Medical Cannabis under Prescription

Debate between Mike Penning and Seema Kennedy

Monday 20th May 2019 Commons Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Seema Kennedy)]

This has been a very moving and important debate. As I know from my own constituency, and as has been outlined with such passion by Members on both sides of the House, this matter leads to great distress for patients and their families. I recognise the deep frustration of families and patients, which has come across strongly this evening. All of us who are parents or who have cared for a loved one can empathise with them. I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Middlesbrough (Andy McDonald) and his wife Sally, who shared their experience with us. It is them and parents like them whom we are concentrating on this evening.

It would be remiss of me not to mention my right hon. Friend the Member for Hemel Hempstead (Sir Mike Penning) and the hon. Member for Gower (Tonia Antoniazzi), all their work on the all-party group and their tenacity in keeping this issue on the agenda. Many points have been raised. Great frustration has been expressed and I have heard that. I will be speaking to the Secretary of State again and taking back all the messages to the officials, but I will try in my remarks to answer the points made.

In November last year, the law was changed to ensure that doctors on the specialist register of the General Medical Council can legally prescribe cannabis-based products for medicinal use in the UK. It is right that we put these decisions in the hands of clinicians because they are the ones with the best knowledge of all the treatments available for conditions in which they specialise. The Secretary of State and I have been clear that whether to prescribe must remain a clinical decision, to be made with patients and their families, taking into account the best available international clinical evidence—I want to reassure the House that we are in close contact with colleagues in other countries to ensure that we learn from their experiences—and the circumstances of each patient.

It is not for me as a politician to second-guess or pillory clinicians’ decisions. I was alarmed to hear my hon. Friend the Member for South Suffolk (James Cartlidge) say that doctors are being trolled for the decisions they are or are not making. They have the best interests of their patients at heart and their primary focus is to do no harm. But I recognise that we do not have the optimal system in place yet. It is undesirable that patients are travelling abroad. The Secretary of State and I are determined to do everything we can to ensure that patients can obtain medicines in this country if it is medically appropriate. There are already systems in place to do that and I want to do everything I can to understand why patients are not using those systems to access medicines here in the UK.

We want to continue to refine the system so that the demands of patients who want to try medicinal cannabis are balanced against other demands on NHS funding. Given the embryonic state of the evidence base on the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of medicinal cannabis, that is not easy. However, we are working hard to ensure we get this right, because it is crucial. I have had many discussions about this with my hon. Friend the Member for Reigate (Crispin Blunt), who spoke with great passion. He mentioned the need for more evidence and the issue of growing a market. We will explore that with the Department for International Trade.

I want to pick up on a point that my hon. Friend the Member for Henley (John Howell) made about the number of prescriptions issued since November last year. Data show that, until the end of February, there had been six items issued in the community under NHS prescription. He thought there were none at all.

[Sir Mike Penning]

The evidence from the families and the APPG that I co-chair is that there have only been two. If the Minister knows of six, we would love to know not the individual cases but where the other four have come from. The families are confused because at the moment we only know of two.

[Seema Kennedy]

My information is that there are six and I will happily write to my right hon. Friend with more information.

As the House heard last month, the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care has met many of the families and patients who Members know through their work on the APPG or their constituencies. All of us could not help but be moved by these distressing cases and the continued efforts of those who support loved ones. The Secretary of State asked NHS England to conduct a process review to identify any inappropriate barriers to clinically appropriate prescribing. I am pleased to say that the review is under way, and NHS England is working with my right hon. Friend the Member for Hemel Hempstead, the all-party parliamentary group on medical cannabis under prescription and patient representative bodies to identify cases that might best illustrate the experience of a range of patients.

[Sir Mike Penning]

We have lots of time, but the Minister is being generous in giving way. Can she confirm when the interim report will be issued on the blockages and when the final report will be made to the Secretary of State? It was indicated to us at a meeting with NHS England only last week that there would be an interim report by the end of May and a report to the Secretary of State in June. Would the Minister like to confirm that?

[Seema Kennedy]

I will come on to timelines later in my remarks. NHS England is currently obtaining patient consent and scheduling the necessary interviews with clinicians, decision makers and their patients. The first interviews were held today.

I want to touch briefly on devolved matters. Health is a devolved matter, but officials across the UK have been working closely on the development of this policy. The law is exactly the same in all four countries of the UK and only funding is devolved. Members have said that clinicians might be nervous about prescription and that we need to improve training. I will talk about this later, but the training package that has been commissioned from Health Education England will be made available across the UK.

Police Funding Formula

Debate between Mike Penning and Seema Kennedy

Monday 9th November 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mike Penning]

I usually disagree with most of what the hon. Gentleman says, but this time I do not. I think that the settlement needs to be fair to the West Midlands authority, and to the other 42 authorities, and we delayed the process so that we could get it right.

[Seema Kennedy (South Ribble) (Con)]

I thank my right hon. Friend for meeting me, and other Lancashire Members of Parliament. Will he confirm that he will continue to meet all the Lancashire MPs to establish a fair funding settlement for the Lancashire constabulary?

[Mike Penning]

I congratulate all the Lancashire Members who took the time, and were considerate enough, to meet me. Members of all parties listened to our proposals, and then presented their own ideas. That, too, helped us to make the decision to delay the process.