NHS (Charitable Trusts Etc) Bill

Nigel Huddleston Excerpts

Friday 22nd January 2016 Commons Chamber

[Kit Malthouse]

I am sorry, but I am actually talking about amendment 3, not amendment 2. I am getting myself confused because, in usual British fashion, the amendment paper has the amendments in the wrong order. I will deal with my hon. Friend’s point when I get to amendment 2.

Amendment 3 would simply ensure that, if any hospital has a charity attached, it has the power to appoint one trustee. That seems sensible. Many of those charities will already have such a provision in their trust document. The amendment would just to make sure of that.

Amendment 2 states that in “exceptional circumstances” the Secretary of State should have the power to

“appoint one or more trustees”.

That returns me to my primary point about when charitable trusts go rogue or off the reservation, or where charitable trustees become locked in a group-think situation. Rather than dismiss them all and take control, the Secretary of State may feel that it is more appropriate to appoint one or two people from outside who can add a bit of ginger to the board’s discussions, and challenge what they are doing.

For example, a particularly powerful charity that is attached to an NHS hospital might feel that it is flush with cash and that it needs to intervene in a dispute with its doctors, or that it may have cause to campaign politically against some of the things that the Government are doing. It might want to lobby on the NHS settlement by region. When trustees or charities stray into that area—there has been a lot of consternation about that across the House with regard to particular charities—the Secretary of State may reserve power in those exceptional circumstances to appoint one or two trustees to challenge that view.

[Nigel Huddleston (Mid Worcestershire) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is making some valid points. Does he agree that instead of a laser focus on the number of trustees in charitable organisations, the motivation, character and skills of those trustees is the important element to investigate?

[Kit Malthouse]

My hon. Friend is right, and anyone who is putting together a board of trustees wants to ensure that it contains a full range of skills and experience. As I have said, trustees appoint themselves. No one externally is taking a wider view of how broad the ambit is of those people’s experience, how fruitful or consensual their discussions are, or whether they are being challenged. We all know of charities that are made up from small numbers of people. Often, those jobs are undervalued and take a lot of work. The people who act as charity trustees are often heroic, and there are too few of them. Many people will not take on such onerous duties, so there are often small numbers of trustees, particularly in some of the smaller charities such as friends of hospitals and so on. In such circumstances it behoves the Secretary of State to keep a weather eye, and when problems with a local charity are brought before MPs and we wish to raise them with the Secretary of State, we must be able to do so in the knowledge that he or she will be able to do something and appoint somebody to challenge or change things.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jane Ellison]

My hon. Friend has effectively just undertaken such an act of lobbying. The take-up of this fund is extremely encouraging, and I would be happy to give her more information, as I know she has spoken about this subject here on many occasions—as, indeed, have other Members. We had Backbench Business debates on it in the last Parliament, and I am sure it is one to which we will return. It is an area in respect of which parliamentarians can be great champions in their local areas. I greatly welcome hearing my hon. Friend speak with such enthusiasm about this matter.

[Nigel Huddleston]

May I encourage the Minister to continue her lobbying efforts in that regard? In my area, the west midlands, just 12% of the population feel confident enough to use a defibrillator. What is important is not just the provision of defibrillators, but the training that accompanies it, which I know is being promoted by the British Heart Foundation.

[Jane Ellison]

rose—

--- Later in debate ---

[Nigel Huddleston]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Aldridge-Brownhills (Wendy Morton) on choosing to introduce this important Bill. I felt compelled to speak today because I do not think my children would ever have forgiven me if I had failed to speak in a debate on a Bill dubbed the Peter Pan and Wendy Bill.

In supporting the Bill, I am reminded of the remarks of one of my predecessors as the MP for Mid Worcestershire, the late Eric Forth, who said that for a private Member’s Bill to be successful, it should essentially be uncontroversial and fairly obvious. By my reckoning at least, this Bill solidly passes that test. It has support not just from this House, but from NHS charities and their representative bodies. It will help to deliver the operating model they require and the freedom that the charities themselves have asked for. It should give them greater independence and greater money-raising potential. As my hon. Friend the Member for Aldridge-Brownhills mentioned, although the Great Ormond Street Children’s Charity is deservedly the most famous, there are 260 such charities around the country with around £2 billion of assets and a combined income of more than £340 million a year. Many are large, but many are small, including in Worcestershire the local NHS charity, the Worcestershire Acute Hospitals NHS Trust Charitable Fund.

The work of the charitable fund, like many NHS charities, is to go over and above current NHS provision and improve the experiences of all patients within Worcestershire and the surrounding areas. One of the fund’s recent appeals is the £1.6 million Rory the Robot appeal, with funds raised going towards the cost of a state-of-the-art da Vinci robotic surgical system, primarily to treat patients with prostate cancer. In Worcestershire alone, 125 to 150 radical prostate cancer operations are carried out each year, and there are approximately 2,500 men in the region surviving prostate cancer at any one time. There is an obvious need that the charity is helping to fill.

People from our region and beyond have got behind this campaign. In September last year, more than 80 cyclists from across the county were joined by Team GB star Hannah Drewett on three cycle routes to raise money for the Rory the Robot appeal. There have also been charity golf days, a theatrical extravaganza and even a local production of “The Full Monty”; hon. Members will be relieved to know that that show was in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Redditch (Karen Lumley) and not mine, so fortunately I was not required to participate.

This Bill fulfils a Government commitment made in 2014 following a 2012 consultation. Respondents to the consultation were clear that, first, they wanted NHS charities to be allowed to convert to independent status, should they choose to, and secondly, that the powers of the Secretary of State for Health to appoint trustees to NHS bodies should be removed. NHS charities were concerned that the current legislative framework was limiting their freedom to grow, develop and raise money. Change was therefore clearly needed.

I am very pleased that my hon. Friend the Member for Aldridge-Brownhills has brought forward this Bill. She has given the House the opportunity to deliver what NHS charities want. If we divide, I will support the Bill, and I encourage all Members present to do the same.

Childhood Obesity Strategy

Nigel Huddleston Excerpts

Thursday 21st January 2016 Commons Chamber

[Nigel Huddleston (Mid Worcestershire) (Con)]

I, too, pay tribute to the Health Committee for its great work. I pay tribute particularly to the Chairman of that Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Totnes (Dr Wollaston), and to my hon. Friend the Member for Erewash (Maggie Throup) for her work in the all-party obesity group.

This is a very important topic. It is also a very emotive one, as we have heard, especially for those of us who are generally instinctively against Government interference and taxation, and want small government. I have wrestled with that, like my hon. Friend the Member for St Austell and Newquay (Steve Double), but I have come round to the idea that when it is necessary to interfere, and when we have to balance out these freedoms with doing the right thing by our children, then we do need to consider all options. I have been slowly persuaded, but am now comfortably persuaded, on issues such as the sugar tax. So unfortunately, probably for the first time ever, I disagree with my hon. Friend the Member for Colchester (Will Quince). However, I am sure that it will be the first of many such times over coming years.

The evidence is overwhelming. Like the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon), in researching this topic I found that the numbers are astounding. The figures are overwhelming, and very alarming. I will not repeat them, but the report contains many such figures, and it is well worth a read.

One of the issues that comes up again and again is food marketing. Research tells us that children as young as 18 months can be influenced and are capable of recognising brands, which is a truly astounding fact. The House will be aware that current regulations on TV advertising mean that foods high in fat, saturated fat, salt and sugar are banned from being advertised during children’s programming, but many organisations, as well as the report, have suggested that that should extend up to the 9 pm watershed, and with considerable reason, given the evidence. The latest Ofcom figures show that two thirds of children watch television during what is considered adult airtime, with peak viewing for children between 7 pm and 8 pm. The British Heart Foundation found last year that during just one episode of “The X Factor”, a programme that is quite popular with children, there were no fewer than 13 junk food adverts. The issue is even more acute with online advertising, where adverts are often attached to videos, including music videos. That is probably worthy of a debate in itself.

Let me turn to food standards in schools, where there has been a tremendous breakthrough over the past few years. Those of us who visit schools look on with envy at the school meals now compared with the ones that many of us had to suffer years ago. Yet in many schools up and down the country, we have the farcical situation where lunches provided by schools are generally very healthy, but the food children themselves bring into schools, or is provided by their parents, is often not healthy. We can only imagine how frustrating it is for teachers, and indeed everybody who works in schools, including my wife, to see children filling themselves up with junk food at school and knowing there is little they can do about it. We need more co-operation between schools, and between parents and teachers. I back the Committee’s proposal that nutritional guidelines should be published for packed lunches and that, where necessary, teachers should be able to have, perhaps robust, conversations with parents so that these guidelines are followed.

Of course, diet is very important, but so is physical activity, as has been mentioned many times. I back up the supportive comments about the DCMS’s sports strategy. In The Times on Monday we saw a snack guide that included information on how long it would take to burn off the calories of various foods. It is easy to laugh at things like this, but it showed that a chocolate bar, bag of crisps and a bottle of Coke would require almost one hour of running or more than two hours of walking to burn off. How many children, or indeed parents, know that? Given that a child could consume all those things on top of, or instead of, a healthy meal, while doing no exercise, it is a really alarming picture. We must do more to encourage and enable exercise.

I am blessed to represent a primarily rural constituency. It is very easy for me and my family to get outdoors, to go on bike rides, and to go on public pathways. I am well aware that not everybody in the country has those privileges. Councils and local government need to do much more to enable access to healthy outdoor living and sports facilities. Planning plays a part in this too. When I see planning proposals for housing developments, I find it remarkable how little provision there is for recreational facilities, or indeed access to countryside. Cities fare far worse than the countryside in this regard.

[Helen Whately]

My hon. Friend is making an important speech covering a wide range of actions that need to be taken to tackle the obesity problem. Does he agree that this is not just about the sugar tax or product placement? The scale of the problem is such that we need a whole range of steps where the Government take a lead in showing how serious the problem is, and a whole range of actions to make sure that a difference is made quickly.

[Nigel Huddleston]

I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention; I could not agree more. Indeed, she has stolen my conclusion. It is absolutely the case that this is a very complex matter that covers so many areas that it is difficult to fine tune it. I hope that we can avoid focusing purely on the sugar tax, as important as it is.

We must recognise and praise the fact that up and down the country there are some great experiments going on, with schools practising innovative ways to encourage physical activity. For example, Commando Joe’s goes into schools and encourages team building and physical activity. I give credit to Bengeworth academy in Evesham in my constituency where we have our own Commando Joe—a gentleman called Chris Parry who works alongside staff and children having previously done four tours of Afghanistan with the Marines. He is doing great work, and long may that continue.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Faversham and Mid Kent (Helen Whately) said, this is not just about healthy eating. It is also about planning, education, labelling, and information, and the cost in healthcare if we do not do anything—we need to cover so many areas. If the aim of this debate was to give the Government ideas about what they could do to help in this area, then I am sure that by the end of it that will have been achieved.