Neuroblastoma Treatment

Debate between Baroness Laing of Elderslie and Will Quince

Thursday 15th June 2023 Commons Chamber

[The Minister for Health and Secondary Care (Will Quince)]

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Darlington (Peter Gibson) for securing this important debate. I thank him especially for sharing the experience of his constituent Mark Bell, and the challenging events leading up to the devasting loss of his much-loved son Luke to neuroblastoma. I am pleased that Mark and Carol could be here for this debate. As a parent who has sadly lost a child myself, I send my heartfelt condolences to Mark and his family. No parent should have to go through what his family have; I know that it is a void that can never be filled. I am full of admiration for Mark and his family: as my hon. Friend pointed out, following their tragic loss, they established their charity, the Team Luke Foundation, to help other parents in a similar situation. I commend and applaud its important work in raising awareness of neuroblastoma and supporting parents in accessing the information and advice that they need.

My hon. Friend also referenced the letter to my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister from the hon. Member for Batley and Spen (Kim Leadbeater) about her constituent Beau. I too would like to extend my deep condolences to the family of brave and beautiful Beau, who also lost her life to neuroblastoma. My thoughts are also very much with Shirley and her family. I would like to assure my hon. Friend and all families who are affected by cancer that one of my and the Government’s top priorities is speeding up the diagnosis and improving the treatment of cancer, including neuroblastoma.

Working together with our colleagues in the national health service, the Government have three priorities for cancer care. The first is to recover from the pandemic and the backlog. The second is to get better at early diagnosis, which my hon. Friend made a very eloquent and articulate case for, and to get better treatment using the tools and technologies available to us. The third is to invest in research and innovation, because we know that things such as genomics and AI have the potential to transform our experience of cancer as a society. With my hon. Friend’s permission, I will focus on diagnosis and research.

Let me turn first to early diagnosis. Cancer services, including those for children, are an absolute priority for the NHS—I know that and have seen it at first hand. The NHS is working to raise further awareness of the symptoms of cancer, lower the threshold for referral by GPs and accelerate access to diagnoses and treatment. The NHS long-term plan for cancer aims for three quarters of cancers to be diagnosed at stage 1 or 2. NHS England launched operational delivery networks in June 2021 to enable clinicians to lead and improve cancer pathways for children and young people.

We are also making interventions to diagnose cancer early. NHS England has announced that it is expanding direct access to diagnostic scans across all GP practices, which will cut waiting times and, importantly, speed up diagnosis for patients. Non-specific symptom pathways are transforming the way that people with symptoms not specific to one cancer, such as weight loss or fatigue, are diagnosed or have cancer ruled out. This gives GPs a much-needed referral route, while speeding up and streamlining the process so that, where needed, people can start their treatment sooner. Thankfully, the majority of people referred will be given the all-clear. It is crucial that people who are diagnosed start their treatment promptly, while giving peace of mind to those who do not have cancer.

We have previously discussed this, but I hope my hon. Friend will be pleased to hear that the Department has committed an additional £8 billion over the next two years to increase our capacity for elective activity and for adult and children’s cancer services.

Community diagnostic centres have played a huge role in recovering the cancer backlog. We have 108 community diagnostic centres open and operational as of today, and our aim is to open 160 by 2025, but I want to go much faster. So far, we have delivered over 4 million additional vital tests and checks since 2021, including for cancer. Testing and diagnosing early means we can provide the right treatment on time, which is why, as my hon. Friend said, it is so important.

The NHS continues to do groundbreaking research to improve treatment for children with neuroblastoma. Supported by the National Institute for Health and Care Research and Great Ormond Street, it has identified a new drug target for children with neuroblastoma, with the hope that new, less intrusive therapies will be developed by targeting a developmental cell type that exists only in neuroblastoma tumours after a child is born. This team of scientists and doctors at Great Ormond Street and University College London has been awarded a £519,000 Wellcome Trust innovator award to continue its ground- breaking research using image-guided surgery for childhood cancers—that is specifically for neuroblastoma.

The NIHR has also awarded funding to support the development of a treatment decision aid for parents of children with neuroblastoma that has sadly relapsed. The study will consist of two phases and aims to develop an intervention to support parents who are having to make multiple different treatment decisions after their child has relapsed. I will gladly meet my hon. Friend and the NIHR to see what further steps we can take to boost research into neuroblastoma.

My hon. Friend referenced the letter that the hon. Member for Batley and Spen sent to my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister regarding the bivalent vaccine trial, which is not currently available in the United Kingdom. UK clinicians and researchers are hesitant about the US trial of bivalent vaccines for children in remission with neuroblastoma, because it has no comparator group to enable measurement of the treatment’s effectiveness and effect. I also understand that the trial involves very intensive and invasive post-treatment monitoring. Nevertheless, I know discussions are ongoing in the international community, including here in the United Kingdom, on the optimal trial design that will generate the high-quality evidence needed to understand the real efficacy of the bivalent vaccine in this group of patients.

Again, I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Darlington for bringing this hugely important matter to the House and, importantly, for sharing Luke’s story. I thank Luke’s family for the work they are doing, not just in raising awareness, which of course is hugely important, but in the support they are giving to families in similar positions. I am pleased to assure my hon. Friend that, together with groundbreaking research supported by the NIHR and the continued efforts of the NHS in recovering cancer services, the treatment of neuroblastoma and all other cancers remains an absolute top priority for not just me but this Government.

Let me conclude by saying that my hon. Friend asked three specific questions, and my answer to all three is: yes, yes and yes.

Finally, I ask you to indulge me on something, Madam Deputy Speaker. Without embarrassing the Whip on duty—Whips rarely get a mention—let me say that I understand my good friend, my hon. Friend the Member for North Cornwall (Scott Mann), is marrying his partner Nicola this weekend. I wish him all the very best for a wonderful day and them a very happy future together. [Hon. Members: “Hear, hear.”]

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

I am sure that the whole House will join the Minister and me in sending our congratulations and best wishes to the hon. Gentleman and his fiancée and family for a wonderful wedding at the weekend—we hope the sun shines for them.

I also thank the House for a very constructive debate. I have said before that I do wish that people who watch our proceedings would pay more attention to these kinds of debates, where we are discussing a matter of great importance and sensitivity, and where the House can welcome the family of a little boy such as Luke, and let them know that we, as a whole Parliament, are working for them and that this place is not only about loud and aggressive argument.

Question put and agreed to.

Government PPE Contracts

Debate between Baroness Laing of Elderslie and Will Quince

Tuesday 6th December 2022 Commons Chamber

[Will Quince]

I have given way once before—

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

Order. The hon. Lady should not be on her feet when the Minister is answering an intervention from another Member. She is simply getting in the way of the dialogue, and that is not the polite way to do it. If her intervention is to be taken, it will be taken in due course. Standing up for a long time while there is another dialogue going on is really not very polite.

[Will Quince]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker.

Independent Review of Children’s Social Care

Debate between Baroness Laing of Elderslie and Will Quince

Monday 23rd May 2022 Commons Chamber

[Will Quince]

I reiterate my thanks to Josh MacAlister and his team for this most excellent review. My hon. Friend is right that there will be an immediate laser-like focus on foster care recruitment—local, regional and, to some extent, national. That is hugely important because we need additional places. The figures are a bit misleading, because there are huge numbers of expressions of interests, often to multiple agencies, and there are some people in there whom we would not want to be foster carers. However, the number of expressions of interest versus the number of successful foster carers is not where we want it to be. That means massively increasing the pool and, when it comes to expressions of interest, really hand-holding and making sure that people get the support that they need to go through to fostering and beyond.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

I thank the Minister for his statement and I congratulate him on Colchester becoming a city. We are very proud of that in Essex.

School-based Counselling Services

Debate between Baroness Laing of Elderslie and Will Quince

Tuesday 9th November 2021 Commons Chamber

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

The right hon. Gentleman knows that that is not a point of order for the Chair. If he does not like what the Minister is saying, he is at liberty to intervene on him and suggest that he says something else. The Minister also has plenty more time to make plenty more points.

[Will Quince]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. In response to the right hon. Gentleman, I am responding to what the Government are doing on the issues that have been raised.

As I mentioned, another important part of the whole school approach is ensuring that all pupils understand how to promote their own mental health and wellbeing. We must ensure that they have the knowledge and confidence to seek additional support when it is needed. That is why we made health education compulsory for pupils receiving primary and secondary education, alongside relationships education in all primary schools, and relationships and sex education in all secondary schools. Through these new subjects, all children will be taught about mental health, including how to recognise and manage any wellbeing issues. We have published a support package for schools to ensure that teachers have the confidence to deliver the subjects, specifically including the content on mental health and wellbeing.

Let me turn to the mental health support teams, which have been referenced by numerous Members across the Chamber. Although schools have an important role to play, teachers are not mental health professionals and they should not be expected to act as such. Where more serious problems occur, schools should expect the pupil and their family to be able to access support from specialist children and young people’s mental health services, voluntary organisations and local GP practices.

Social Security

Debate between Baroness Laing of Elderslie and Will Quince

Tuesday 9th February 2021 Commons Chamber

[Will Quince]

I work very closely and meet with all the organisations that the hon. Lady references, but work coaches are an important reference point. They all say without hesitation, when I visit jobcentres across the country, that universal credit is an incredible tool—a powerful tool—to help support and empower people back into work. That is why it is so absurd that the Labour party wants to scrap it.

Several Members raised pension credit and its uptake. I have no doubt that the Pensions Minister will be willing to meet hon. Members to discuss that further, because I know that he has done a considerable amount of work in that area.

The uprating order will ensure that working-age benefits increase in line with inflation, which represents a cash increase of £500 million for working-age benefits. That includes those benefits that contribute towards extra costs arising as a result of disability or a health condition, and pensioner premiums in income-related benefits.

To conclude, I will summarise the benefit increases that the Government are implementing to support those most in need. We are increasing the basic state pension and the new state pension by 2.5%. That will deliver on our manifesto commitment for the state pension triple lock. We are increasing the pension credit standard minimum guarantee in line with the cash increase in the basic state pension to support the poorest pensioners. We are increasing working-age benefits in line with prices; we are increasing the universal credit work allowances so that claimants can earn more before their payments are reduced; and we are increasing benefits to meet additional disability needs and carer benefits in line with prices. I commend the order to the House.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That the draft Social Security Benefits Up-rating Order 2021, which was laid before this House on 18 January, be approved.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

I will suspend the House for three minutes in order that the Chamber can be prepared for the next item of business.