Health and Social Care

James Brokenshire Excerpts

Thursday 16th January 2020 Commons Chamber

[James Brokenshire (Old Bexley and Sidcup) (Con)]

It is good to see you restored your place, Mr Deputy Speaker, and a particular privilege to take part in today’s debate on the Gracious Speech, with a particular focus on our precious NHS. It is also good to see the emphasis in the Government’s programme on funding, innovative medicines, safety and mental health, so that we can improve the services that our NHS delivers and improve the lives of those who needs its care.

The timing of today’s debate has some particular poignancy for me. I was struck by the comments of my right hon. Friend the Member for South West Surrey (Jeremy Hunt) about the ups and downs of politics. It is almost exactly two years to the day that I had surgery to remove the top part of my right lung and the cancerous tumour contained within it, but I am pleased to say that, in the immortal lyrics of Sir Elton John, “I’m still standing.” [Hon. Members: “Hear, hear.”] I count my blessings each day, and today provides me with a further opportunity to pay tribute to the incredible people in our NHS who saved my life and continue to save the lives of countless people up and down the country every single day.

I have learned so much over the past two years, and I am determined to use my experiences to act as an advocate for change, especially for less survivable cancers such as lung cancer. I have been heartened by the encouragement of colleagues across the House—even the colleague who upon my return to the Members’ Tea Room after surgery said, “Didn’t expect to see you back.” To this day, I am quite sure that the omission of the words “so speedily” was simply an unconscious oversight.

Over half of us will get cancer at some stage in our lives. That is why we need to be more open about and change the nature of the conversation around the disease. For many people, cancer is becoming the treatment of a chronic condition, and more and more people are living well with or beyond cancer.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for giving way. I was pleased to see him back after his operation, and he is making a clear case on cancer-related issues. Just this week, I met representatives from the Teenage Cancer Trust who indicated that, for young people and teenagers, cancer is not just about the operation and other physical activities, but mental anxiety, too. The Government have set aside money to ensure that that anxiety is addressed, but only 61% of such services are taken up in hospitals and just 40% of the available assistance and help is taken up afterwards. I am sure that the Government response will be positive, but does he agree that now is the time to address those shortcomings for those who experience mental health anxiety due to cancer?

[James Brokenshire]

I commend the hon. Gentleman for his point about mental health issues and some of the stresses and strains, and there is a need for greater focus and attention on teenage cancer patients. That leads me on to my next point, which is about the need to overcome the fear that a diagnosis can bring. I know what that can feel like. Early diagnosis and speedier treatment are key, not least to reduce the worry and sleepless nights that result from knowing something is wrong by getting something done about it. It is great that the NHS long-term plan recognises that. By 2028, the plan commits to improving cancer survival dramatically, increasing the proportion of cancers diagnosed early from a half to three quarters. That is why the NHS Funding Bill, with its commitment to an extra £33.9 billion a year for the NHS, is especially important.

There is, however, a question around how we turn the increased investment and that intent into the reality of improved outcomes. That is why we need to focus on what I term the “SAS”: better screening for the disease, greater awareness of the disease, and a breaking of the stigma attached to the disease. By doing that, we can make a real step change. I welcome the introduction of the targeted lung cancer screening programme, which I championed, and which is being rolled out as we speak. I commend the charities and the regular campaign events to highlight the symptoms and, yes, the importance of getting things checked out—especially for us blokes, who can be pretty rubbish at actually going to the doctors and doing something about it. The stigmas are linked to that, and we need to talk about the big C, because it is the disease that dare not speak its name. False judgments can be made, especially with something like lung cancer, because people may make wrongful assumptions that it must be perhaps the sufferer’s fault as they must have smoked. However, as one leading clinician said so effectively and succinctly at a recent conference I attended, “If you have got lungs, you can get lung cancer.”

All this needs to be looked at in context. We need the right workforce in place with the right equipment and the right systems and processes to back it all up. I welcome the Government’s commitment to increased investment in CT scanners and to increasing the overall number of nurses, but we need to recognise the particular role of specialist nurses and the incredible difference that they make. I look forward to the publication of Baroness Harding’s workforce planning review, and I hope that it sees this special group of nurses strengthened and supported and that their numbers will be increased.

There can be no doubt about the pressures that exist within the system and the increasing demands that our NHS has to meet, but the overwhelming experience of most people who use and rely on our NHS is positive, with a real appreciation of just how special it is. We need to continue to stand up for it, to champion it and to be positive about what more it can achieve. I have every confidence that we will and, in doing so, that we will help improve the lives of the people it serves and the people we are privileged to serve as Members of this House.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

Oral Answers to Questions

James Brokenshire Excerpts

Tuesday 29th October 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

We are all grateful to the national health service, but I know that the right hon. Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (James Brokenshire) has spoken movingly of the particular debt of gratitude he owes to the institution.

[James Brokenshire (Old Bexley and Sidcup) (Con)]

I am delighted to echo that again in the context of the fact that next month, November, is Lung Cancer Awareness Month. I ask my right hon. Friend to commend the Roy Castle Lung Cancer Foundation and all those who are highlighting the signs of this disease to save lives, quite literally, because of the need for early diagnosis. Equally, could he update the House on the lung health checks programme, which is targeted screening that could quite literally save lives from this terrible disease?

[Jo Churchill]

Along with my right hon. Friend, I pay tribute to the Roy Castle Lung Cancer Foundation, but also to all the charities that work in the cancer space and do the most tremendous work on awareness raising, because it is only by awareness raising that we can actually get earlier diagnoses and beat this disease. We are looking very seriously at what my right hon. Friend suggests.

The National Health Service

James Brokenshire Excerpts

Wednesday 23rd October 2019 Commons Chamber

[James Brokenshire (Old Bexley and Sidcup) (Con)]

It is a huge privilege to be able to speak from the Back Benches for the first time since my change in role and position. I cannot think of a better topic to be speaking on than our wonderful NHS. It will not surprise many in this House to hear me champion the NHS in those terms given the experiences that I have had, in a very positive way, within it over the past two years.

In some ways I very much welcome the opportunity of this debate, but there is also a part of me that does not welcome it, because we should have been debating something else today. However, even though we are not able to do so, I remain confident that we will secure a Brexit deal and get it through this House, and that the Prime Minister will remain focused on seeing that we leave with that deal.

This Queen’s Speech is profoundly about responding to the concerns of our constituents out there across the country. It has many good and positive measures, whether on violent crime or on things like building safety, which I care about enormously. I welcome the commitment to follow through with Dame Judith Hackitt’s review by ensuring that there are measures in place to promote safety, so that people are safe and feel safe in their homes. I also welcome the Domestic Abuse Bill and the new statutory duty, which I am sure will raise the standard and provide the level of care and support needed.

I appreciate the emphasis placed on our NHS in the Queen’s Speech, with measures such as the Health Service Safety Investigations Bill and the medicines and medical devices Bill, which I hope and firmly believe will continue to drive the changes we need in outcomes for people with cancer. The NHS long-term plan rightly set out an ambition and intent to diagnose more people with cancer at stage 1 and stage 2, to ensure that we get more people living well with and beyond cancer. That is critical if we are to see, as the NHS long-term plan says, 55,000 more people each year surviving cancer for at least five years after diagnosis. We must give that focus through these measures and further investment to achieve not only the numerical targets but to profoundly change people’s lives. After my diagnosis just under two years ago, I did not know whether I would even be here today to be able to give this speech. That is what we are talking about—this is about saving people’s lives, and with early diagnosis and earlier treatment, we can do that.

I was looking at a report published in the last couple of weeks by the UK Lung Cancer Coalition about the need for speedier diagnosis, and I commend it to the Secretary of State. I welcome the effort being made through the lung health check programme, which I hope to return to during Lung Cancer Awareness Month next month, and the optimal lung cancer pathway, to ensure that people get speedier treatment. In its report, the UKLCC included a profound and very pertinent quote from Sir Mike Richards, the former national cancer director, who said:

“When you receive a diagnosis of suspected lung cancer, it’s not about the number of days until you get access to treatment, but about the number of sleepless nights until you do.”

We need to focus on the overall impact of people receiving a diagnosis and ensure that we make it as effective and speedy as we can, knowing the burden on not just the individual but their loved ones and the pressures it brings. That needs our attention.

If we are to meet the ambition in the NHS long-term plan, we have to shift the dial in relation to lung cancer. There are 47,000 cases of lung cancer diagnosed each year. Sadly, it is the biggest cancer killer, with around 35,000 people dying from lung cancer every year in the UK, equating to nearly 100 people every single day. Only 15% of people diagnosed with lung cancer will survive their disease for five years. That is an unacceptable figure. Why is it the case? Because far too many people are diagnosed in the late stage, when the disease has spread and the options are more limited.

I welcome the innovative drugs that are coming through, which I hope the new legislation will support, and the £200 million investment in CT scanners that the Health Secretary has announced, which is so important. It is crucial that we shift the dial. Over half of us here today will get cancer at some stage in our lives. That is why we need to change the terms of the debate and focus on getting earlier diagnosis and speedier treatment. We also need to be more open and honest. Rather than talking about “the big C”, we should be looking at ways to discuss this far more openly. Through our investment, our plan and the steps set out today, we can turn the debate into one about cancer being a chronic disease that we can live well with and beyond. I hope that the measures we are debating today will help to achieve that.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

Lung Cancer

James Brokenshire Excerpts

Thursday 26th April 2018 Commons Chamber

[James Brokenshire (Old Bexley and Sidcup) (Con)]

I am very grateful to you, Mr Speaker, for your kind wishes and kind comments and the support that you have given to me as I renew my acquaintance with the ways and processes of the Back Benches. I very much appreciate your kind words and support.

A week ago today, I had the privilege to speak in the brain tumour debate inspired by the incredible work of Baroness Tessa Jowell. It was one of those very special moments in this House, which was made even more poignant by Tessa being present to hear the debate and to hear the tributes to her courage, her spirit and her determination to bring about positive change for people to live well with cancer for longer. The abiding theme through all that debate was a message of hope—hope for the future, hope for others, and hope in the face of personal physical adversity. There was also the overriding power of human kindness, compassion and love, and I want to return to some of those themes later on.

At the end of August last year, I was out in Northern Ireland for a family weekend. It was a Saturday afternoon and we had had some fun exploring somewhere new with the kids and we were about to have some lunch. I had just sat down when I realised that I needed to clear something from my throat, thinking that it must be a bit of food or perhaps some phlegm. The next think I remember is looking down and realising that my tissue had a bright red blob of blood in it. I felt my heart pounding and a knot at the very pit of my stomach at the shock. That is the thing about cancer: half of us will get it, and it can strike just when we least expect it.

Of course, I could have left it; we blokes are pretty good at doing that. I felt fit and full of energy and I did not have any pain. It actually never happened again. I could have said, “It’s a one off; it’ll just sort itself out.” I did not, because deep down I knew that something really was not right. I trusted my instincts. I did not delay in going to see my GP. I trusted his advice in seeing a consultant when my initial X-ray was clear

“because we probably shouldn’t just leave it there.”

I trusted my consultant’s advice to have a bronchoscopy—a tube down my throat to have a poke around in my lungs—after my CT scan showed a small area of inflammation

“because we probably shouldn’t leave it there.”

At each stage, I could have left it there. I was too busy with work, too busy with Brexit and too busy with the Northern Ireland political talks, but I did not leave it there and that saved my life. I was lucky because my cancer was caught early. I was able to receive curative treatment—surgery to remove the upper part of my right lung—but, sadly, too often that does not happen. Too often people find out that they have cancer too late, and that is what we need to change.

Every year around 36,000 people will die from lung cancer. That is more than breast, prostate and pancreatic cancer combined. It is the UK’s biggest cancer killer and survival rates remain stubbornly poor. One of the main reasons for this is that it is detected at a point when curative treatment is no longer an option. Two thirds of lung cancers are diagnosed when the disease is at an advanced stage. Let me give hon. Members a sense of what this means. Some 83% of lung cancer patients diagnosed at stage 1, when the cancer has not spread, survive their cancer for at least a year. This drops to just 17% at stage 4, when the cancer has spread to another organ. But this is not a numbers game. It is real life—and death.

The Roy Castle Lung Cancer Foundation, which does such excellent work, gave me just one example of this stark reality. Steph lost her dad to lung cancer in December last year. He died 12 weeks after diagnosis. She said:

“I think the worst thing was my dad wasn’t given the opportunity to really fight it.”

We are talking about mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, friends, loved ones and colleagues. Lives are cut short because we do not pick up on the signs and symptoms. We just do not get it picked up quickly enough.

Symptoms could include a persistent cough that just will not go away; feeling breathless but just not knowing why; hoarseness in the voice; unexplained tiredness or lack of energy; weight loss that cannot be understood; coughing up blood. Yet, according to opinion research commissioned by the British Lung Foundation and BritainThinks, one in five people in the UK are unable to name any symptoms of lung disease at all. Smoking is a clear risk factor, but many people who have never smoked develop lung cancer. I was one of them. Around 15% of lung cancers are in non-smokers. Given that 46,000 people are diagnosed each year, that is a big number in its own right.

I have been struck by the number of people who have asked me, “Did you smoke?” And that is how I have come to appreciate that stigma and misperceptions can be a barrier to getting people the help they need. Rightly, we have made huge steps forward in smoking cessation programmes. We have firmly cemented in people’s minds that lung cancer and other lung diseases are caused by smoking. But there are unintended consequences. Lung cancer can be caused by a number of factors, not just smoking, yet British Lung Foundation opinion research suggests that as many as a quarter of us assume that everyone with a lung condition is a smoker. This was brought home to me when I was contacted by someone with cystic fibrosis—a genetic condition—who told me that even he had been asked if he had smoked. There is even the suggestion that lung conditions are considered less sympathetically.

If someone links lung cancer so strongly to smoking and they have never smoked, they might simply ignore symptoms. Equally, if someone has obvious symptoms but is struggling with feelings of guilt or blame because they do smoke, they might not seek help. We need to challenge perceptions and ensure that stigma does not get in the way. We need to see that people with lung cancer receive the support and treatment they need, whether or not they have smoked.

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

It is good to see the right hon. Gentleman back, hale and hearty, as we say in Scotland. I wish him well for the future. He is quite right that not everybody who gets lung cancer is a smoker. Attention is often not drawn to health and safety at work, but people should be very careful. Workers who deal with deadly industrial processes are not always aware that this could have quite an effect on their health. Medical science is now gradually starting to make some breakthroughs, which gives us all a little bit of hope. I hope that he will touch on that.

[James Brokenshire]

The hon. Gentleman is prescient, because I was about to say that I believe there is real reason to be positive about what we can achieve.

Since my diagnosis, I have met leading experts in the field in the charitable sector and within our NHS. I have experienced incredible care by amazing NHS professionals on the frontline and spoken to experts in the field working on ground-breaking programmes. I have heard about new immunotherapies that are offering new hope even when surgery is not possible. I have even donated a small sample from my own tumour to an amazing Cancer Research UK programme to help understand cancer better by getting to the heart of its DNA to get to grips with its specific genetic make-up, help us find its weaknesses, and destroy it.

I commend the work of the NHS England clinical expert group for lung cancer, chaired by Professor David Baldwin, in seeing that speedier routes to diagnosis and other good practice can be applied across the country. The 10 new one-stop shop rapid diagnostic and assessment centres announced this month to speed up cancer diagnosis where there are vague or non-specific symptoms are another exciting new initiative. There is the work of the cancer taskforce in delivering the Government’s cancer strategy. There is the work of the taskforce for lung health to develop a five-year plan to improve lung health and prevent lung disease more generally. We should be hopeful, we should be positive, and we should be ambitious about what we can achieve and focus on how we can make the biggest impact.

From everything I have seen and experienced, early diagnosis and treatment lies at the heart of this. That is why I believe that a national screening programme for lung cancer is needed, as we have for breast cancer and bowel cancer. We are not starting from scratch. I commend NHS England for its announcement in November of a lung health check programme. It drew on the success of the Manchester scanner scheme, where mobile CT scanners detected four out of five cases of lung cancer in the early stages. In 12 months, the mobile scanning trucks picked up one cancer for every 33 patients scanned. Following this announcement, new lung screening pilots are about to get under way in various parts of the country.

But we risk each pilot doing its work in varying ways—not being joined up and with a fragmented approach to data collection preventing us from making comparisons and harnessing the lessons learned. There also remains some reticence to see this work progress to a national screening programme, with a desire to wait and see the results of the NELSON trial from Holland and Belgium. Yet we have already seen the huge benefits of CT scanning in the United States, and we have already dealt with issues such as false positives in other screening programmes.

There is a real human cost to delay. We should reflect on how many lives could be saved and how many lives are being lost while we wait. One example of this is Bill, whose lung cancer was picked up early through screening. He shared his story with the Roy Castle Lung Cancer Foundation, saying:

“If I hadn’t gone through that scan I could have been dead in a year’s time. The doctor when I went said it’s probably given you ten more years of your life.”

It is because of an overriding desire to see more people enjoy more years of life that I believe we should act now rather than wait. We should commit to a national screening programme and use the pilot programmes to support its implementation. If we want to see a step change in survival rates—to see people living through rather than dying from lung cancer—now is the time to be bold.

The last few months have been hard, knowing that in resigning from Government, my illness would be very public, and knowing that because of the need for a public announcement, many friends and family would be hearing about it on the TV or radio rather than hearing from me directly. When you go through something like this, it puts things in perspective and reminds you of what is really important—most especially, your family and those you love. In so many ways, it is even harder on them than it is on you. I want to thank my wife Cathy and my children Sophie, Jemma and Ben for the love and support they have given me and how they kept me going and kept me positive at some of my darkest moments.

I thank the incredible NHS professionals who have looked after me. They are very special people and without them I would not be giving this speech today. I have also got to know and appreciate even more the work of amazing organisations such as the Roy Castle Lung Cancer Foundation, Cancer Research UK, Macmillan Cancer Support and the British Lung Foundation. I have been humbled and overwhelmed by the kind messages of support, prayers and letters of encouragement from so many people, the contact I have had from people who have gone through or are going through a similar experience and the good advice I have received from key friends. It reminds you of the power of basic human kindness.

I have been very touched by the concern, kindness and support of colleagues from right across the House, some from people I might have expected, and some from people I did not. It has meant a great deal to me at a very difficult time. I hope that we can harness that spirit of good will and the skills, knowledge and experience of Members across the House, so that we can work together to shift the dial on cancer survival and above all deliver on the message of hope that I started with—hope for people receiving a lung cancer diagnosis just like me, hope for the future, hope for a continued life well led and hope for ourselves—and see that more of us are living well with cancer, and living well beyond it.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jackie Doyle-Price]

It has always been a mystery to me why we spend £200 a year on an MOT for our car but do not do the same for our own health. But I will come to the issue of screening in a moment.

I first want to tackle some of the specific points about lung cancer that my right hon. Friend the Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup raised. As he said, it is one of the most common and serious types of cancer, with 44,500 people diagnosed every year in the UK. Early diagnosis is key but, as he said, in the early stages there are not necessarily signs or symptoms, which is why diagnosis can often come too late. We need to raise public awareness and people need to be vigilant.

The issue of smoking is a very important one. It says here in my brief that smoking is the leading cause of avoidable cancers, particularly lung cancer—that is true, but because it is true it has led to a stigma around the disease, and because of its close association to smoking, many people, even if only subconsciously, view it as a self-inflicted disease. As we can see, that was not the case for my right hon. Friend, but it is very unfair to reach such prejudiced judgments about what is a very unpleasant disease.

As was the case with my right hon. Friend, 15% of lung cancer patients are non-smokers, yet an international survey by the Global Lung Cancer Coalition revealed that a quarter of people in the UK had less sympathy for people with that illness than for those with other forms of cancer. It is clear that lung cancer is not just a smoker’s disease, yet some people believe that that stigma is one of the reasons that lung cancer does not receive the level of research funding that other cancers enjoy. When it comes to cancer research, we know that as well as Government funding there is lots of voluntary funding, and for as long as that prejudice exists, lung cancer will not attract as much investment.

It is important, however, that we continue to spend money on research because, as my right hon. Friend has pointed out, lung cancer survival rates are poor and, although overall cancer survival rates are at an all-time high, some cancers have a five-year survival rate of less than 20%. That is why the Government are supporting the less survivable cancers taskforce, which the Under-Secretary of State for Health, my hon. Friend the Member for Winchester (Steve Brine), launched last year and which will look specifically at lung cancer, but also liver cancer—which I suspect suffers from the same stigma—brain, pancreatic and stomach cancer. It will focus on encouraging more research into less survivable cancers. My right hon. Friend also referred to the Roy Castle Lung Cancer Foundation, which does fantastic work to raise awareness of the disease, and I thank it for its work.

By way of an aside, if people are diagnosed with lung cancer, that tends to be all people see. I had a relative who died of emphysema, but he was a smoker. His death certificate pointed out that the cause of death was emphysema due to smoking. It ignored the fact that he had spent most of his working life in mills, where he would have inhaled various things. That is something that the hon. Member for Coventry South (Mr Cunningham) touched on, and it is close to my heart because of my own experience, as well as that of my right hon. Friend.

On screening, the United Kingdom national screening committee advises Ministers and the NHS in all four nations about screening policy. At the moment, systematic population screening for lung cancer is not recommended, owing to a lack of evidence that it will save lives. There is a considerable amount of research worldwide on CT screening for high-risk groups, such as smokers and ex-smokers. In the Manchester pilots, NHS England offered free health checks and on-the-spot scans to smokers and ex-smokers in Manchester, as my right hon. Friend has explained, as a result of which 46 cases of cancer were discovered. There is evidence that we can achieve things by intervening, and that is something that we should look at. NHS England is encouraged by the results. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Wantage (Mr Vaizey) has said, by reaching diagnosis early, we take cost out of the NHS. What is not to like about that? We will look at it further.

I am running out of time, but the Floor belongs to my right hon. Friend the Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup, who is now trying to intervene on me.

[James Brokenshire]

I think my hon. Friend has a few minutes left, because we started just after 5 o’clock. I commit to working with her and her ministerial colleagues to advance screening. I know that there is a lot of discussion about how to do so in the expert working groups. The pilots were not so much about screening as they were about carrying out scans, so the set-up is slightly different. None the less, it is important that they inform our working together. As I have made clear, CT scanning has the clear benefit of ensuring that we can pick up cancers sooner and enabling patients to get the treatment that they need to live full and long lives.

[Jackie Doyle-Price]

My right hon. Friend has made a generous offer. I will address the point that he has made in two ways. The Under-Secretary of State, my hon. Friend the Member for Winchester, is responsible for cancer screening programmes. Our current advice is that national uniform screening would not be productive, but we know about that route. I come back to my right hon. Friend’s experience because he had the wherewithal and courage to face up to a health issue that he had identified and take things forward. I think that the best way of getting improved outcomes is to empower patients to look after and manage their own care, and to have mature conversations with medical professionals so that full investigations can be made. Such conversations would lead to earlier screening. I would be delighted to work with my right hon. Friend to achieve that. We educate the public by sharing real life examples, and that is how we give them the tools to look after themselves. I look forward to working with him on that.

In the time I have left, I re-emphasise that we are making good progress and remain on track to deliver each of the 96 recommendations in the cancer strategy. That will help us to transform cancer services in England, to the benefit of all cancer patients including those with lung cancer. I cannot thank my right hon. Friend enough for securing this debate. I wish him continued success with his own health and send my best wishes to his family, who have gone with him through a very painful and traumatic journey. I thank him again for all the work that he is doing to raise awareness of the disease.

Cancer Treatment

James Brokenshire Excerpts

Thursday 19th April 2018 Commons Chamber

[James Brokenshire (Old Bexley and Sidcup) (Con)]

I am very grateful to the Backbench Business Committee for enabling the House to debate these important issues this afternoon. It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Croydon Central (Sarah Jones), who introduced the debate in such a powerful and effective way.

I do not think that anyone who watched Baroness Tessa Jowell’s speech could have been anything but moved by her powerful and poignant words. I know it moved me, having got to know, like and respect Tessa over many years for her work in Government and in the House, and for the way she is able to bring people together from across politics with a very constructive, focused and tenacious approach just to get things done.

The timing of Tessa’s speech also touched a particular chord with me, coming as it did just a week or so after my own surgery to remove a tumour from my lung. It was a brave, humbling and inspiring speech in equal measure, with her very personal description of her brain tumour and the impact it has had on her, her call to action to secure more funding for brain tumour research, and her stressing the need for more effective clinical trials and the joining up of analysis and data.

But fundamentally, what shone through in Tessa’s words was a profound message of hope—hope for the future; hope in the face of her own physical adversity—and her unstinting passion to secure positive change for the benefit of others. So many debates in this House or in the Lords, while passionate and important, can sometimes appear sterile, perhaps a little arcane, with discussions of statistics, policy or implementation of points of law. Tessa’s speech cut through all that to focus on the human condition: the life well led, what gives it meaning and purpose, and the overriding power of human kindness, compassion and love.

Tessa’s campaign has already made a difference. I warmly welcome the positive response from the Government by the Prime Minister, the Health Secretary and Members across Government to make change happen.

[The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Mr Jeremy Hunt)]

rose—

[James Brokenshire]

Perhaps I can give way to the Health Secretary on that point.

[Mr Hunt]

I am most grateful to my right hon. Friend. I wonder whether, on behalf of the Prime Minister and the Cabinet, I could follow the shadow Health Secretary in commending Tessa’s campaigning. Most people come to this place hoping to leave a legacy, but she has left not just one legacy, but two—her amazing achievements with London 2012 and her amazing campaigning on cancer. It is our privilege to take part in this debate and our duty to act on what she says.

[James Brokenshire]

I am extremely grateful to my right hon. Friend for underlining what can and will come out of this debate, which is continued momentum and a sense of purpose to bring about real change. Like the debate in the House of Lords, today’s debate should be a day not for political difference, but for how, together, we can all play our part in securing positive change to ensure that we use the best science to help beat cancer, and to offer the best support to those living with or beyond the disease.

After nearly eight years as the Member of Parliament for Old Bexley and Sidcup, this is my first opportunity to address the House from the Back Benches. While this is most certainly not a maiden speech, I hope colleagues will understand if I place some of my comments in a very local context. A few weeks ago, I was contacted by Lisa and Matt Taylor, the parents of young Olivia Taylor. In January, when Olivia was 17 months old, she was diagnosed with a large slow-growing glioma tumour, which is located at the centre of her brain. By February, Olivia had lost her sight and many other cognitive functions.

Olivia is no longer able to know whether it is night or day, impacting on sleeping patterns not just for her, but for the rest of the family. Because of its location, sadly the tumour is inoperable, and Olivia is receiving chemotherapy to keep the tumour stable and to help retain as much of her quality of life as possible. She is a very brave little girl and clearly surrounded by so much love.

As a parent, I find that a heart-breaking story, and the family face an incredible strain in meeting Olivia’s immediate needs and those that lie ahead. Despite all this, I have been struck by their hugely positive outlook in ensuring that Olivia has happy memories and that she has access to all the right support. They have launched a campaign with the hashtag #KeepOliviaSmiling to help to raise awareness of the signs and symptoms of brain tumours in children and the need for early diagnosis.

Brain tumours are the biggest cause of preventable or treatable blindness in children and the family believe that if the signs of Olivia’s tumour had been spotted sooner, her sight might have been saved. The campaign is also intended to help raise funds to support future treatment for Olivia, which might not be available in the UK. The family have highlighted to me the need for better join-up between hospitals on available treatments, accessibility to international trials and the need for greater research in childhood brain tumours, which can develop in different ways from adult tumours.

I warmly welcome the additional £45 million investment in brain tumour research, which has been committed by the Government in conjunction with Cancer Research UK. I hope that in winding up the debate the Minister will be able to commit to ensuring that part of that funding is used to advance our understanding of, and deliver new treatments specifically for, brain tumours in children. Making a difference in individual cases such as Olivia’s is precisely what today’s debate is all about. I hope that, in some way, today we too can help to keep Olivia smiling.

There is no doubt that the science and analysis of cancer are advancing rapidly. Increasing amounts of patient data are being generated, as well as much greater recognition of the ways cancer develops and the individual mutations that can cause one tumour to behave in a completely different way from another. The challenge, as we heard from the hon. Member for Croydon Central, is co-ordinating the data in a consistent way that leads to more effective treatments and therapies.

One example of that is genetic analysis to help predict a cancer’s evolutionary path. I commend Cancer Research UK for its support of the innovative and significant work to examine the genetic make-up of individual tumours. I recently gave permission for a sample of my own tumour to form part of this molecular research. I hope that in some small way that might add to our understanding of the disease.

Such work is clearly leading to much clearer analysis not just of the nature of individual cancers, but of treatments and immunotherapies that are more likely to be effective for the patient. Rather than talking generally about cancer in a particular organ, we are increasingly able to talk about the nature of a specific tumour for that individual. That is a potential game changer, but it also raises new challenges and potential restrictions that must be overcome if we are to make the necessary progress.

I believe that the UK can be a world leader in this new era of precision medicine, driving forward innovative research to deliver new treatment options, but that will take time, when time for many is a precious commodity. That is why the use of adaptive clinical trials remains important. Yes, there are existing routes for new drug treatments to be made available, such as the early access to medicines scheme, and the cancer drugs fund, but we should be prepared to be more radical.

I pay tribute to the work of the incredible people in our NHS who deliver the care and compassion that Tessa Jowell rightly highlighted. They are amazing, and having received significant NHS treatment and support over recent months, I know just how special they are. I also want to recognise the huge impact that charities such as Cancer Research UK, Macmillan Cancer Support, the Brain Tumour Charity, and the Roy Castle Lung Cancer Foundation have on the lives of thousands of people.

We need to do more as part of the broader cancer strategy, and I will return to a number of topics on another occasion, but we should be positive about what we can achieve, the difference that can be made and the outcomes that can be secured if we work together. In connection with that, some of Tessa Jowell’s own words from her speech in the House of Lords bear repeating:

“I hope that this debate will give hope to other cancer patients like me, so that we can live well together with cancer—not just dying of it—all of us, for longer.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 25 January 2018; Vol. 788, c. 1170.]

That inspiring message is one that we should all take to heart.

Childhood Obesity: Bexley

James Brokenshire Excerpts

Tuesday 6th March 2018 Westminster Hall

[David Evennett (Bexleyheath and Crayford) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered childhood obesity in Bexley.

It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone. I am particularly delighted to see here my right hon. Friend the Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (James Brokenshire), a constituency neighbour and personal friend; we work together for Bexley. We are glad to see him back in his seat after his recent illness; indeed, we are delighted to see him here today.

I am grateful to be able to raise what is both an extremely important health issue in my borough of Bexley and a national concern—namely, childhood obesity. This is an opportune moment to raise the issue of obesity, because today Public Health England chief executive Duncan Selbie is urging shops and food outlets to reduce portion sizes by 20% within the next six years after stating that obesity has become “the norm”. Indeed, he is today launching the One You campaign, with the slogan “400-600-600”—the number of calories that people should eat at breakfast, lunch and dinner. He says that the issue of overweight or obese children needs to be addressed. PHE nutritionist Dr Alison Tedstone says that children are consuming 500 calories a day more than they require; that is equivalent to another meal. Therefore, as I said, this is an opportune moment to raise the issue.

Bexley is a great place to live and work in, and I am delighted to have been a resident of Barnehurst for a considerable time, because there is so much to see and do. I urge you, Mr Hollobone, and my hon. Friend the Minister to come down to Bexley sometime and see the huge opportunities that there are to visit the parks, stately homes and other facilities that are so good.

[James Brokenshire (Old Bexley and Sidcup) (Con)]

I thank my right hon. Friend for his very kind wishes on my return to duties at Westminster. I support him in this debate and what he says about the London Borough of Bexley. He has rightly focused on the comments this morning by Public Health England. Obviously, part of this issue is what goes into ready meals and things like that. What thoughts does he have on what Public Health England has said about ingredients and what goes into so much of the food on the supermarket shelves that we buy, and the impact that that is having? He is making really important points this morning.

[David Evennett]

That is a very valid point. Recipes, portion sizes and calories need to be looked at and addressed. I urge all restaurants, fast food outlets and food manufacturers to look seriously at how they can reduce people’s salt, sugar and calorie intake. We have to address that, as I am sure the Minister will accept later.

The statistics for childhood obesity in Bexley are mixed when compared with those for the rest of England. There are areas of public health where we do much better, and I will highlight the stop smoking campaign, which has been very successful across our borough, but unfortunately childhood obesity is a real issue in the borough and needs attention.

It is widely accepted by health experts that once weight is gained, it is difficult to lose. The Government have called childhood obesity

“one of the top public health challenges for this generation”.

That is certainly the case for Bexley. The Government are well aware of the issue nationally and are being proactive in addressing the concerns. The childhood obesity plan in 2016 was a welcome step forward, but plans need to be actioned; we are looking for results and outcomes. Measures in the plan included the soft drinks industry levy, which will apply to manufacturers; a recommitment to the Healthy Start voucher scheme, enabling low-income families to buy fruit and vegetables; and action to increase physical activity in schools. We all appreciate that there is no quick fix, but that is the first step on a long journey that aims to

“significantly reduce England’s rate of childhood obesity within the next ten years.”

We do need an understanding and a culture change.