Autism and Neurodiversity Research Funding

Jim Shannon Excerpts

Tuesday 16th November 2021 Commons Chamber

[Robert Buckland (South Swindon) (Con)]

It is with great pleasure that I rise in my first end-of-day Adjournment debate in the better part of eight years, but it is a topic that I am very happy to return to from this position. It is one that I championed in Government and one that I worked very hard on when I was a Back Bencher prior to my ministerial office. I am hugely grateful to Mr Speaker for granting me today’s debate.

Many hon. and right hon. Members will know that this issue has been close to my heart for many years: autism and the range of brain conditions that can be summarised by the word neurodiversity. From my own direct family experiences, which I spoken about in this Chamber when we held the first Chamber debate on autism back in 2013, and from the plethora of constituency casework that I have worked on over the years helping families of children and young people with autism and associated conditions, I have developed a certain knowledge and experience of these issues. As a Minister and a Secretary of State, I was glad to be able to push the agenda even further.

One of the privileges of being a Back Bencher is that I can put on record my thanks to local organisations in my constituency which do so much to support and work with people with autism, whether it is officers of the local authorities, volunteers in local carers’ groups such as the Swindon Carers Centre, or organisations such as the Uplands Enterprise Trust, which is pioneering and developing more post-19 support for young people with autism and other disabilities in my area, working with the excellent special schools network and the Brunel multi-academy trust in Swindon. It is really innovative work.

My debate today is the beginning of a process that was made clear in my exchange of letters with my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister on my departure from Cabinet two months ago: to bring about a sea change in how autism and other brain conditions are not only diagnosed, but supported and treated throughout the lives of those people. Our country is one of the most advanced in the world when it comes to these issues, but there is still a huge amount to do.

My successor as chair of the all-party parliamentary group on autism, the late, great Dame Cheryl Gillan, will always be remembered as the author of the groundbreaking Autism Act 2009, which was a new departure for health, in that a specific condition was delineated in legislation, much against the initial resistance of the then Government, but the strength of feeling in this place and outside was such that Dame Cheryl thankfully got her way. The autism strategy, which was revised in its latest iteration only in July this year, is the direct result of that important legislation. Twelve years on, I think we can safely say that awareness and diagnosis levels have risen dramatically, but the situation remains stark.

About 1 million people in the United Kingdom are autistic, but they still have some of the worst outcomes in our society. First, the death rates mean that they die on average decades before the rest of us. Secondly, with two in 10 in employment, they have the lowest employment rates of all disability groups. Importantly, and deeply worryingly, disproportionate numbers of autistic people and people with brain conditions end up in mental health detention or, even worse, in our criminal and youth justice systems. They are being locked up by a system that represents barbaric practices from a generation ago. I have certainly found, from my professional and ministerial experience, far too many in our prison system, our young offenders’ institutions and our criminal justice system generally with those conditions.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I know the right hon. and learned Gentleman has had a particular interest in the issue for a number of years, for both personal and other reasons, so I congratulate him on securing this debate. I give an example from Northern Ireland, which to be fair is not the Minister’s responsibility, but shows what is happening: an increase of 148% in the number of children waiting for an assessment for autism and a 687% increase in the number waiting more than a year for an assessment. This is a system where the capacity is nowhere near meeting demand, as I think the right hon. and learned Gentleman has also said. Does he agree that a corresponding increase in funding to get to the root of autism and how best to treat and live with it must be a priority for the Government?

[Robert Buckland]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman, who rightly outlines some of the pressures on the system—the increase in diagnosis, which in many ways is a good thing, and the personnel and capacity issues that cause many of the delays in diagnosis, which are all too familiar a pattern for many families, including those in England, Wales and Scotland.

It is interesting to note that research by, I think, the Northern Ireland Assembly calculated the estimated cost to the country of the failure to deal with autism at a staggering £32 billion. Let us just think about that. What a cost to our country: resources wasted, lives wasted and lives lost as a result of these omissions. It does not have to be like this.