HIV and World AIDS Day

Eddie Hughes Excerpts

Thursday 29th November 2018 Commons Chamber

[Eddie Hughes (Walsall North) (Con)]

I just want to say briefly how fortunate I feel I am to have been walking past the Chamber, seen that there was this debate and taken the opportunity to come in. My first wife was a nurse, and I remember when she came home from work—I think 27 years ago—having just treated her first AIDS case, and we were both scared. Since then, the treatment of it and the understanding and appreciation of it in society have changed so dramatically. I realise now, having heard the speech of the hon. Member for Brighton, Kemptown (Lloyd Russell-Moyle), that there is still some way to go for those who are hesitant about telling new friends and acquaintances, but it felt like a genuine privilege to have been here to hear him speak, so I thank him very much.

[Steve Brine]

I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention.

As I was saying, much has changed since the late ’80s: health needs are different; we have better drugs and better diagnostic tools; and, as has been said, attitudes towards HIV and AIDS are totally different and totally transformed.

The hon. Member for Kensington mentioned Princess Diana—the original one, as opposed to the new one—and that incredible moment. I will repeat what I said the other night in Speaker’s House. I was in secondary school at that time, and I remember that powerful image being broadcast. I was only a teenager at the time, and little did I know that I would one day be the public health Minister talking about these issues. It was one of those images that is really seared into our national conscience. What a great loss that lady is to so many social causes, as well as of course to her family. It was an incredible image.

As the hon. Member for Brighton, Kemptown has said, today, it is not about dying of AIDS, but about living with HIV. I would go further, however, because it is about more than that, is it not? It is not really “living with”; it is just “living”. I am also very privileged to be the cancer Minister, and how many times cancer patients say to me—my shadow, the hon. Member for Washington and Sunderland West (Mrs Hodgson), knows this, because people very often used to say this to us when we ran the all-party group on breast cancer together—that, “I am not my cancer. It is just something that I do and something that I have as well.” Happily, HIV is now just part of the hon. Gentleman: I am sure he would rather it was not, but it is not just something he lives with; it is something that he lives.

A big public health display in the foyer of the Department of Health and Social Care currently shows all the different public health campaigns over the years. The terrifying tombstone image is obviously something that we have, rightly, moved on from, but it is still an incredible part of our public health campaign history. Back then, the Government made the bold move to run a major public information campaign on HIV—“Don’t die of ignorance”—and we piloted needle exchange schemes, introduced HIV testing and raised the prospect with the public. If we consider the HIV epidemic in this country, we can be proud of the record of Governments of all parties over many years.

As figures released today show, the UK has met the UNAIDS 90-90-90 target—yes!—and it is one of the first countries in the world to do so. Members from across the House are proud of that, and the latest report from Public Health England showed that in 2017 an estimated 92% of people living with HIV in the UK were diagnosed, 98% of those were on treatment and 97% of those on treatment were unable to pass on their infection. That is a major achievement that we should be proud of. More importantly, those who work in our health service and have done so for years—like the partner of my hon. Friend the Member for Walsall North (Eddie Hughes)—should be even more proud.

Prevention is one of my passions, and one of the Secretary of State’s priorities. We do not yet have a cure for HIV, which is why prevention is so important. Our efforts to prevent HIV and AIDS have been highly successful, and much has been said about the international dimension, which I will touch on. The UK is a world leader in efforts to end the AIDS epidemic, including through our major investment in the global fund. Our largest investments are through multilateral organisations such as the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, UNAIDS and Unitaid, given their greater reach and scale. I met Lelio from Unitaid at the G20 in Argentina last month, and it is doing such good things with the investment that we announced in Amsterdam, to which the hon. Member for Cardiff South and Penarth (Stephen Doughty) referred. I work closely with my hon. Friends in the Department for International Development and the Foreign Office, and these three Departments are very tight and work closely together on this issue.

Excellent initiatives such as the MenStar Coalition aim to get more young men tested and on to life-saving HIV treatment to protect them and their partners. There is the Elton John AIDS Foundation and other partners, and MenStar is rolling out a self-testing campaign in east Africa. The UK is the second largest donor to Unitaid—a charity that does so much work against stigma—and provides an annual contribution of around €60 million as part of our 20-year funding commitment.

There has been much talk about the domestic situation, and NHS England launched the world’s largest pre-exposure prophylaxis—PrEP—trial last year. To be honest, I had never heard of that until I became a health Minister—why would I have?—but once officials had explained it to me, it did not take me long to think that it sounded like a real no-brainer. I know that many people are eagerly awaiting the results of the trial. I am one of them, and my officials know of my impatience, which is legendary in our Department. It is crucial to have the right information to address the major questions and effectively implement the PrEP trial on a larger scale.

The point about savings was well made and not lost on me. I am not in a position to make a policy promise at the Dispatch Box today, but on the point about places made by the hon. Members for Brighton, Kemptown and for Cardiff South and Penarth, I say only that I am listening closely and they should continue those discussions with me—I know they will. The Department met members of the all-party group on HIV and AIDS to discuss these issues, and they should continue those discussions with me. We are listening. Many of the public health challenges we face today require different approaches and fresh thinking if we are to make progress. Indeed, in the past few years many innovative ways to tackle HIV have emerged, including HIV testing options such as self-sampling and home testing services, which I know are very popular.

I would like to mention the HIV prevention innovation fund, which I am very proud of. Innovative community-led interventions have had a significant role to play in limiting the HIV epidemic in England, so we set up the HIV prevention innovation fund in 2015 to support voluntary sector organisations. The fund has supported many projects since it started. I announced them at an event here in the House last year—the hon. Member for Cardiff South and Penarth, who chairs the all-party group, was present. In 2017, we awarded just under £600,000 to 12 projects. I am very pleased to say that we are running the fund again this year. The principle of the fund is something we are carrying over into other areas of policy, because it has been so successful. I want to see us do more of that.

This year we celebrated the 70th birthday of the NHS. I have already mentioned the incredible staff who work across the service. England has an outstanding record of achievements in HIV treatment and care. I want to take this opportunity to recognise and thank everyone for doing that. Care for people with HIV is now highly effective, and increasing numbers of people are living with HIV into older age with normal life expectancy. Antiretroviral therapy has transformed the outlook for people living with HIV, from what used to be a tragic death sentence to a very manageable long-term condition, as we heard so eloquently this afternoon.

Our policy is to make sure that HIV testing is as accessible as possible, in particular to those at increased risk. It is therefore very important that testing is available in a range of clinical and community settings—hence why the innovation fund and its programmes are important. Over the years, local authorities, which are now public health authorities up and down the land, have introduced innovations and improvements of their own, in particular on testing. We know it is working. Testing activity at sexual health services, which we know are under great pressure—we do not deny that for one moment—continues to increase and HIV diagnoses have fallen. HIV testing in sexual health services has increased 15%, from 1.07 million tests in 2013 to 1.24 million in 2017. Most significantly, we have seen a 28% drop in new HIV diagnoses between 2015 and 2017. That is encouraging and good, but we must not be complacent. I assure the House that we are not complacent and we want to continue to maintain this progress.

The hon. Gentleman mentioned the prevention strategy. That was a very top line document. I had a meeting this afternoon to discuss the prevention Green Paper, which will follow next year. I can assure him that the long-term plan, which will follow before that, will absolutely have sexual health and HIV in it. I am being very ambitious with officials on that. I know that he will rightly hold us to account and I thank him for giving me a chance to say that.

I want to touch on education and awareness. Education around HIV and how it is transmitted remains absolutely critical, as the hon. Member for Brighton, Kemptown said in his opening remarks. I am pleased to say that schools will be required to teach relationship and sex education from September 2020. The Government announced that relatively recently. I have been very involved in that in relation to the cancer brief, because I am very keen for schools to responsibly teach cancer awareness to young people. At secondary schools, there will be clear and accurate teaching about sexual matters, including factual knowledge around sex, sexual health—including HIV—and sexuality. The schools Minister was sitting next to me throughout his speech. He wanted me to pass on his congratulations to the hon. Gentleman on his speech.

Testing is the only way to be certain of HIV status. Last week was National HIV Testing Week and the Secretary of State took part. This flagship campaign promotes regular testing among the most at-risk population groups and aims to reduce the rates of late diagnosis or of those remaining undiagnosed. Sadly, stigma remains a significant factor in why people do not test for HIV. I understand that. This can mean that HIV goes untreated and can then be transmitted. It is vital that we continue to break down the stigma, normalise testing and support those most at risk of infection.

I want to mention the “Can’t Pass It On” campaign. Whoever is doing the marketing for the Terrence Higgins Trust is doing a very good job—I know it works with a very good agency. As I said at the reception the other night, I was on the tube the other day with my daughter, who spotted some advertising or branding for testing week. She asked me what it was, because it caught her eye, and I was able to explain it to her. She is only 11. If more parents did that for their children and relatives, it would help to break down that stigma. The trust’s website has a very good page on the “Can’t Pass It On” campaign that includes different people’s stories, and I have a funny feeling that before we leave the Chamber, “Lloyd’s story” will be on it, with a clip from today in Parliament. I will certainly be clipping it off the Parliament TV website and tweeting it out through the Department of Health’s social media account.

In conclusion, I congratulate the hon. Gentleman again on introducing this timely and vital debate, and I wish him and everybody well for Saturday who will be marking World AIDS Day, whether they be remembering and celebrating private, not yet able to do so publicly, and those who, like him, are able to do so publicly. They are all part of the story, and our best wishes and love go to them all. We look forward to brighter futures in this policy area, as we work towards what I am determined will be zero stigma and zero transmissions.

Healthcare (International Arrangements) Bill

Eddie Hughes Excerpts

Wednesday 14th November 2018 Commons Chamber

[Eddie Hughes (Walsall North) (Con)]

I want to make a brief but enthusiastic speech in support of the Bill. It is a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for East Renfrewshire (Paul Masterton), although I have to admit to being mildly distracted by the tales of his stag-do in Portugal. I look forward to concluding my speech and finding out more details about that later.

An odd place to start would be my constituency, where 20% of constituents do not have a passport, and therefore do not get the opportunity to travel and have any concerns about reciprocal healthcare arrangements. However, they do need to worry about the healthcare arrangements that are provided in this country. Any country that might wish to engage in reciprocal arrangements with us will no doubt be looking jealously at our health service, which I understand employs 1.5 million people, making it one of the five biggest organisations on the planet. Clearly, it is an incredible organisation. We are spending over £100 billion a year on it, so why would other countries not want to enter a reciprocal arrangement with us? We have a lot to offer.

There has been some question about what the Brexit deal will be and what the future might look like next year, when we leave the EU. My right hon. Friend the Member for Wokingham (John Redwood) has made this point a number of times: if you were to sit down with your iPad now with nothing better to do and try to book a flight for next year to Europe, you would have no difficulty doing so at all. We do not know what the arrangements are for international travel yet. We have not seen the detail of that, in terms of what has been signed and agreed, but we know planes will take off and will land in Europe and I think we are fairly confident that people will be able to get healthcare when they go to Europe and that there will be no unusual situation where ambulances drive up to one end of the border and hand a patient over. That is not likely to be the case, so let us bring a degree of practicality to the debate. That is what the Bill does: it is a practical Bill in order for us to make the necessary preparations because we are, of course, leaving the EU. It is necessary partly because 25% of Brits who travel abroad do not have holiday insurance. Perhaps they are taking a bit of a flyer and hoping that those reciprocal arrangements will be the safety net that protects them.

I have a particular concern because that 25% figure rises to 40% for 18 to 24-year-olds and 38% for those aged between 18 and 30. I am the father of two kids, aged 22 and 27. I think it is very unlikely that if they were travelling to Europe they would have the common sense to book travel insurance, despite protestations by their father. So I am hoping that we achieve those reciprocal arrangements, not least because my understanding is that nine of the 10 top holiday destinations abroad for Brits are in Europe—if it were not for New York, the top 10 would be entirely in Europe. So we are leaving the EU, but we are not leaving Europe.

[Dr Wollaston]

Does my hon. Friend accept that at the moment people do not need to have health insurance as they are covered by the EHIC? The fact is that they will need to have such insurance if we do not have a deal. People who travel thinking and believing that they are insured next year may find, if they have a serious medical emergency abroad, that they are completely wiped out by the medical costs. We need to be clear about that with people.

[Eddie Hughes]

I completely understand, and to a degree accept, that point, except that I perhaps have more faith than my hon. Friend in the ability of our ministerial team and Government to negotiate an agreement with Europe that will mean that those worries are allayed. I confidently believe that the arrangements will be very similar.

[Vicky Ford (Chelmsford) (Con)]

I intervene on an extremely important point. The EHIC does give reciprocal care, but it is not the equivalent of health insurance. If someone has a very serious accident, it does not pay for the travel costs, for example, of coming back to the UK, which other health insurance policies would do. So while this is fantastic and I will be voting in favour of it, it is not the equivalent of having traditional health insurance.

[Eddie Hughes]

I thank my hon. Friend for making that point. I want to conclude my speech by saying that I am optimistic not only that we will get a good deal and these fears will be allayed, but that post Brexit people will look further afield than Europe for their travel destinations. Not only will we be getting trade deals across the globe, but we will be travelling more widely.

Prevention of Ill Health: Government Vision

Eddie Hughes Excerpts

Monday 5th November 2018 Commons Chamber

[Matt Hancock]

Yes. [Laughter.]

[Eddie Hughes (Walsall North) (Con)]

The Secretary of State is obviously too young for it, but will he endorse the mile walk aimed at the over-50s that leaves the Stan Ball centre in my constituency at half-past 10 every Monday morning?

[Matt Hancock]

The daily mile—or, in this case, the mile walk once a week—is not just for children but for all of us who can make it. The example that my hon. Friend mentions is valuable to the community, and I am absolutely delighted that it is happening.

Clinical Waste Incineration

Eddie Hughes Excerpts

Tuesday 16th October 2018 Commons Chamber

[Stephen Barclay]

I thank my hon. Friend for that question. There has very much been a Government-wide effort to ensure that waste did not build up, for the reason he mentions—the ability of the NHS to maintain its services and continue to operate if clinical waste could not be removed from the site. There is a varying degree of contingency capacity on different sites, so certain hospital sites would quite quickly exhaust that capacity if it was not cleared. That is why, as my hon. Friend the Member for Henley (John Howell) said, the ability to mobilise the contract quickly was so important.

[Eddie Hughes (Walsall North) (Con)]

Will the Minister assure the House that good governance will be in place to ensure that the new provider can dispose of the waste very safely?

[Stephen Barclay]

I am very happy to give my hon. Friend that assurance. There are lessons to be learned from the HES contract, and I am keen that we do so, but as I commented earlier, the contract with Mitie—through the use of different logistics firms and different waste sites—will actually build greater resilience into the arrangements for clearing clinical waste.

Gosport Independent Panel: Publication of Report

Eddie Hughes Excerpts

Wednesday 20th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

Of course that is an issue that we will look into. I would just say, in the interests of transparency, that the Department of Health has been on the same journey as the whole of the rest of the NHS with respect to patient safety issues.

[Eddie Hughes (Walsall North) (Con)]

Does the Secretary of State agree that this report highlights the importance of the CQC to the NHS and patient safety? Will he consider giving that body greater regulatory powers?

[Mr Hunt]

The legal independence of the CQC, and its ability to act as the nation’s whistleblower-in-chief, is one of the big, important reforms of recent years, and I think that will give the public confidence. However, I do not think that that is the entire answer, and I still think there is an issue about who families go to when they think they are being ignored by the establishment.

Acquired Brain Injury

Eddie Hughes Excerpts

Monday 18th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Steve Brine]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. I hope to get to his part of the world at some point while doing this job and it may be that I could visit it while I am up there.

The World Health Organisation states that rehabilitation intervention should be aimed at achieving the following five broad objectives: preventing the loss of function; slowing the rate of loss of function; improving or restoring function; compensating for lost function; and maintaining current function. NHS England’s Improving Rehabilitation programme applies those principles, rightly, in a holistic way to encompass both mental and physical health. In 2015, the programme published the “Principles and expectations for good adult rehabilitation” to support commissioners on delivering rehabilitation care locally in our constituencies. This document describes what good rehabilitation looks like and offers a national consensus on the services that we think people should expect.

[Eddie Hughes (Walsall North) (Con)]

It is important that we consider that it is not just trauma with regard to ABI. One of the other causes might be excessive exposure to carbon monoxide, so I was grateful to the support that Headway gave to my private Member’s Bill, which seeks to introduce mandatory carbon monoxide detectors in new-build and social rented houses.

[Steve Brine]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. As I said at the start, obviously there are non-traumatic injuries—so, through conditions, and meningitis and stroke were two examples that I gave—but he is absolutely right to point out that issue. I congratulate him on his success with his Bill.

The rehabilitation programme includes 10 principles and expectations that were designed by people who use rehabilitation services—the carers, healthcare professionals, commissioners, strategic clinical networks and national clinical directors. Building on this, in 2016, NHS England published further rehabilitation guidance covering both adults and children. This provides local service planners with a commissioning model, a range of case studies and crucially, an evidence base for the economic benefits of delivering high-quality rehabilitation services.

While the vast majority of rehabilitation care is locally provided, NHS England commissions specialised rehab services for those patients with the most complex levels of need. Teams within trauma units assess and develop a rehabilitation prescription for patients with ABI. Through this, patients can access specialists in rehabilitation medicine, whose expert assessment helps to inform the prescription. The teams manage ongoing patient care, including a key worker to support patients through the pathway and into rehabilitation at a level appropriate to their clinical need, in accordance with their clinician’s advice—be that highly specialised rehabilitation or through a local provider in the local network.

I want to mention the Rehab Matters campaign. As I said, rehabilitation is a key part of the patient’s recovery. I saw at first hand the impact that this can have in helping people to recover from illness or injury when I visited the Hobbs rehabilitation centre in my Winchester constituency earlier this year. The Chartered Society of Physiotherapy launched its Rehab Matters campaign here in the House at the end of October last year. It makes a very powerful case for community rehabilitation, and I think that all commissioners should ensure that levels of provision are meeting local needs and look to places such as the Hobbs centre as a good example of what can be achieved through rehabilitation care. The society produced a film that was made by the Oscar-shortlisted UK director, Chris Jones, called “Rehab Matters”, and I highly recommend it to Members interested in this area.

I am just going to skip over to research, and then close, because we have only an hour and I know that a lot of people want to speak. Let me just highlight the research being undertaken in this important area. We are investing over £1 billion a year in health research through the National Institute for Health Research. The NIHR is funding ABI research from basic science to translational research in civilians, military and sport. For example, we are investing over £100 million, over five years up to 2022, in a biomedical research centre in Cambridge that is developing new approaches to reduce the impact on patients’ health and wellbeing of neurological disorders, stroke and brain injury. We are investing £5 million to co-fund the surgical reconstruction and microbiology centre in partnership with the Ministry of Defence—that has been going since 2011. The centre specialises in research, taking discoveries from the military frontline to improve outcomes for all. We have invested about £16 million in brain injury research since 2014 through the NIHR health technology assessment programme, and we are investing just over £2 million over three years through NIHR’s global health research group on neurotrauma, which aims to advance global neurotrauma care and research to help to save lives, reduce disability from the trauma and improve the quality of life for patients with brain injury.

I fully recognise the devastating impact that acquired brain injuries can have on individuals and their families. The evidence shows that neglecting rehabilitation is a false economy. Rehabilitation equips people to live their lives, fulfil their potential and optimise their contribution to their family, their community and society as a whole. I am honoured to have introduced this debate and, as always in such debates, I look forward to hearing the views and insights from across the House on what further work or support is needed to reduce risk and improve the care available.

Mental Health Units (Use of Force) Bill

Eddie Hughes Excerpts

Report stage: House of Commons
Friday 15th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Philip Davies]

I am afraid I cannot answer my hon. Friend’s question. I do not know. The Minister was absolutely right to highlight the fact that although stakeholders do welcome this Bill, it would be wrong to say that they welcome every provision within it. That is certainly the feedback that I have had from my local care trust. While it certainly agrees with the thrust of the Bill and many of its provisions, there are still some it is not comfortable with. I cannot tell my hon. Friend about the genesis of this or any widespread level of support for it, because I am not aware of it. Perhaps the hon. Member for Croydon North or the Minister can help out. All I can say is that that definition of “ethical” is

“relating to moral principles or the branch of knowledge dealing with these”.

I am not sure whether my hon. Friend is any more enlightened by that definition that members of staff may have to take into account. I have no idea what it all means, to be perfectly honest, and yet we are expecting members of staff who are dealing with patients in difficult situations to be weighing up all these things.

I think it can be established that everyone has their own individual take on morals, but surely we cannot start applying ethical and moral views in serious situations such as these. This will end up being the beginning of a long list of other factors that it will be demanded people be mindful of. My view is that healthcare should be provided in a legal and law-abiding way, and not with the addition of anybody’s personal, individual ethical take on what is moral and not moral.

[Eddie Hughes (Walsall North) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is making a fascinating speech that seems to be very well researched. Given that he considers this to be flim-flam, if there were other elements of law surrounding this topic that included the use of the term “ethics” or “ethical”, might this need to be included in order to satisfy some type of uniformity across different pieces of legislation?

[Philip Davies]

My hon. Friend may well be right; I do not know. I have not been able to find any evidence for that, but it may exist somewhere. Perhaps the promoter of the Bill or the Minister will be able to enlighten us. If my hon. Friend has any evidence, I would be very happy to change my mind, but as it is, I cannot see any purpose to the provision.

The general thrust of my argument is that while this Bill should indeed be making staff and institutions accountable, it should also be helping them in their daily job, but it is making their life far more difficult than need be. I do not see that it is helping to protect the rights of patients, which is at the heart of what it is supposed to do.

Oral Answers to Questions

Eddie Hughes Excerpts

Tuesday 8th May 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call Eddie Hughes. Get in there, man.

[Eddie Hughes (Walsall North) (Con)]

T9. I hope the Minister will join me in congratulating the mayor of Walsall, Marco Longhi, whose mayoralty has raised a significant sum to support WPH Counselling and Education Services, which provides adolescent mental care and counselling in Walsall.

Mental Health Units (Use of Force) Bill

Eddie Hughes Excerpts

2nd reading: House of Commons
Friday 3rd November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)]

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Croydon North (Mr Reed) for introducing the Bill; he certainly made a powerful case for it. Everything we have heard has made it clear why the Bill is necessary. I congratulate Opposition and Government Members for the constructive way in which they have contributed to the debate so far. There is broad support for the measures in the Bill and I hope that if there are disagreements, they can be ironed out in Committee.

My hon. Friend the Member for Croydon North spoke movingly about the case of Seni Lewis, who, as we heard, tragically died after being restrained face-down in a mental health hospital. We have heard other examples of the issues that the Bill is designed to address. Sadly, Seni’s case was not an isolated incident. Restraint is still used far too regularly, despite Department of Health guidelines that state it should be used only as a last resort. Guidelines state that the dangerous practice of face-down restraint should be phased out, but unfortunately the technique is still used widely. There is significant variation in the use of restraint on mental health patients.

[Eddie Hughes (Walsall North) (Con)]

rose—

[Justin Madders]

I am not going to give way. Many other Members wish to speak and there are other items of business that we want to get to.

As Members have highlighted, there is an issue with unconscious bias. Young black men are statistically more likely to be seen as having psychosis or schizophrenia, and are at risk of being subject to inappropriate use of force, as are women.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health (Jackie Doyle-Price)]

I join Members across the House in congratulating the hon. Member for Croydon North (Mr Reed) on bringing the Bill before us today. I thank him for the constructive way in which he has engaged with me and my officials. I look forward to taking this Bill further—hopefully completing its journey—so that we can bring Seni’s law to the statute book.

The death of the hon. Gentleman’s constituent, Seni Lewis, was a tragedy. I know that the hon. Gentleman has been deeply touched by the incident—so touched that he has brought forward this Bill, with an impressive coalition of interests behind it. May I send my very best wishes, through the hon. Gentleman, to Seni’s family? It must be an incredibly difficult time for them and I extend my deepest sympathies to them.

As we have heard, the Bill seeks to reduce the inappropriate use of force or restraint against people with mental ill health, to allow greater scrutiny of the use of force in mental health units, and to ensure that police officers use body-worn video cameras in the course of their duties in relation to people in mental health units. It also seeks to guarantee that the mental health system learns from and applies appropriate lessons in relation to the use of force. For too long, restrictive interventions have been accepted as the norm in health and mental health care settings, and we want to change that culture. That is why the Government support the principles set out in the Bill.

[Eddie Hughes]

It is important to note that there were 67,864 incidents against NHS staff in 2015, 67% of which took place in a mental health setting. We need to appreciate that there is a need for force, because staff working in these situations sometimes need to be protected.

[Jackie Doyle-Price]

My hon. Friend makes a valid point but I think that we are all agreed in this House—certainly in this debate—that we need to balance rights and liberties with the need to achieve safety. I can say, quite categorically, that this Bill goes a long way towards achieving that.

The Government support the principles set out in the Bill, but we accept—as I think the hon. Member for Croydon North would—that there is still some work to do on the detail regarding the right mechanisms and processes. We can explore those matters in Committee and we are fully behind the Bill’s Second Reading.

NHS Pay

Eddie Hughes Excerpts

Wednesday 13th September 2017 Commons Chamber

[Eddie Hughes (Walsall North) (Con)]

Like everyone who has spoken, I completely welcome the hard work that is done by NHS staff up and down the country, but please let me bring some context to the debate. In representing Walsall North, I represent the 31st most deprived constituency in the country and the 17th most deprived in England by income. The average income in my constituency is £440 a week, which is approximately £23,000 a year. Across Willenhall and Bloxwich in my constituency the average property price is £122,000. My constituency is the complete embodiment of the hard-working, just about managing, and the people there, after 38 years, decided to elect a Conservative MP to advocate on their behalf. I intend to advocate on behalf of all my constituents, not just those who work in the public sector. Why is that? Well, the average salary in my constituency is £23,000, which is about the same as a qualified nurse starts on in the NHS.

Many workers in my constituency are employed as hairdressers, plumbers or carpenters, and what pay rise do they get every year on an incremental basis? They do not get one. They have had to work hard every year for their pay, and when we make the comparison using other factors, such as pension schemes, we see that in order to earn the same sort of pension a plumber would need to be putting away 43% of their salary. What have this Government done instead? Since 2010, we have increased the national minimum wage from £5.93 to £7.50, an increase of 26%; and we have increased the basic rate above which people pay tax from £6,500 to £11,500, putting an extra £1,000 in the pay packets of the people in my constituency. When the average salary is £23,000 a year, that money goes a long way to helping them buy a property. So, yes, I completely endorse the arguments I have heard and, yes, we value the public sector in this country, but the Conservatives value all the workers in this country, which is why I will be advocating that we continue with a Conservative Government in the future.

[Several hon. Members rose—]