if the Government are going to pass legislation, it has a role to play in preventing people from having unrealistic images put in front of them?

[Claire Coutinho]

That is an excellent point.

I will finish on this point. We in this House should be looking not just at the provision of cosmetic procedures but at the use of social media and how it affects our young people and at the teaching of body and face positivity. We should be doing that in all our schools with all our young people to tackle the issue at the root. I am very happy to support this Bill.

--- Later in debate ---

[Anthony Mangnall]

This goes back to the intervention that I made earlier about the datasets used by cosmetic companies on adverts. It is extraordinary to read that “80% of all women think this product works” when the dataset is only 105 people. That is not an acceptable way to market a product. It aims to change someone’s perception, using incredibly persuasive advertising techniques, with incredibly beautiful people and saying, “This works.” That is a misnomer, and it is very damaging. Many of us have spent a great deal of time watching television in lockdown, and it is a real problem for parents to see their children influenced in that way.

[Claire Coutinho]

On my hon. Friend’s point about there being little evidence on whether these procedures will be successful, does he agree that, by regulating, we could ensure that practitioners have insurance, in which case they might face a financial cost if the procedure does not go to plan?

[Anthony Mangnall]

That ties in succinctly with the point about enforcement for practices that are undertaking these procedures. That will be an important part of ensuring that those who offer these services are fully aware of the implications of breaking the law, when the Bill is hopefully passed.

My hon. Friend the Member for Bosworth used his extensive experience and medical insight to explain the value of the Bill and its implications, and I do not need to go over what he said. However, I would like to make a few points about why I support the Bill and am so pleased to speak in the debate. As we have heard today, the Bill will introduce parity with the age at which someone can get a tattoo. It makes sense to regulate and level up so that we are all equal at the age of 18 in terms of the procedures that we can get, so that no one at a younger, more susceptible age might be influenced by the fads of social media. I have spoken to many of my constituents about that. They are worried about the body image messaging sent out by the fashion houses of Paris, magazines, newspapers and social media, so I welcome the inclusion of that measure in the Bill.

Covid-19 Response

Claire Coutinho Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd June 2020 Commons Chamber

[Matt Hancock]

The hon. Lady is right to raise the case of Weston hospital. We have been working hard to ensure that the local outbreak is brought under control, and we are making progress. She is also right, of course, to raise the PHE report that we published today.

The critical next step is to ensure that we understand the drivers of the disparities that are seen in the data and, in particular, that we address the question of the impact, taking into account co-morbidities has such as obesity and the impact of occupation, which are not taken into account in the PHE work thus far. That is the work that the Minister for Women and Equalities, my right hon. Friend the Member for South West Norfolk (Elizabeth Truss), will be taking forward.

[Claire Coutinho (East Surrey) (Con)]

I know the worry that has been felt by the BME community during this period. I have personally felt it, as have many of my family members working on the frontline in the NHS, so I sincerely thank the Secretary of State for commissioning the review and continuing its work. Can he confirm that its publication was not delayed due to the sensitivity of its findings?

[Matt Hancock]

I can absolutely confirm that. I know my hon. Friend understands this, not least because I think that both her parents are doctors who are absolutely in the heat of this. In terms of the data publication, when I asked PHE to undertake this piece of work, I asked it to produce it by the end of May, which it did. It delivered it to me on Sunday, and we have published it and brought it to the House at the earliest opportunity.

Covid-19 Update

Claire Coutinho Excerpts

Tuesday 5th May 2020 Commons Chamber

[Matt Hancock]

Exercise Cygnus was undertaken under my predecessor, and there are specific rules in Government around decisions over papers that were produced before one’s time. I will take away that point.

[Claire Coutinho (East Surrey) (Con) [V]]

There is some evidence that under-10s are at much lower risk of getting and transmitting the virus. If true, this would be a huge comfort, both to teachers and working parents. What evidence has the Secretary of State seen to that effect, and what work is being done to further explore this?