Infants, Parents and Carers Bill

John Grady Excerpts

2nd reading
Friday 4th September 2026 Commons Chamber

[John Grady (Glasgow East) (Lab)]

I start by paying tribute to the right hon. Member for New Forest West (Sir Desmond Swayne), who has served our family of nations in many different ways with real distinction. Ensuring that we are here discussing how we make sure that our society treats every baby with compassion and love and provides them with safety is his finest achievement. I welcome the fact that so many Members have come along to signal to our family of nations that this is such an important topic.

As a Labour Member of Parliament, I am immensely proud of my favourite policy of the 1997 to 2010 Government: Sure Start. Being an MP and able to change laws is something precious, and being a Government MP—a Labour Government MP—is immensely precious to me

I find it helpful, as a recovering lawyer, to road-test drafting against real-life examples of what might happen, and what we are seeking to do. One must ask, will this Bill work in the real world? I say it will. I have assessed the Bill against the serious safeguarding issues raised in the Glasgow Child Protection Committee’s learning review about Family C. The report pointed to catastrophic failures in the care of four babies and children in my home city. The neglect and abuse of the children was catastrophic, and the system that was meant to protect them did not do so.

Against that, I turn to the first duty in the Bill, which is a duty on, and a power for, the Secretary of State to make regulations specifying the services that are relevant to good outcomes for babies. The Family C case points to an important issue when the Secretary of State comes to exercise her discretion: what services should be covered? That will need very careful thought. Consider homelessness services. The report shows that there were 12 occasions when housing and homelessness services came into contact with the family, and could have had the opportunity to identify and report risk factors. That did not happen.

Another example of the sort of services that the Secretary of State will need to grapple with are health and dentistry services. This example occurred in 2010, when child A was three and child B was less than four months old:

“In February, Child A was diagnosed with a squint and referred…but was not brought to the appointment. Child B was diagnosed with a small heart defect. By April he had missed three outpatient cardiology appointments.”

For today’s purpose, that points to the importance of the careful exercise of the power in the Bill so that all relevant services for babies are captured. I also applaud the Bill for another reason: it signals to those involved in the care of children how important the care of babies is. It is Parliament speaking to the professionals involved.

The Bill also provides for a duty on the Secretary of State to consult parents, carers and prospective parents and carers when making the assessment of the level of need of services, and to take those views into account. For all the reasons set out by my hon. Friend the Member for Sherwood Forest (Michelle Welsh), that is a very important requirement; however, I am anxious about one point. I appreciate that it is not possible to consult with babies, but while adults have a voice expressly specified in the statutory framework, babies and children do not have a voice in the Bill.

Related to that is a central principle underpinning child protection law: that the law should act, and we should act, in the best interests of the welfare of a baby or child. The Children Act 1989, in relation to England and Wales, explains that when a court is considering these matters,

“the child’s welfare shall be the court’s paramount consideration.”

The analogous Children (Scotland) Act 1995 provides that

“the welfare of that child throughout his childhood shall be…its paramount consideration.”

It naturally follows from the use of the word “paramount” that the child’s interests must be prioritised over those of any adults in the child’s life.

A potential response to what I say is that all this is obvious, but even though it is obvious to all of us here, it is not always acted on—children are not listened to. A lesson from the learning review is that the staff in Glasgow did not ensure that they were listening to the children, and observing what the children were saying through not only their words. The learning review explains:

“Indicators of distress, like headbanging and deliberately seeking eye contact with professionals were not considered”,

and the children’s welfare was not considered paramount. When there was a conflict between the welfare of the children and what the adults were saying, the babies’ welfare was not prioritised.

On page 28, we read:

“Overall, professionals accepted the parents’ view of the children’s behaviours as being ‘challenging’. When staff raised concerns about the children’s care with the parents, they would effectively shift the issue to what it meant for themselves. Child A’s behaviour was generally described by staff from the parents’ perspective i.e. that her behaviour was “challenging”.

I gently suggest that serious thought is given to ensuring that the operation of the Bill, and perhaps even the drafting, gives greater weight to the interests of babies and some sort of mechanism to give babies a voice in the assessment and the Bill’s process.

I now wish to make some brief remarks on duty four. This is another important provision in the Bill and it requires the Secretary of State to assess an appropriate level of provision. I believe that that is critical in Scotland as well, and I hope the Scottish Government look at the Bill and consider whether something similar should be introduced in Scotland. What this very sensible provision calls for is an assessment not just of the number of social workers or the amount of money spent, but of the quality of the services—whether there are sufficient senior social workers, and so on.

In that regard, one of the many questions left unanswered by the learning review is whether the overall level of service provision in Glasgow is adequate. The learning review does not address that, but it is a very important question, because what happened to those babies really points to a lack of appropriate resources. Child A was born in 2007 to an adult mother who had serious substance misuse problems. She was born with neonatal abstinence syndrome and as a result of that was placed on the child protection register. Despite that, there was no adequate scrutiny of the adults involved in the child’s life. No qualified social worker was allocated to child A—a baby at the time—from February 2008 to October 2009, when adult E was pregnant with child B. That was despite very many serious issues being identified. This is the important point about the Bill: it calls for an assessment about whether we are putting adequate resources into the safeguarding of babies. It is an essential question that must be answered in Scotland, too.

The Bill is incredibly important. It forces this House—because it will result in reports being laid in this House and in the other place—to grapple with whether we are doing everything possible to give babies and young children the best possible start in life. It is underpinned by a critical point that I think each and every person in this House today shares: that our youngest children must be treated with love, compassion and safety. I have concerns and their voices should not be dismissed. For that reason, I am delighted to support the Bill.

Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill

John Grady Excerpts

Report stage
Friday 13th June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Carla Lockhart]

No, I will not.

Amendment 443 sought to mandate that those substances be approved through the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency and either the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence or the All Wales Medicines Strategy Group processes. I therefore strongly support amendment 96, tabled by the hon. Member for Sleaford and North Hykeham (Dr Johnson), which

“ensures that drugs can only be approved if the Secretary of State is reasonably of the opinion that there is a scientific consensus that the drug is effective at ending someone’s life without causing pain or other significant adverse side effects.”

That is a common-sense approach that should attract support from across the House.

This week, more than 1,000 doctors wrote a powerful letter to all MPs to outline their deep concerns about this Bill, calling it a

“real threat to both patients and the medical workforce”.

I strongly urge this House and colleagues to read that letter before Third Reading. The Government’s own impact assessment does not provide any comfort with regard to the use of lethal drugs under the terms of the Bill, which the doctors’ letter picks up on, saying that

“there is no requirement for…[the drugs]…to undergo rigorous testing and approval that would be required of any other prescribed medication, nor indeed for them to be regulated by the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency”.

They go on to say that that is

“contrary to all good medical practice”.

This matters not just for regulation, but with regard to patient safety and complications. There is no requirement in the Bill to inform patients about how risks—including a prolonged death, rather than the promised peaceful and dignified death—will be managed. Complications do occur, and this is not scaremongering. In Oregon, when complications have been recorded, patients have experienced difficulty swallowing, drug regurgitation and seizures, and they have even regained consciousness. In Canada, a Canadian association has noted that patients have experienced regurgitation, burning and vomiting.

I draw Members’ attention to the written evidence submitted to the Bill Committee by a group of expert senior pharmacists and pharmacologists. In their submission, they warn that the approach of the Bill puts the cart before the horse. Specifically, they caution against proceeding without

“a comprehensive review of the evidence for efficacy and safety”,

and note that that review

“should be scrutinised by MPs before…consideration of legalising assisted suicide”.

These are not small details or incidental matters, yet, even at this late stage in the Bill’s passage through the Commons, we are still being asked to pass legislation without satisfactory answers to basic questions from experts in the field. That is simply not good enough.

I am grateful to have had the opportunity to speak, and I will close by saying simply that whatever mitigating amendments may be passed, this Bill remains morally and ethically wrong. It is flawed and should not be passed.

[John Grady (Glasgow East) (Lab)]

I rise to speak to amendments 8, 13, 82, 83, 85 and 86, but first I turn to amendment 77, which would extend some of the provisions of the Bill to Scotland. My review of the Bills in Scotland and England that are proceeding at the minute suggests that if someone moved permanently from Glasgow to Bradford or Newcastle, they would lose their right to an assisted death in Scotland and would have to wait a year to acquire their right to an assisted death in England. Imagine the heartbreak if somebody was diagnosed as terminally ill three or six months into their permanent move to Newcastle. That is a natural consequence of the law of habitual residence; there is long-standing case law on that. One matter that has not been addressed satisfactorily is how the relationship between Scots and English law and the Scottish and English Bills will be worked out. I suspect that that will require further primary legislation in this place and in Holyrood if both Bills pass.

I turn to the remainder of the amendments. Amendment 13 is very sensible and would introduce much-needed scrutiny and oversight to the appointment of a commissioner. The right hon. Member for Salisbury (John Glen) has set out in detail the very sensible reasons for the introduction of his suite of amendments. Amendment 86 is particularly important, because the panel faces real difficulties in compelling people to come before it if they have relevant evidence. It seems manifestly reasonable that the panel should hear from people who have relevant evidence. I am also concerned that the panel process does not provide a clear role for people who love and care for the person seeking an assisted death. Amendment 8 would require the panel actively to consider hearing from such people, which addresses a serious gap in the Bill.

--- Later in debate ---

[Kirsteen Sullivan (Bathgate and Linlithgow) (Lab/Co-op)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that across all aspects of the Bill we cannot legislate only for those with good mental health, or for those who are loved, supported and protected? We must have at heart the best interests of the most vulnerable and those without a voice or without loved ones, to ensure that they are protected.

[John Grady]

I am obliged to my hon. Friend—that is precisely why I joined the Labour party as a 16-year-old. Faced with terrible circumstances, some people will seek an assisted death. I find it hard to accept that those will be truly autonomous choices. We must be clear that the very same circumstances that have denied people dignity and robbed them of autonomy throughout their lives will drive them to an assisted death. I find that deeply troubling, and I worry that we are placing too much confidence in concepts of capacity, autonomy and self-determination.

Everyone accepts that coercive control is common—indeed, it is incredibly common, as is domestic abuse and elder abuse. There are very clear risks of coercion. I recognise that the supporters of the Bill have sought to improve protections, and to protect people in those types of circumstance. I have anxiously scrutinised those protections, and I do not believe that they will achieve their aim. That is why the amendments are so important.

[Jess Asato]

Last weekend my hon. Friend the Member for Spen Valley (Kim Leadbeater) posted on X a story of two older people who wanted to die together, and who had found doctors to sign off their assisted death. Is my hon. Friend concerned that this debate might be romanticising suicide pacts given that, as we know, there are mercy killings, which are, unfortunately, actual deaths? Does he share the fears of the Government’s suicide adviser that the Bill will undermine suicide prevention efforts?

[John Grady]

I think everyone in the House debates this issue in good faith, and in the courts there is a general view that one should be reluctant to attack otherwise. I am sure that question was meant on that basis. However, one must not lose sight of the fundamental point that the protections in the Bill will not address the profound societal pressures that people will face. One must not lose sight of the fact that, whatever protections are included in the Bill, it will not protect people against coercion.

[Sir John Hayes]

Edmund Burke said:

“Bad laws are the worst sort of tyranny.”

Over time, I have seen many imperfect measures put before the House—under Governments of all persuasions, by the way—and usually, through scrutiny, they are improved. That is because the parliamentary process works when there is time available, and in particular when there is pre-legislative scrutiny, independent analysis and thorough thinking about the consequences of what we debate here. That could have happened on this important matter, but it has not because it has been shoehorned into a process ill-fitted for its purpose.

The amendments we are debating are a late attempt to improve the Bill. I particularly recommend the amendments tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Runnymede and Weybridge (Dr Spencer), who made an excellent contribution to our debate, my right hon. Friend the Member for Salisbury (John Glen) and the hon. Member for Rochdale (Paul Waugh). I support those amendments because it is critical that the safeguards in the Bill are not only maintained but improved and enhanced, for all the reasons advanced by hon. Members across the House about coercion and vulnerable people.

The hon. Member for North Herefordshire (Ellie Chowns) said she has never encountered coercion. North Herefordshire must be a wonderful place where people carry harps and drink ambrosia, but in the rest of the kingdom and, I assert, the rest of the world, there are many wicked people doing many bad things. We must never allow those wicked people to have reign and power over those who inevitably, because of their circumstances, will be at risk if the Bill is not improved.

Income Tax (Charge)

John Grady Excerpts

Tuesday 5th November 2024 Commons Chamber

[John Grady (Glasgow East) (Lab)]

Glasgow has the shortest life expectancy in Scotland and in western Europe. The people of my city, who bring me so much joy, live shorter and less healthy lives than those anywhere else in the UK. Far too many die too soon. They do not get the happiness that the autumn of life brings: time with grandchildren, time with friends and time volunteering at a local church or a local mosque.

My constituency has some of the highest levels of poverty in the United Kingdom. Poverty is one the principal causes of ill health and early death. Health is the topic of today’s debate. Many of my constituents cannot afford to pay for the essentials and live in shocking housing conditions. They live every day petrified of what tomorrow will bring. This Budget confronts poverty. It increases the national living wage, giving a pay rise to the lowest paid in my constituency, and gives pensioners more than £400 this year under the triple lock and more than £1,700 over the course of the Parliament. This Budget makes a choice—it targets our scare public resources at the poorest—and I support it.

My constituents rely on the Scottish NHS, but the Scottish NHS is in crisis. Almost one in six Scots is on an NHS waiting list.

[Pete Wishart]

Look at what they have done in Wales.

[John Grady]

I am discussing Scotland. This is a serious topic about my constituents’ health. The waste by the Scottish Government—hundreds of millions returned to the EU unspent and hundreds of millions wasted on ferries—could have been diverted to the hospitals in Glasgow, to put beds in the Royal Infirmary, where they are needed.

The SNP is never to blame. The 62-day cancer treatment standard has not been met for over a decade, despite cancer being one of Scotland’s biggest killers. I have met countless pensioners who have been forced to pay thousands of pounds to go private for their hip replacements and knee operations, because the Scottish NHS waiting lists are so long. This Budget means £1.5 billion this year for the Scottish Government to spend on the NHS, and an additional £3.4 billion next year.

Our Budget puts the people of Scotland first and enables the SNP to fix the mess it has made of our health service. With its record increase in Scottish funding, this Budget demonstrates our commitment to Scotland.