New Cancer Strategy

Mark Durkan Excerpts

Thursday 19th November 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Bury St Edmunds (Jo Churchill), particularly as she ended by referring to off-patent drugs. She spoke powerfully on Second Reading of the Off-patent Drugs Bill, which was promoted by the hon. Member for Torfaen (Nick Thomas-Symonds) only a couple of weeks ago. This debate draws on many points made in previous debates, including that Second Reading debate and Westminster Hall debates. There have been debates about the cancer drugs fund, specific cancers and, recently, secondary breast cancer.

I am an officer of a number of all-party groups, including that on cancer, which is so ably led by the hon. Member for Basildon and Billericay (Mr Baron), who secured this debate. We have also heard from colleagues who are members of other all-party groups, including the hon. Member for Scunthorpe (Nic Dakin), who is on the all-party group on pancreatic cancer, and the hon. Member for Castle Point (Rebecca Harris), who is doing so much to raise awareness and to promote action on and understanding of brain tumours.

I welcome the fact that the Backbench Business Committee has afforded us this opportunity to join up what might otherwise appear to be disparate work. The APPGs are not rivals—their efforts are entirely complementary. The cancer strategy is a benchmark document and this debate gives us an important opportunity to consider how we can marshal parliamentary effort and will behind it. We need Ministers in the Department of Health and elsewhere to know that we are not taking it for granted and that, just because we have had unmet need for a long time, that should not continue to be the case. I would like to hear a Minister tell us that their portfolio means that they see themselves as the Minister for meeting unmet need. If they set that target and seek to make that change and turnaround, they will have many backing vocalists from the different all-party groups.

Other hon. Members have said that there may be some issues with aspects of the cancer strategy, but it clearly lays down some important standards, not least on a recurring message that the APPGs get from the evidence we receive, namely the question of early diagnosis.

[Mr Baron]

The hon. Gentleman is a good friend of the all-party group on cancer. He will already know this, but it is worth putting it on the record that the separate all-party groups on cancer are endeavouring to get their act together and to speak with one voice where there is a common interest—and there are many when it comes to cancer.

[Mark Durkan]

I fully recognise that point. That was what I was trying to say when I said that the APPGs are not rivals. This debate allows us to bring together their work and their common message, and to acknowledge the work of the hon. Gentleman and the chairmen of the other APPGs. In that regard, I should also mention the hon. Member for Washington and Sunderland West (Mrs Hodgson). She cannot be here this afternoon, but she has done so much on the all-party groups on ovarian cancer and on breast cancer.

Early diagnosis is a common theme and the issue is not just about making sure that there is more access to diagnosis. The hon. Member for Bury St Edmunds has mentioned how many people end up being diagnosed in A&E, which is not what should happen. Although certain cancers raise more sensitive and technical questions than others, there needs to be more awareness among GPs, and diagnostic tools are also key. However, this is about not just ensuring earlier diagnosis with better use of diagnostic tools, but ensuring much clearer referral pathways. The cancer strategy sets a target of making sure that, by 2020, 90% of people are diagnosed within a month to see whether or not they have cancer. That is a very good working standard.

All the APPGs, particularly the all-party group on cancer, have strongly suggested that the indicator of one-year survival rates would be a very good test of our ambitions and efforts and of the actions of health authorities. That working standard needs to be adopted, because it would help us to monitor and manage our progress.

I am conscious of the fact that I speak as a Member from Northern Ireland, whereas the cancer strategy and much of this effort relate to England. However, as everybody knows, in a lot of these areas we are talking about predictive policy. When we set frameworks or national strategies on particular diseases or illnesses for the NHS in England, they can extend, through policy airspace principles, to the devolved areas. That is one reason why I have no hesitation in joining in the work of the APPGs here—it helps to advance understanding at home.

Of course, that was not the case with the cancer drugs fund. We do not have a Northern Ireland version of that, which has led to the frustration that was identified by the late Una Crudden, who suffered from ovarian cancer. Many of the drugs that were available in England under the cancer drugs fund had been the subject of clinical trials in the excellent centre in Belfast, yet they were not available to patients in Belfast.

The success of the cancer drugs fund has shown its limitations, which is confounding us in thinking about how to develop and replace it. When considering the future of the cancer drugs fund and what will succeed it, I ask him to think not just about doing something for England and then seeing whether the devolved Administrations can match it or do better, but about the possibility of a UK-wide funding pool for some of the newer drugs and for some innovations in research and diagnosis, such as molecular diagnostic testing, which comes under the cancer drugs fund. Perhaps this is a conversation that we need to have with the Chancellor in the context of his announcement next week and what will happen beyond that. I am saying not that it should all be funded by London, but that there could be a pool of money to which the devolved areas contribute, with common standards and bands. It might be that certain groups of patients would then be covered by further arrangements made at the devolved level.

The more commonality and consistency we can bring to funding, the better. It would make it so much better for the many good cancer charities and policy advocacy groups that work with cancer patients, which have to busk around the different Administrations to see who has what bit of money. That also creates a lot of confusion at the parliamentary level. It is hard for us to join up our efforts and marshal our arguments when we are dealing with different structures and systems. The more commonality we can create in funding, particularly in the area of innovation, the better.

Perhaps there should be a UK-wide effort, or perhaps it should go beyond the UK. The British-Irish Council includes all eight Administrations on these islands, including the south of Ireland. Perhaps there should be a common effort at that level, given some of the clinical networks that will be involved. When we consider the rarer cancers that will not be treated in some of the other places, perhaps a more united effort would help to take the thinking forward. A lot of the ingredients in the cancer strategy for England might best be brought forward as part of a combined strategic effort on cancer across these islands.