Medical Aesthetics Industry: Regulation

Judith Cummins Excerpts

Tuesday 14th May 2019 Westminster Hall

[Alberto Costa]

The hon. Gentleman is correct. We need to ensure that we have appropriate regulation with these procedures, or similar types of procedure. He is right to raise this issue on behalf of his constituents.

[Judith Cummins (Bradford South) (Lab)]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for securing this important debate. He will be aware of its importance as he is a vice-chair—along with my hon. Friend the Member for Swansea East (Carolyn Harris) and me—of the all-party parliamentary group on beauty, wellbeing and aesthetics. Does he agree that any new regulations that come forward need to consider non-medical regulation? We need to ensure we have properly qualified beauticians, with recognised qualifications, to carry out these procedures.

[Alberto Costa]

The hon. Lady is correct. I pay tribute to her and to the hon. Member for Swansea East (Carolyn Harris) for setting up the new all-party parliamentary group on beauty, wellbeing and aesthetics, along with me. I look forward to her interventions at meetings of that all-party group; I know she has a great deal of knowledge of this area. I agree that we do not want to stifle the beauty industry—we want it to grow and be successful—but we all want to protect our constituents.

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[Jackie Doyle-Price]

The hon. Gentleman makes a good point, because when we talk about these examples, there is a danger that people can apply that prejudice to the entire industry. It is in the interests of everyone involved in this industry to welcome regulation, not least to celebrate the professionalism of what they do. There are some very reputable practitioners out there who are not actually in the medical industry. For example, semi-permanent make-up—a surgical procedure that does not involve any invasion—clearly does not require as strident regulation as what we are talking about with injectables, but it is the same industry, and we need to ensure an adequate registration system.

[Judith Cummins]

I very much welcome the Minister’s announcement today. On training and regulation for beauticians—non-medical people who constitute around 50,000 jobs in the UK economy—there is huge appetite and support within the industry for proper and appropriate regulation, and there is recognition of the urgent need for that. However, there are no regulated qualifications available for non-medical practitioners for injectables at the moment. Going forward, does the Minister think there will be some kind of progression route for beauticians to go into this kind of industry, so that we can guarantee proper standards for the consumer?

[Jackie Doyle-Price]

The hon. Lady is right, and I am grateful for the spirit in which she makes her comments. Anyone who establishes themselves in business as a beautician wants to deliver a good service, has pride in what they do and would not want to be accused of doing anything unsafe.

My first focus of activity is those organisations that train people in these procedures, because I can see a situation in which a beautician will have paid thousands of pounds to go on a course and will then think that they are qualified, but they might not be. That is where we need to bring the focus of regulation in the first instance, so that when somebody proudly displays their certificates, consumers can have some guarantee that they are legitimate. I welcome the opportunity to air these issues with the all-party parliamentary group as we move this system of regulation forward.

Sadly, we only have 30 minutes for this debate, so I doubt whether I will be able to get through as much as I would wish, but I will do my best. I am grateful for the interest of all Members here. We will continue this discussion. It is worth saying that Botox treatments and dermal fillers are increasing and, along with laser hair removal, now represent nine out of 10 non-surgical treatments performed in the UK. This is a major area of risk.

Hon. Members have referenced the campaign that we launched today. Clearly, consumers will be the best defenders of their own interest, but we must make sure that they have access to appropriate information with which to do so; we need to do much more to inform people about the risk. Just as in my hon. Friend the Member for South Leicestershire’s example of his constituent, I am quite sure that many people who have had fillers—who have gone to have their lips done, like they do—would have no idea that there is a risk of their artery being injected with poison. We need to make sure that consumers are much more aware of that, which is why we are doing so much more in the next six weeks to try to raise public awareness.

We will focus on targeting our messages to women aged 18 to 34, on whom the majority of the treatments are undertaken. I am pleased that we are working with Bauer Media, which publishes Grazia, Closer and Heat, which I hope will be appropriate vehicles to reach that audience. We will make sure that the NHS information is kept up to date and remains a meaningful resource for consumers.