Rare Cancers Bill

Joe Powell Excerpts

Friday 14th March 2025 Commons Chamber

[Dr Arthur]

The challenge is devolution. I am a huge fan of devolution, but often the UK is at its best when it works together, particularly on healthcare. I hope that in time we will see progress and the nations will work together. I do not want to overstate this, but there have been discussions across the UK about how we could work together on the issue, so perhaps the answer is, “Watch this space.”

The Bill’s fourth measure is to trigger a review by the Government of the orphan drug regulations, to examine how they can be reformed to better incentivise pharmaceutical companies to invest in clinical trials for rare cancers. Specifically, it will consider how incentives could be provided to pharmaceutical companies to trial the repurposing of new cancer treatments. We often hear about how drug development for one cancer can be used to defeat another; that is what Kira relies on right now. My Bill aims to build a foundation for industrialising that approach via incentives. The EU has a similar system for incentivising the testing of drugs for paediatric use that have already been approved for adult use, so the approach has been tried and tested.

Together, these measures will ensure that we have leadership in Government and will remove the barriers to running new clinical trials that researchers and pharmaceutical companies face.

[Joe Powell (Kensington and Bayswater) (Lab)]

I thank my hon. Friend for the powerful way in which he is introducing the Bill. Will he recognise the work of pioneering teams such as the one at Charing Cross hospital, under Imperial College healthcare NHS trust, where Professor Michael Seckl is leading the way in groundbreaking treatment for and research on gestational trophoblastic disease and germ cell tumours? Does he agree that those centres need support to expand and share their research findings with the rest of the NHS?