A Plan for the NHS and Social Care
John Lamont Excerpts(3 years, 6 months ago)
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John Lamont (Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk) (Con)
I welcome the measures set out in the Gracious Address to deliver the national recovery from the pandemic, which will make all the United Kingdom stronger, healthier and more prosperous than before. I welcome the fact that this Government are pursuing an agenda that will be for all parts of the United Kingdom, including Scotland and my constituents in the Scottish borders.
It is also clear from the Gracious Address that the Government are committed to the Union. I welcome the measures to enhance transport infrastructure, with investment promised to improve connectivity within the United Kingdom. I look forward to seeing more detailed plans in due course, but for my constituents in the Scottish borders there are exciting opportunities to improve cross-border transport links: by getting the borders railway extended to Hawick and Newcastleton and on to Carlisle, and by upgrading the A1.
A theme of today’s debate is the NHS and social care. It is important for me to pay tribute, as others have done, to those across the NHS who have worked tirelessly to deliver the national vaccine roll-out—nurses, doctors and many others within the NHS family have been working incredibly hard to get jabs into arms as quickly as possible. We have been leading the world. We should also recognise the efforts of UK Government Ministers, who have secured a robust profile of 450 million coronavirus vaccines for all the United Kingdom—something from which Scotland has undoubtedly benefited. This weekend, I will proudly roll up my own sleeve and finally become part of the daily statistics, receiving my vaccine at the Borders Events Centre in Kelso. It is worth pausing to reflect that the SNP Scottish Government would have preferred Scotland to have been outside the UK-wide procurement scheme and part of the EU vaccine process instead.
The SNP’s desire to be outside the UK leads me to the conclusion of my contribution, but before I finish I want to congratulate my colleague and friend Rachael Hamilton MSP, who was re-elected to the Scottish Parliament last week. We should also recognise my hon. Friend the Member for Moray (Douglas Ross), leader of the Scottish Conservatives, for his achievement in the election. He took over the leadership in August last year, and in that short period he has dedicated himself to stopping the SNP majority. Many in the press thought that he could not outperform our previous best ever Scottish election performance in 2016, achieved by Ruth Davidson. But not only did he secure 31 Scottish Conservative MSPs last week; he also attracted 100,000 additional Scottish Conservative votes. Crucially, he stopped that SNP majority and a mandate for a second independence referendum.
The SNP went into the election saying that securing a majority would give it a mandate for a referendum; Scottish voters thought otherwise. It should be focusing not on a referendum but on the day-to-day priorities that matter most to Scottish voters: the education system, the NHS and all the other pressing issues that need to be resolved. I congratulate my hon. Friends in the Government for producing this programme for government, and I wholeheartedly support it.
Oral Answers to Questions
John Lamont Excerpts(3 years, 7 months ago)
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Matt Hancock
We are putting record resources in. Of the increase in the NHS budget, the fastest increase in the long-term plan settlement is for mental health services, and within that, for children’s mental health services. We have also increased support through the pandemic. There is an awful lot that we continue to need to do, and there is a very significant plan, as part of the long-term plan, for improving access to these vital services.
John Lamont (Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk) (Con)
Matt Hancock
Scotland gets her fair share of vaccines allocated, and then we publish the amount of vaccines that are delivered. That is slightly lower in Scotland as a proportion of the population compared with the UK as a whole, but we are working very closely with the NHS across Scotland, with the armed services and, of course, with the Scottish Government to try to make sure that they can catch up.
Oral Answers to Questions
John Lamont Excerpts(3 years, 10 months ago)
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Jason McCartney (Colne Valley) (Con)
John Lamont (Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk) (Con)
Julian Sturdy (York Outer) (Con)
Matt Hancock
Everybody will be able to get a jab locally. We are committed to ensuring that across England a local vaccination centre will be available within 10 miles of where everyone lives. For the vast majority of people—over 95%—this will be a fixed, permanent site. For some of the most rural parts—more rural than my hon. Friend’s constituency—there will be mobile units. If people get called to a mass vaccination centre and they feel it is too far for them to travel, they will be able to get a vaccine locally through one of the local GP services. I am delighted that the centre at the John Smith’s stadium in Huddersfield is going to be opening in the next couple of weeks.
John Lamont
I very much welcome the great work by my Government colleagues to secure the vaccine supplies for all parts of the United Kingdom and the amazing work of NHS staff to ensure that the vaccines are being delivered into people’s arms as quickly as possible. Will the Secretary of State tell the House how many vaccines have been delivered by the UK Government for use in Scotland?
Matt Hancock
We distribute the vaccine supplies that are available according to population, so it is based on the Barnett formula. In Scotland, of course, the Scottish NHS is delivering. A fair population share of vaccine is available to the Scottish NHS—that is available right now, so the stocks are there—and then it is for the NHS in Scotland to do the vital work of making sure that each and every one of those jabs gets into somebody’s arm and helps to protect lives.
Covid-19 Response
John Lamont Excerpts(4 years, 5 months ago)
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Matt Hancock
I entirely agree that it is critical that people play their part in making sure that we continue the work of controlling this virus and driving down the number of new transmissions. I am glad that he recognises the work that has been done, not just by Government, but by all of us, to get this virus under control.
Let me answer the hon. Gentleman’s questions specifically. He asks about the inequalities in health outcomes. He is quite right to address that subject. It was important before we went into the coronavirus crisis, and it is even more important now. Black lives matter, as do those of the poorest areas of our country, which have the worst health outcomes. We need to ensure that all these considerations are taken into account and that action is taken to level up the health outcomes of people across this country, because there is no more important levelling up than the levelling up of a person’s life expectancy and the quality of health with which they live that life.
The hon. Gentleman asked specifically about those with learning disabilities and autism. That testing in care homes for those of working age has continued all the way through this crisis, and we are rolling it out further. He mentions the changes to those who are in the shielding category. I was very pleased that we were able to make these changes. We announced them at the weekend and they have been very well received, especially by those who are shielding, because they are now able, safely, to go outside. It is hard to overstate the impact of saying to people that the recommended medical advice was that they should not go outside for 10 weeks. I am glad we have been able to lift, just slightly, the restrictions on those in the shielding category.
The hon. Gentleman also asked about the restart of the NHS. It is vital that we get the rest of the NHS going again, and that work is under way. The expansion of cancer facilities is under way. The demand for accident and emergency and urgent care is not as high as it was, but I look forward to the full restoration of our A&E facilities across the country, including in central Lancashire.
The hon. Gentleman asks, rightly, about the NHS test and trace capability. That is up and running, and working well. He asks how I can say it is working well. It is working well because thousands of people have been contacted and their contacts are being traced. So the system is working. We absolutely will publish data on that, but, as the letter from the UK Statistics Authority this morning shows, it is very important that we get that data publication right. We will work with the UKSA to make sure it is happy with how we are publishing that data, to make sure we get the data published in a reasonable and sensible way, one that also supports the operation of NHS test and trace, which we agree is a critical part of the next stage. I commit to publishing that data and to working with the UKSA on how it is put together.
The final point to make in response is that the goal here is to have a more targeted approach to the lockdown, so that we can carefully and cautiously lift the broader lockdown. That is what we are working to achieve, and I am very grateful for the support from right across the House for our efforts to accomplish that.
John Lamont (Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk) (Con)
Let me start by thanking the NHS and care workers in my constituency in the Scottish borders, who are working so hard to keep us healthy. The Health Secretary will be aware of the very low levels of testing taking place in Scotland, which is clearly a concern as we move into the test and isolate phase. Given the UK Government’s role in providing test facilities in Scotland, what further assistance can they provide to the Scottish Government to help push up the testing numbers?
Matt Hancock
We have supported and helped the Scottish Government throughout this, because although they have missed their targets in the roll-out on tests delivered in Scotland, the UK programme of the drive-through centres and the home-test kits has also been operational in Scotland. I work closely with my Scottish counterparts to try to make sure that testing is as available in Scotland as it is in England, and that work is ongoing.
Eurotunnel: Payment
John Lamont Excerpts(5 years, 8 months ago)
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Matt Hancock
In listening to that, I notice that the hon. Gentleman did not disagree with the decision we made on Friday. That decision was to ensure that we have the ferry capacity in place so that whatever happens in the Brexit scenario we can have the unhindered supply of medicines. That is the duty of this Government and that is why the whole Government came to this decision. He asked some specific questions, which I answered in my statement. However, let me reiterate: this is a legal settlement with Eurotunnel; the maximum cost is £33 million, as was set out clearly on Friday; and the purpose of the decision is to ensure that unhindered flow of medicines. So, as I said in my statement, the purpose of this is to make sure that whatever happens in Brexit people can be safe. I was happy to support that decision, which everybody in this House would have made in the same circumstances.
John Lamont (Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk) (Con)
Many of my constituents are concerned about the supply of medicines after Brexit. What reassurance can the Secretary of State give me that the supply of medicines to harder-to-reach places such as Scotland will continue after we leave the European Union?
Matt Hancock
My hon. Friend is absolutely right to ask about the unhindered supply of medicines. The first thing he can do to ensure that that supply continues, with no risks to it, is to support the deal in the meaningful vote, as he has done before. Secondly, we are working with all parts of the country and with the devolved authorities on this. Although ensuring that we have these supply chains in place in any Brexit scenario is a UK Government matter, we are working with the devolved Administrations, especially to ensure that the flow reaches all parts of the country.
Eating Disorders Awareness Week
John Lamont Excerpts(5 years, 8 months ago)
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John Lamont (Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk) (Con)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Bailey. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Angus (Kirstene Hair) on securing this important debate during Eating Disorders Awareness Week. She made a passionate, well-informed and thoughtful speech, which I learned much from.
In my area of the Scottish Borders, some great charities and organisations work with young people to overcome issues such as eating disorders. There are now counsellors in every high school in the Scottish Borders, so teenagers have someone to speak to at school who is not a parent or teacher. We also have a specialist eating disorder nurse based in the Scottish Borders and some great work is done in the child and adolescent mental health service to support younger people.
I am sure that there are many good examples around the country. My hon. Friend the Member for Cheltenham (Alex Chalk) has spoken to me about the Brownhill eating disorder clinic in his constituency. He holds the clinicians and the work they do for his constituents in high regard.
Treatment across Scotland is patchy to say the least. In the Scottish Borders, there are no community tier 1 services aimed at preventing the onset of eating disorders locally and waiting times for help are far too high, as we have heard. I will focus on the impact that technology can have on the issue. The all-party parliamentary group on technology addiction looks at how smartphones, tablets and social media can have a detrimental impact on our health.
We have all seen the shocking stories about how diet pills, some of which contain lethal substances, are readily available to buy on social media, or how eating disorder-related hashtags and accounts are available and easily accessible to vulnerable people. Some of the content is more subtle. Platforms where we show only the best of ourselves mean that young people in particular can find it harder to feel content with their lives. Online images of thin and happy people clearly act as a trigger for some.
Social media platforms are working to tackle the issue and remove negative content, and so they should be. The idea of allowing the promotion of a category of mental health illness that kills so many people is completely unacceptable. I agree with those who argue that the likes of Facebook, Instagram and Twitter are on their final warning and that if they do not step up to properly tackle the issue, it is time to regulate. Given the clear link between mental health and social media use or abuse, there is certainly a case for requiring tech companies to mitigate the negative effects of their product, as the tobacco and alcohol industries are required to.
Although TV, films and social media are undoubtedly part of the problem, it is important to recognise the good work that some do. There are more documentaries and storylines in our soaps raising awareness about eating disorders. Social media platforms are also taking some action to tackle the issue. For example, Instagram has rolled out a warning that displays when users search for pro-eating disorder content and offers them help and support.
Matt Warman (Boston and Skegness) (Con)
I thank my hon. Friend for giving way and for making an excellent speech. Does he agree that this process should be about more than warnings and that there should be a proactive attempt to stop this sort of material being visible in the first place, which needs to be algorithmic and technology-based, so that people can recover in the community?
John Lamont
I absolutely agree with that important point and the social media platforms that are responsible for their content need to understand it much more clearly. They cannot just allow a free market, as it were, on their space, and if people are putting content on it that is clearly leading people to harm themselves, action needs to be taken, either by the companies themselves or, if they fail to do so, by the Government.
Perhaps above all, a vast array of online communities has been set up by people who have been through this experience and want to offer support. The internet can provide something that is immensely powerful—the sense that someone is not alone if they suffer from an eating disorder. That is what makes this issue so complicated. When it comes to eating disorders, the internet is both an enabler and potentially a powerful tool for good.
We will never get to a situation where eating disorder triggers can be removed entirely from social media. So, instead let us use technology as part of the solution, as best we can.
World Cancer Day
John Lamont Excerpts(5 years, 9 months ago)
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John Lamont (Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk) (Con)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered World Cancer Day.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Christopher. I am grateful to right hon. and hon. Members for being here to debate an important issue that sadly affects too many of our constituents.
This debate comes ahead of what will be the 20th World Cancer Day, which will take place on Monday 4 February. I am delighted that following a suggestion from Elaine Monro, who is a constituent of mine and a Cancer Research UK volunteer, the Palace of Westminster will mark World Cancer Day by lighting up in pink. As far as I am aware, this will be the first time that Westminster will be illuminated for World Cancer Day, so I would like to place on the record my thanks to the Speaker and the Lord Speaker for agreeing to that request.
World Cancer Day is an initiative led by the Union for International Cancer Control. Each year, the global cancer community is united in seeking to raise awareness about cancer prevention and treatment, and about the importance of Governments working together, tackling cancer globally. Last year’s World Cancer Day involved more than 1,000 activities in 139 countries, culminating in half a million social media mentions and over 14,000 press articles and broadcasts in 145 countries worldwide.
Cancer is a global problem. Last year, more than 18 million people worldwide were diagnosed with cancer, but the story of those patients varies hugely depending on where they were born; many countries have no access to basic treatments, such as radiotherapy. This is all about working together—a global push to tackle a global issue. As Cancer Research UK has put it:
“No single person, organisation, or country is going to beat cancer on its own. We must all work together.”
In the UK, a number of charities mark World Cancer Day through campaigns or fundraising activities. Cancer Research UK and CLIC Sargent both sell wristbands, which I am pleased that I and colleagues are wearing today, to raise funds and awareness about the day. Children with Cancer UK and the Institute of Cancer Research are also running campaigns to coincide with World Cancer Day, and in previous years many other charities, including Macmillan Cancer Support, Marie Curie, Breast Cancer Now and Anthony Nolan, have also marked the day. Events are taking place across the United Kingdom, from the Scottish cancer prevention conference in Edinburgh to Cancer Research UK’s winter run in London.
I pay tribute to each and every one of those charities, their staff and volunteers; they do incredible work. They are truly a credit to our country and contribute significantly to the global effort to tackle cancer, doing hugely valuable work with global partners. Cancer Research UK is the largest independent funder of cancer research in the world and it has played a role in developing eight of the world’s top 10 cancer drugs. Can the Minister touch upon how the Government support this work and how they help the UK to continue to contribute to the global effort to tackle cancer? I know that some charities have concerns about the impact that Brexit may have on the UK’s continued contribution to this work.
There is some great work being carried out in my constituency; I shall mention a few examples. The Cancer Research UK team from Selkirk, led by Elaine Monro, has developed an official tartan scarf, which is produced in the Borders by Lochcarron and continues to sell like hot cakes, not only in Selkirk and Scotland, but throughout the United Kingdom. The Marie Curie team in the Borders, who now help patients with terminal illnesses generally, not just cancer, do some incredible work caring for people in their final days. I must not fail to mention that I will be running the London marathon in a few weeks to help raise funds to support my local Marie Curie nursing team. I hope that by raising £5,000 I shall be able to support their work in caring for people with terminal illness in my constituency.
In partnership with Macmillan, NHS Borders runs a dedicated, world-leading cancer centre at the Borders General Hospital, which pulls together specialist staff and treatments all in one location. NHS Borders is very good at meeting its cancer treatment waiting times, as well as targets for cancer screening, not least because of that Macmillan centre.
Although World Cancer Day is focused on tackling cancer globally, we are understandably focused on the UK’s record. Like most other developed nations, the UK has higher rates of cancer, but we also have quite high mortality rates—just above the average, according to the 2018 Global Cancer Observatory figures, and higher than many other developed nations. Given that the UK leads the way in vast amounts of cancer research, and that we have some of the world’s best cancer professionals and a universal health service, our mortality rates are simply too high.
Cancer continues to affect far too many people in the UK. More than 360,000 Brits are diagnosed with cancer each year, and that is expected to rise to the equivalent of one new case every minute by 2035. Every day, 12 children and young people are diagnosed with cancer, which remains the biggest killer of children by disease in the United Kingdom.
Douglas Ross (Moray) (Con)
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his excellent speech and for securing this debate. When he mentions children’s cancer, he will be aware of a case that I have raised in Parliament and a guest that I had at Downing Street last week. Abbie Main, who sadly died on Christmas day two years ago, died of a very rare disease—sarcoma. Her legacy, through a difficult period, was to set up a charity. While great work is done by charities to raise funds for research into cancer, great work is also done by local charities such as Abbie’s Sparkle Foundation, raising money for people who have to live with cancer, to give them better facilities and better care in hospital.
John Lamont
My hon. Friend makes an excellent point; I was delighted to meet Abbie’s brother at the Downing Street Burns supper last week. He has done an incredible amount of work to raise funds for Abbie’s Sparkle Foundation in memory of his sister. He is one of many examples, not only in Moray but in all our constituencies throughout the United Kingdom, of fundraising groups that are raising the profile of cancer and also raising much-needed funds to tackle it.
Kirstene Hair (Angus) (Con)
I congratulate my hon. Friend on bringing this important debate to the House. Does he welcome the initiative in my constituency, run by the Maggie’s Centre in Dundee, which helps and supports many people who are suffering? We had a penguin parade in which 80 penguins were decorated across Tayside, and children through their summer holidays had to go on a penguin search. In the end, we raised £540,000 for the local Maggie’s Centre. It just shows that there are initiatives all across Scotland and the United Kingdom that are beneficial in raising as much money as possible.
John Lamont
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising that example, which demonstrates that it is not just in large cities, but smaller communities, whether they be in Angus and Dundee, in Moray or across our county, that people are coming together to produce such great work to tackle this dreadful disease.
Paul Masterton (East Renfrewshire) (Con)
My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. One issue that is not often raised is that of people with cancer who have disabilities. Wendy Douglas, a constituent of mine, died of breast cancer aged just 36. She had very severe autism, and her cancer was caught too late because she was not able to communicate any symptoms or pain verbally to her family or doctors. Will my hon. Friend join me in paying tribute to Wendy’s mother Eileen, who raises money for all kinds of cancer charities, and particularly for her work trying to raise awareness of cancer in those who cannot communicate it?
John Lamont
Again, I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising a powerful case and example. I suppose the question is what would happen were it not for all these volunteers, raising huge amounts of money and raising awareness of cancer, and filling a gap that otherwise the NHS and the state would have to provide for. That is something we should not forget.
That is not to say that we have not made huge progress in tackling cancer. While diagnosis rates have risen significantly in the past decade, the number of people dying from cancer in this country is falling.
Alex Sobel (Leeds North West) (Lab/Co-op)
I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on securing this important debate. On the question of diagnosis, I congratulate Leeds Teaching Hospitals and the University of Leeds; their pathology department is the first in the world, I believe, to move away from glass slides to fully digitised diagnosis, and is now working with artificial intelligence, which will improve diagnosis rates and move us forward, so that many more people can get early treatment.
John Lamont
The hon. Gentleman makes an excellent point, and raises a very good example. My brother’s father-in-law sadly died a couple of weeks ago. His treatment was provided by Leeds hospital, so I know the tremendous amount of resource and expertise they have in that particular hospital.
For breast cancer in Scotland, the mortality rate was 53 per 100,000 women in 1992. That has fallen to 32 per 100,000, despite the incidence of breast cancer increasing. In short, we are much better than we used to be at both identifying and treating cancer. That is because the UK has taken the steps that World Cancer Day promotes—in particular, tackling tobacco use and obesity levels and rolling out national cancer strategies.
Big issues clearly remain; pretty much all the cancer charities I have spoken to ahead of today’s debate agree with that. We need to get better at early diagnosis, because we know how much of a difference it can make. For example, if bowel cancer is diagnosed early, nine in 10 people will survive, but with a late diagnosis, the survival rate is only one in 10.
Dr Philippa Whitford (Central Ayrshire) (SNP)
Does the hon. Gentleman agree that research shows that the awareness around breast cancer means that women come forward quickly, but with bowel cancer people do not? Research done in the west of Scotland showed that the biggest delay was in going to the GP. We need to get people to talk about it, be open about it and go and get help.
John Lamont
I could not agree more. There is an awareness issue. Often, when people develop some symptoms that they are unsure of, they are nervous about going to the doctor. People need to be encouraged to step forward and go to their GP, to ensure that if there is an opportunity to get an early diagnosis, that is achieved, because the results are clearly much more positive if that is the case.
That is why we have early diagnosis targets across the UK, and why it is so serious that in Scotland, more than 20% of patients are waiting for longer than the six-week standard for diagnostic tests. Too many people are waiting too long for treatment. NHS boards north of the border are meant to take no more than two months to start treatment, but that target is being missed for every type of cancer. In some health boards, one in five patients did not meet that target. I am sure we have all received emails from patients who are faced with an agonising wait for treatment, knowing that they have cancer. While the missed targets are by no means unique to Scotland, I hope that we can all come together here—Scottish National party colleagues included—to call on the Scottish Government to make clear that that needs to get better.
I should also be interested to hear the Minister’s views on whether any consideration has been given to reviewing treatment target times with a view to introducing faster treatment targets for certain types of cancer. It strikes me as odd that across the UK our targets are the same for all cancers, regardless of type.
One significant reason for the time taken to diagnose and treat is problems to do with workforce. Demand for tests is only going to increase, due to a growing and ageing population, but we already do not have enough staff in a range of areas.
Karen Lee (Lincoln) (Lab)
Does the hon. Gentleman agree with me on the impact of no longer having nursing bursaries? When I was a nurse, I had a nursing bursary. I could not have trained without that. We really must bring back the bursary. It is all right saying, “We have all these vacancies and we are going to have all these nurses,” but if people do not train, we will not have the people to fill those vacancies.
John Lamont
I am grateful to the hon. Lady for making that point. There is a range of options that we need to consider. I recently met my local NHS health board, and I meet a number of my GPs frequently. There are vacancies in all different parts of the health service, and we need to consider how we get more people in to do the jobs that we need. There is a particular challenge in my constituency—many rural communities do not have enough GPs or get enough nurses. Bursaries may be part of that. There are a range of things that we need to do, and that the Scottish Government and the UK Government can do, to address those issues.
For example, there is a 10% vacancy rate for radiology consultants across Scotland. One in five of the current workforce are expected to retire over the next five years. So, yes, there are challenges just now, but there are future challenges coming down the line.
Ged Killen (Rutherglen and Hamilton West) (Lab/Co-op)
I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on securing the debate. He talks about access to existing treatments, but does he agree that more work has to be done on conditions for which treatment is not yet available? The late Tessa Jowell worked very hard on this issue, right up to the end of her life, trying to improve access to new treatments and to improve care for people with conditions for which there is perhaps no treatment out there. Does he agree that we should pay tribute to Tessa Jowell and continue that work?
John Lamont
I absolutely agree. We need to do much more to promote awareness of those conditions. I will come on later to the availability of drugs.
The Scottish Government recognise that the high number of vacancies is a problem, but missed their target for increasing the number of nurse endoscopists by 40%. In England, nurse vacancies are similarly too high. The availability of drugs is also an issue that concerns charities and patients alike. The most high-profile example is the breast cancer drug Perjeta, which was rejected for use three times in Scotland but was finally approved just a few weeks ago. Quicker and more cost-effective access to the latest and best treatments must be a priority in future.
I know that colleagues will want to press the Minister on what the UK Government are doing to tackle cancer in England, but all these issues need to be addressed across all parts of our United Kingdom. As a Scottish MP, I am conscious that the Minister is not directly responsible for the cancer waiting times and treatments for my constituents. However, UK-wide approaches should be taken to help us tackle cancer head on, together.
World Cancer Day is all about recognising that cancer knows no boundaries, and that individual Governments cannot address these challenges in isolation. That gives rise to the question: are the UK Government and devolved Governments working as well together on this issue as they should be? For example, should we buy some drugs and equipment on a UK-wide basis? Current practice is that four separate bodies approve new drugs across the UK. While that allows different parts of the UK to make their own decisions, surely a UK-wide approach would make sense in some cases. We could make ultra-orphan drugs more affordable or use economies of scale to deliver common drugs at lower cost.
I am therefore interested in the Minister’s views on this suggestion. Have there been any discussions with the devolved Administrations about this possibility? Are health boards across the UK as good as they can be at talking to each other and sharing best practice? Representing a constituency on the border with England, I all too often see examples of that border acting as a barrier to co-operation. I certainly hope that that is not the case when it comes to cancer treatment.
I hugely welcome the extra funding coming the NHS’s way, which will of course mean an extra £2 billion a year for the Scottish Government to spend on health, if they choose. Will the Minister outline what that means for cancer treatment in England, and how much of that extra funding will be used to improve treatment and reduce cancer waiting times?
Can we do more to support families with the cost of cancer treatment? Parents spend an average £600 a month in additional expenses as a result of their child’s active cancer treatment, much of that on travel costs. Young people in my constituency often have to make a 100-mile round trip to Edinburgh for tests and treatment. Children’s cancer charity CLIC Sargent is calling for a cancer patient travel fund, as well as a review of the disability living allowance and personal independence payments, to backdate young cancer patients’ financial support to their day of diagnosis. I certainly think that these are reasonable suggestions.
Ruth George (High Peak) (Lab)
As a parent who supported a child through cancer, I know at first hand how much a child going through cancer costs and the financial strain, as well as the emotional and physical strain, on parents and families. Universal credit does not take account of the cost of cancer; both parents often have to give up work to support one child in hospital and other children at home or at school. Does the hon. Gentleman agree that that is absolutely crippling for those families?
John Lamont
I am grateful to the hon. Lady for sharing her experience. This all needs to be looked at. As I said, DLA and PIP should at the very least be backdated to the date of diagnosis. Additional support, particularly for parents like those in my constituency who have to travel such long distances to access treatment, should be factored into the calculation of how much they might be entitled to. We need to ensure that the system at least recognises those extra financial pressures.
Dr Whitford
I utterly agree with the hon. Member for High Peak (Ruth George) on financial support. Macmillan Cancer Support estimates that having cancer costs £570 a month, which is very difficult for some families. Will the hon. Gentleman suggest to the Minister that removing the expensive parking charges at hospitals in England would make a little difference? At the moment, a parent being stuck in hospital for eight hours and then paying through the nose for parking adds insult to injury.
John Lamont
I am grateful for that point. I am certainly aware of constituents, including hospital staff, facing huge penalties from the health board for parking at Borders General Hospital, because of the limited parking spaces—that is a consequence of the hospital’s parking arrangements. There are lots of dynamics, but Scotland has just as many issues as England.
It is great to see so many colleagues present today. I am pleased that Parliament will mark World Cancer Day in such a public and clear way on Monday. We have made great strides in treating cancer in recent years, thanks in no small part to the work of charities, researchers and health professionals across every part of our United Kingdom. World Cancer Day is an opportunity for us all to come together to make a strong commitment to continue the fight against this dreadful disease.
John Lamont
I am grateful to all Members who contributed to the debate. I am struck, as ever, by how many of us have had friends, families or people in our community—as well as people through casework—affected so personally by this terrible illness. I am also grateful for the Minister’s comments. I make a final plug for 4 February, the coming Monday, which is World Cancer Day. If people are able to join the team from Cancer Research and others on the Terrace at about 5.30 pm on Monday, they will see the Palace of Westminster lit in pink to mark that important day.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That this House has considered World Cancer Day.
Points of Order
John Lamont Excerpts(6 years ago)
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Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)
I thank the hon. Lady and the Secretary of State for their points of order. Obviously, the Secretary of State will have heard the point that the hon. Lady has made. I am sure that she will wish to pursue this further. The Secretary of State and the Leader of the House are here on the Treasury Bench, so I am sure that if there is further information forthcoming, that will be the way to proceed.
John Lamont (Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk) (Con)
On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. I seek your guidance as I am a relatively new Member of this House. It came to my attention on Friday that the hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart) was visiting my constituency at the weekend. I did not receive advance notice of his visit. I understand that the purpose of the visit was to hold a rally to do a number of things, but particularly to try to get rid of the Scottish Conservatives. Reassuringly, only a handful of people attended the event. I have given the hon. Gentleman notice of this point of order. Am I correct in thinking that it was appropriate for him to give me advance notice of visiting my constituency?
Madam Deputy Speaker
I thank the hon. Gentleman for giving me notice that he wished to raise this matter. I am glad that he has confirmed that he also warned the hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart) that he was going to raise the point of order. The hon. Gentleman is quite right to say that there is a well-established convention that if Members plan to visit other Members’ constituencies for political—not for personal—reasons, they should give them advance notice. It is important that we maintain this courtesy to one another.
Bill Presented
School Uniforms Bill
Presentation and First Reading (Standing Order No. 57)
Frank Field, supported by Tim Loughton, presented a Bill to require school governing bodies to implement affordability policies when setting school uniform requirements; and for connected purposes.
Bill read the First time; to be read a Second time on Friday 23 November and to be printed (Bill 283).
Prevention of Ill Health: Government Vision
John Lamont Excerpts(6 years ago)
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Matt Hancock
The earlier that we can start with this sort of strategy of preventing ill health the better, and there is a lot of merit in a lot of what the hon. Lady said.
John Lamont (Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk) (Con)
I very much welcome the statement today. I also welcome the Government’s commitment to the daily mile in primary schools—I am a particular fan of it because it was invented by a Scottish headteacher in Stirlingshire. Does the Secretary of State agree that young people being fit and active is good for their mental, social and physical wellbeing?
Matt Hancock
Absolutely. I strongly support the daily mile and I try to do it myself. The key is that this is about activity. It is not necessarily about competitive sport, but about healthy activity that can help to prevent all manner of ills.
Ovarian Cancer: Diagnosis and Treatment
John Lamont Excerpts(6 years ago)
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Westminster Hall is an alternative Chamber for MPs to hold debates, named after the adjoining Westminster Hall.
Each debate is chaired by an MP from the Panel of Chairs, rather than the Speaker or Deputy Speaker. A Government Minister will give the final speech, and no votes may be called on the debate topic.
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John Lamont (Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk) (Con)
I, too, congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for North East Derbyshire (Lee Rowley) on securing this important debate and on speaking so compassionately and movingly about his constituents and, indeed, his family.
Like other hon. Members present, I am sure, I was inundated with emails and correspondence from constituents urging me to take part in the debate, so I want to make a few remarks on their behalf. Of course, those emails come from the lucky ones—the women who, like Amanda Gilham from Makerstoun in my constituency, benefited from timely diagnosis and treatment. Amanda was totally unaware that she had ovarian cancer and was diagnosed only because she was fortunate enough to be given a blood test, as her GP suspected that something else entirely was wrong.
When talking about statistics, it is important to remember that the numbers on spreadsheets represent people—our constituents—and, in the case of ovarian cancer, grandmothers, mothers and sometimes daughters. Clearly, early diagnosis and treatment are crucial to tackling ovarian cancer, as they are to tackling all types of cancer. If ovarian cancer is found early, the five-year survival rate is 90%, compared with 4% if it is found late. Although survival rates have doubled in the past 40 years, survival rates in the United Kingdom are lower than the European average, and still not enough people are diagnosed early.
The NHS in Scotland is of course entirely devolved and therefore the responsibility of the Scottish National party Government. I want to spend a little time talking about the situation in Scotland and the circumstances that my constituents have to experience. Patients in Scotland are being let down. Much more needs to be done to improve diagnosis and treatment. This summer, for example, the Scottish Medicines Consortium approved the use of niraparib, but only for women without a gene mutation that affects about one fifth of women living with ovarian cancer. That restriction does not apply in England, meaning that women with a BRCA gene mutation in England and Wales have more treatment options than their counterparts north of the border, in Scotland. A postcode lottery for accessing life-enhancing drugs is unacceptable. I agree with Ovarian Cancer Action that women in Scotland deserve better.
Women in Scotland also deserve better in terms of the time that it takes to receive a diagnosis and treatment. Scotland’s cancer treatment waiting times are at their worst in six years. Only 87% of patients with ovarian cancer started treatment within 62 days of referral. In response, the Scottish Government have admitted that that is “simply not good enough”. Just last week, the Scottish Government announced that they were not planning on meeting their own diagnosis target until at least 2021. That was spun as a new “three-year plan” to meet waiting time targets—something that was supposed to be good news. Given that the SNP has been in charge of the NHS in Scotland for the past 10 years, the Scottish Government’s record, particularly on cancer treatment, deserves further scrutiny. I hope that some of the extra £2 billion a year that the Scottish Government will be receiving to spend on the NHS, thanks to yesterday’s Budget, can be put to good use to reduce those waiting times.
Ovarian cancer is not the most common type of cancer in the United Kingdom and is not easily diagnosed at the moment, but the impact of early diagnosis is significant. I again congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for North East Derbyshire on securing this important debate. I support the efforts across the United Kingdom to improve diagnosis and treatment of this terrible disease.