Public Health England Hub Programme and Porton Down

Jane Ellison Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd September 2014 Westminster Hall

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health (Jane Ellison)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Robertson. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Salisbury (John Glen) on securing this debate. It is not his first on this subject, but he is right to use his opportunities to highlight such important topics. I also thank my hon. Friend the Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon) for his contribution.

The future of Porton Down is important not only to the constituents of my hon. Friend the Member for Salisbury, but to the whole country, given its work on a wide range of public health threats—including, as he highlighted, most recently the Ebola outbreak in west Africa. Scientists have been doing invaluable work at Porton Down since the 1950s, but its buildings are more than 60 years old and, based on independent surveys of the estate, they are increasingly unfit for purpose. My hon. Friend agrees that we need to find a solution to that problem to ensure that this vital work is able to continue in top quality facilities.

We all agree it is important that scientists have the benefit of state-of-the-art facilities that reflect the latest technological advancements, including, as my hon. Friend alluded to, the shift from the Petri dish to big data. Public Health England put forward the case that significant benefits would result from not only re-providing the facilities at Porton, but bringing together the range of public health science functions that it manages across disparate sites to create an integrated national science hub. That would enable the UK to punch above its weight on the international stage in preventing, and reducing the burden of, both communicable and non-communicable disease.

As my hon. Friend knows, Public Health England is considering a number of options to meet that challenge and its preferred option is to create a public health science hub based at the former GSK facility, in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Harlow. To reach that position, it has had to consider a wide range of long and short-listed options and demonstrate which offers the best value for money.

The main focus of those options has been on Porton, Colindale—it is good to see my hon. Friend the Member for Hendon (Dr Offord), who represents Colindale, in his place—and Harlow. Public Health England has briefed the local Members, including my hon. Friends, and the local authorities about the three sites affected and considered those views in the option appraisal.

The case submitted by Public Health England is being scrutinised by the Department of Health, the Treasury, the Cabinet Office and the Major Projects Authority. I assure my hon. Friend the Member for Salisbury that the process will be thorough and robust. Following that process, the business case will require ministerial approval, as he mentioned, and will be published once finalised.

It is not appropriate for me to give further details on the business case until the review has been completed and I hope that my hon. Friend will understand that. As he may be aware, that is to protect commercial confidentiality and the integrity of decision making. It is established practice that outline business case documents are not shared outside the Government before decisions have been made, but the Department and PHE are committed to being open and consultative throughout this process.

When I am being briefed on these issues ahead of debates, my first question is always whether we have had regular and open contact with the Members involved. I am assured that regular contact has been made between PHE and those hon. Members who are rightly concerned for the future of the facilities in their constituencies. We want to ensure transparency on the progress of the process, and at all stages we are providing opportunities to comment on the case, with this debate being the most recent example. That commitment to a consultative process has, for instance, led to all three affected authorities submitting statements about how the science hub would link with the local economy, which have been included in the business case.

[Dr Matthew Offord (Hendon) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Salisbury (John Glen) on securing the debate. We have focused on the business side, which is very important when we introduce a national hub, but I am concerned that my constituents’ views about what will happen to them and their extended families have not been considered. Many of my constituents who work at Colindale are responsible for elderly family members and children, and they feel that that has not been taken into account. Will the Minister respond to that point?

[Jane Ellison]

I would be disappointed if that issue had not been considered. There have already been some meetings with staff, but this is an ongoing process. My understanding is that at the point at which any firm decisions are made there will be an extensive consultation process. I have time set aside to meet with my hon. Friend, who is right to highlight those concerns. We can explore them further and I can respond to any specific concerns. Those valuable members of the scientific community make an enormous contribution in lots of ways to our country and we want to ensure that they and their families are considered carefully in this process.

On the point about the consultation process, I recently received a letter from the Minister responsible for PHE’s neighbours at Porton, the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory, which praised PHE’s open, collaborative approach to discussions about the use of specialist high-containment facilities. That reassures me that a good level of communication is being achieved.

The business case contains a summary of the collaborative work. When my predecessor, my hon. Friend the Member for Broxtowe (Anna Soubry), outlined the Department of Health’s position in a debate a year ago—also secured by my hon. Friend the Member for Salisbury—she said:

“We need to be clear that although PHE and DSTL will continue to collaborate closely, PHE needs dedicated high-containment facilities to ensure that public health work can proceed in the event of the DSTL facilities being fully occupied. This will provide resilience if DSTL’s facilities are closed for any reason.”—[Official Report, 11 September 2013; Vol. 567, c. 1136.]

As my hon. Friend the Member for Salisbury said, issues of national security and our national response capability must be carefully considered before a final decision is made. It is therefore key that Public Health England continues to develop links not only with DSTL, but with all the other agencies involved in the national security response.

Another important consideration that my hon. Friend drew out in his speech is the commercial impact of the chosen solution, which must ensure that PHE can continue to work in partnership with industry to support wider growth in the UK life sciences sector. Like him, I celebrate the important work and development that has taken place in that area in recent years. I reassure my hon. Friend that PHE has undertaken a survey of its current key customers, and only one has said that moving from the Porton site would be important for their future business relationship with PHE.

In Harlow, PHE proposes that the science hub would link with the Harlow enterprise zone and the London-Cambridge corridor, which my hon. Friend the Member for Harlow mentioned. It is one of the key international centres for the life sciences sector and PHE has had discussions with Cambridge university about the opportunities for collaboration based around Harlow.

Even if a decision were made to relocate research functions and staff, PHE has confirmed that it remains fully committed to the recently announced Porton science park, which would involve PHE facilities—consisting of some 300 staff in the development, production and regional laboratories—remaining at Porton. I know PHE has briefed my hon. Friend the Member for Salisbury on the work it is doing to maximise the commercial potential of the production facilities at Porton, which he highlighted in his speech. I want to reassure him that his important concern has not been overlooked.

The final decision on the outline business case will be made as soon as possible. My hon. Friend’s wish to have certainty on the case sooner rather than later is entirely reasonable and understandable, but—as he said—it is important that we get this vital decision right. I have listened carefully to his arguments—this is the first opportunity I have had to hear them laid out first hand—and to the important short speech by my hon. Friend the Member for Harlow. I will look at the document to which my hon. Friend the Member for Salisbury referred and ask PHE to respond to it. My hon. Friend is right to champion that renowned facility and his constituency, and I congratulate him on using this further opportunity to highlight his concerns, to which we will give a serious response.

Question put and agreed to.