Oral Answers to Questions

Miriam Cates Excerpts

Tuesday 5th December 2023 Commons Chamber

[Maria Caulfield]

May I pay tribute to the hon. Lady for her work on the all-party parliamentary group on suicide and self-harm prevention? She knows that financial difficulty is a priority area in the suicide prevention strategy, because we know it is a high risk factor. That is why suicide is now everyone’s business—not just the Department of Health and Social Care, but our colleagues at the Department for Work and Pensions, His Majesty’s Revenue and Customs and all Government Departments. Anyone who has financial stress and pressure will be given support to reduce their risk of suicide.

[Miriam Cates (Penistone and Stocksbridge) (Con)]

My constituent Dan Archer runs the highly successful Visiting Angels care agency, which has an annual staff turnover rate of just 13%, compared with an industry average of 60%. The secret to his success is very straightforward: paying decent wages, investing in training, valuing staff and prioritising client satisfaction. As a consequence, an enormous amount of money is saved on recruitment and invested into training and retention instead. Would the Minister meet my constituent to learn more about the success of Visiting Angels and how it can be shared more widely to help solve the shortage of workers in the care sector?

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

Order. Can Members please cut their questions in half? Otherwise, I will have to stop this questions session and people will not get a chance at all.