Layla Moran
Main Page: Layla Moran (Liberal Democrat - Oxford West and Abingdon)Department Debates - View all Layla Moran's debates with the Cabinet Office
(1 month, 1 week ago)
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Louise Haigh
The Cabinet Office supports the wider civil service and still fulfils a number of incredibly important functions, including cross co-ordination of governmental priorities. The Cabinet Secretary’s role is to run the civil service as a whole, and that role will always be required.
Layla Moran (Oxford West and Abingdon) (LD)
I warmly welcome the First Secretary to her post. I also welcome her good judgment in taking one of the esteemed former members of our Health and Social Care Committee, the hon. Member for Worthing West (Dr Cooper), to be her Parliamentary Private Secretary. I know the First Secretary has probably already had some of this in her ear already, but I cannot lose this opportunity. This morning, the Health and Social Care Committee, with the Education Committee, heard moving evidence about why death by suicide has now overtaken almost everything else as the No. 1 reason that we lose children in this country. Often when we dive into issues like this, we find that education is not talking to health or to the local authorities. It cannot be beyond the wit of man, or indeed a shared governance structure with the right fiscal flows, to stop these stories happening. Will the First Secretary of State meet me to discuss what we are seeing in the Committee so that we can unlock the potential in all parts of society, because without doing that, I fear that the devolution agenda might fail?
Louise Haigh
I am incredibly grateful to the hon. Member, who I have worked with over many years on a number of campaigns. As ever, she raises an incredibly important point. I cannot imagine there are many people in this House who have not been touched by suicide in one way or another. I certainly have, in my close family. It is an incredibly important point that she raises and one that should and could be easily fixed in terms of the specific problems that can lead to state failings. Of course I would be delighted to meet her to discuss how we can address this.