Rare Cancers Bill

Patricia Ferguson Excerpts

Friday 14th March 2025 Commons Chamber

[Patricia Ferguson (Glasgow West) (Lab)]

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh South West (Dr Arthur) for bringing forward this Bill. If, as we always say, politics is the language of priorities, then my hon. Friend has got his absolutely correct. I thank all Members who have shared their experiences and their stories, some incredibly moving. They should be what inspires us to take forward all the action we are proposing today.

I was struck by the fact that the hon. Member for Wokingham (Clive Jones) and I have something in common, which we probably would not want to have in common, in that we were both diagnosed with breast cancer in 2008. I have to say, my breast cancer was a strange breast cancer, and it always feels slightly strange talking about it, because no one’s ever heard of it. It is not a rare cancer as such, because it is a breast cancer, although there are some who argue it is actually a soft tissue sarcoma—whatever, it was treated as a breast cancer. It is called a phyllodes tumour.

Unlike other breast tumours, phyllodes tumours do not go into the ducts, but into the connective tissue. It presents differently from other cancers of the breast, and the treatment is also different, in that the only treatment that works is excision. Excision can be anything from a lumpectomy to a mastectomy. The hope is that there are clear margins, which mean the patient will be okay, but—and it is a big “but”—when a malignant phyllodes tumour is present, it can spread, and it can be difficult or impossible to treat. That is when it becomes a very different outcome.

I mention it today not because it is a rare cancer, but because it can be difficult to diagnose. It does not show up in a mammogram, for example, and there is no definitive explanation why such tumours occur. Some research is going on just now, but it is not conclusive as yet. A lot more work needs to happen, and because incidence is so low, it is difficult to research. The things we know about it for certain seem random to me. They tend to occur more often in the left breast. Why? I have no idea. They usually occur when a patient is in their 40s. As I have said, they do not seem to respond to chemo or radiotherapy, and they are not thought to be genetic or hormonal.

The reason I mention my case is that it can be a lonely thing to have an unusual cancer. When trying to explain it to family and friends, you say, “No, it did not show up in a mammogram. No, I am not getting chemotherapy or radiotherapy. No, I do not know why it happened. No, I had not heard of it either.” You begin to doubt yourself a little, and you begin to question what is actually going on. For someone with a very rare cancer, it must be incredibly difficult when there is not a background of research, not anything that they can read, and no one can give them a pamphlet about it and tell them what is happening.

It seems to me that we should know more about cancer full stop. We have got to 2025, and we know some things about cancer. We know how to treat some cancers, but there are so many others that we do not have the answer for. We need people to be diagnosed more quickly, which means that we have to have the research. We need people to have the best possible treatment, which means we have to look at the drugs and find out what works and what does not work, and where a drug can be transferred from one thing to another successfully. Crucially, we have to know why it is that some people get cancer and others do not.

This Bill will make a huge difference to the lives of some of the people we have heard about today. For some, as we know, it will not be soon enough. It is the responsibility of every single one of us to make change happen, and we have an opportunity today to take that step forward. My hon. Friend the Member for Mitcham and Morden (Dame Siobhain McDonagh) spoke about her sister, Margaret, who I worked with for a time in the Labour party. While I was listening to the other speeches, I was reflecting on what my hon. Friend said. I think we all need to be angry. We need to say—to shout it from the rooftops—that change begins today.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)]

That was very powerful. I call Leigh Ingham.