Bereavement Counselling

Susan Elan Jones Excerpts

Tuesday 26th March 2019 Commons Chamber

[Matt Warman]

I absolutely agree.

There is also a role for us to play in opening up the debate and shining light on steps outside organisations can take to make bereavement in general more bearable, but also, on the theme of this debate, to make Mother’s Day or Father’s Day less difficult for those who have experienced loss.

[Susan Elan Jones (Clwyd South) (Lab)]

I wonder if there may be a role for funeral directors in this, given the links they have with families. I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on his moving speech.

[Matt Warman]

I thank the hon. Lady for her kind words. The Co-op has done interesting and very valuable work on this, and the Department can put some of these initiatives together.

One interesting example I would like to see introduced across the board is the new policy from an online flower company called Bloom & Wild. It has given customers the opportunity to opt out of Mother’s Day emails as it recognises that it can be a very sensitive time for some. If other companies were to follow suit, the dread—and I do mean dread—around this day might be mitigated for many people. I personally do not feel, for whatever reason, the same dread about Father’s Day marketing, but obviously it should be treated equally in case anyone is worried. Organisations such as the Advertising Standards Authority could perhaps make this part of a voluntary code around data. I am not a Tory asking for some enormous nanny state. I am saying that providing another tick box for when people sign up for yet more emails would be kind. Companies bang on about corporate social responsibility all the time, so why not try this?

This debate is important to me for three reasons. Yes, this is a sad anniversary, but I am lucky to have this platform to say that the Government are right to acknowledge that they need to do more to ensure that there is ongoing support for those who have lost someone they love. This is also a chance to open up the discussion on how everyone in society and business can play a role in increasing the sensitivity with which these difficult days, which last for many years, are handled. I hope that by securing this debate, through your good offices, Mr Speaker, we will move fractionally closer to ensuring that all men and women who, like myself, have not always felt comfortable discussing such emotional topics are able to do so more freely, to seize the help that is there and perhaps ultimately to need that help just a fraction less.

Respite Care for Vulnerable Adults: Teesside

Susan Elan Jones Excerpts

Monday 12th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Alex Cunningham]

I certainly do agree. I opened my speech by talking specifically about this being not just a Teesside issue, but an issue across the country, and it is a tremendous challenge to Government to plan for the future; I will also be developing that later in my speech.

I know that the team members at the CCG dealing with respite and wider provision are dedicated to their jobs and that they too have been distressed as we have gone through this process, and I for one appreciate the strains of dealing with such sensitive issues. They are trying to do their best within what they say are the ring-fenced resources available, although I personally could have hoped that they would have kicked the Government for failing to provide the resources needed.

Currently, respite is provided in two NHS centres of excellence, Aysgarth and Bankfields, but what are they planning to do now? The best of the options available to carers is this perceived reduction in residential care provided by the expert and nursing staff for their family members, and then the provision of a menu of alternative choices, largely without nurses. The choices include beds in care homes, hotel rooms, adapted caravans and even in carers’ own homes. Could we really see a vulnerable adult accommodated in a caravan somewhere and looked after by people in whom their parents may struggle to have confidence? What about the risk assessments for that menu of provision? Who is going to check that all the new people caring for these vulnerable people are both trained and suitable for this role and that the premises are suitable? What respite is it for a carer if they have the respite worker under their own roof? That is not much of a break for the carer or the family member.

To be fair to the CCG, it has promised that there will always be appropriately trained staff to offer the care and support required. Sadly, however, it is yet to provide the families with the reassurance they need, and the uncertainty is torture for them. So much more needs to be done to drive understanding. We also have to ask whether changes that cause such disruption are really appropriate in 21st-century Britain when carers do not know what the future holds. Our provision should be improving, not deteriorating in practical terms nor in the eyes of the carers.

[Susan Elan Jones (Clwyd South) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend is making a powerful case. Does he agree that this country needs to be doing a great deal more to support carers? I think back to the 1997 Labour Government, when national insurance contributions towards carers’ pensions were introduced. Is there not a case for looking at things in the round and doing more to support carers?

[Alex Cunningham]

I am a member of the all-party parliamentary group on carers, so I spend a bit of time on this subject. I do not know whether we will ever get to a point at which we are content that we have done enough, but we need to do much more.

I recently wrote to the Hartlepool and Stockton-on-Tees CCG regarding the consultation that was taking place at the time. It confirmed that it is committed to retaining the full £1.5 million fund for this provision, but it highlighted that the money will have to be spread further to reach more families. That confirms that provision is being diluted, and when provision is diluted, it is cut, and it will be the carers who will pick up the extra responsibility.

I accept the CCG’s point that more people need respite services, but the answer is surely to increase funding and provide the services that are needed, not water down what is available and provide a poorer-quality service. Demands for such services will continue to increase over the coming years as more vulnerable, high-needs young people grow into adults, live longer and need the kind of comprehensive support given by the people I have been speaking of today. The cost of meeting the services will therefore go up and, yes, although the cost may in some cases be shared between the NHS and local authorities, neither of them can sustain quality services for a growing cohort of people when the income simply is not there.

According to the National Audit Office, Stockton Council has had its budget cut by 52% since 2010 and spends around 57% of its money on social care. Does the Minister realise that we are facing a potential crisis? Does she understand the tremendous role that carers take on? Does she appreciate the need for comprehensive respite care to give them a few days’ break, or does she think that they will get by and manage? Well, while some may, others will not and will face the difficult decision to hand their loved one over to the health service full time because they simply cannot cope any more. What short, mid and long-term planning are Government doing to ensure that we have a strategy in place not just in Teesside but across the country to cope with increased demand and provide the increased resources required to deliver appropriate provision?

My colleagues on Teesside—my hon. Friends the Members for Stockton South (Dr Williams), for Hartlepool (Mike Hill), for Middlesbrough (Andy McDonald) and for Redcar (Anna Turley)—have all listened to carers’ stories and recognise that they are facing tremendous anxiety over what the changes will mean to respite care. Others have listened, too, including the scrutiny committees of our local authorities. The joint health scrutiny committee, a cross-committee of local councillors, stated that it could not endorse either of the two options or any other that would reduce provision. None of the councillors believe that the CCG has covered itself in glory in its handling of the matter, and they can see why those dependent on these services for a decent quality of life have lost all trust in the organisation, feeling that it has ignored their pleas and failed to understand their needs.

There is another dimension to this. I applaud the CCG for the comprehensive consultation exercise—and it has been comprehensive. Sadly, the CCG has failed to get its messages of reassurance across to these needy families, who interpret that as its having failed to recognise the anxieties created by the process. Carers tell me they have no understanding of any new criteria that will determine who gets what services. They feel that they are being left in the dark. Yes, I praise the public consultation by the CCG, but at the end of day the options were severely limited. I repeat that there is no extra cash to cope with increased demand.

I have heard that at one meeting with councillors, the CCG said that carers cheered when option 2 was chosen over option 1, which would have ended all provision at the two nurse-led residential units. Naturally, the carers cheered the better of two bad options. There was no option at all to extend the current provision or provide resources to cater for the additional needs of new adults coming into the system, which is something that Ministers need to reflect on. The CCG also stated that this was not a cost-cutting exercise. I know that the money is ring-fenced, but with the need to look after more people with the same money, there are fewer resources per person in the system. While I remain critical of the CCG and the way in which it has handled this issue I recognise that in many ways it has been backed into a corner. It know the demands on its service, but does the Minister? It knows that there are more people needing services, but there is no additional funding to provide that.

We all know that we have a health and social care crisis in our country, and while local authorities can shift the burden on to local council tax payers as Government cuts bite deeper, it is not something that our local NHS commissioners can do. They cannot tell local tax payers that they are sticking an extra 3% on their bills to try and alleviate the shortage of funds in areas such as respite care. That leaves the buck well and truly in the Chamber, with the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care and the Minister. My plea to her is simple. Will she take an interest in what is happening on Teesside with respite care for vulnerable adults? Will she examine the proposals, which parents see as a cut to provision for families in the area?

This is much bigger than Teesside. Yes, I know that there are CCGs up and down the country facing the same issues, so perhaps it is time for Ministers to consider the whole policy area of supporting carers such as those I have talked about this evening and find ways of providing the NHS and, for that matter, local authorities with the resources that are needed. Will the Minister instigate a much-needed policy review to see how we can do much better as a country to support carers?

Many families—I have talked to several—are living on the edge, struggling to cope with the needs of their loved ones. They have no intention whatsoever of handing them over to the state, but they need comprehensive respite care services to give them a little of their own time and space. We as a nation owe them no less.

Brain Tumours

Susan Elan Jones Excerpts

Monday 18th April 2016 Westminster Hall

[Susan Elan Jones (Clwyd South) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Edward. I have just a few words, and they are from my constituent, Mr Philip James of Tallarn Green, which is near the English border. Philip James is a 3D artist, and this is what he movingly wrote:

“I was diagnosed with brain cancer a few days after my 30th birthday where I proposed to my fiancée. Since then I have set a wedding date of 7th April 2017. It is my mission to help others dealing with this awful disease that has a preventable poor prognosis by doing a daily blog about how I’m fighting it and about what research I have done myself.”

Mr James is chronicling his condition in a daily blog. His is a very heartfelt story and it shows one of the many reasons why we need to listen to people who are fighting and battling against brain tumours and why it is so important that we as a country spend more on research.

NHS Funding

Susan Elan Jones Excerpts

Wednesday 12th December 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

He does support it—well, there we are. So now we have it. Labour policy in Wales is to cut the NHS budget, and that is supported by Labour Front Benchers.

[Susan Elan Jones (Clwyd South) (Lab)]

Can the Secretary of State tell us whether that has anything to do with the cuts in capital spend from Westminster central Government? Does he have any comment to make on National Audit Office figures showing that spending on health in Wales is higher than that in England, or does that not fit with his fictitious version of events?

[Mr Hunt]

I gently remind the hon. Lady that this is about the choice made by the Labour Government in Wales. They had a choice. They could have protected the NHS budget—they had the money under Barnett to do that—but they chose not to do so, and that is supported by the right hon. Gentleman.

Health and Social Care Bill

Susan Elan Jones Excerpts

Tuesday 20th March 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr David Anderson (Blaydon) (Lab)]

This debate is about contempt—for the Information Commissioner, for the tribunal, for the people who signed the e-petition, for the public who have contacted hon. Members in their hundreds of thousands and for the principle of transparency. For years, we had lectures from the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats when they were in opposition, when they said that sunlight was the best light.

We should not be surprised, because the whole debate on this Bill has been about contempt, starting with the contempt for democracy. The Government have no mandate, no support and no truth—the Conservatives promised no top-down reorganisation. The Conservatives and Liberal Democrats were not straight with the people, but why not? I hate to disagree with my right hon. Friend the Member for Wentworth and Dearne (John Healey), but this debate is political. The Conservative party has always opposed the national health service, because it is the living example that collectivism works. Conservatives oppose the NHS because they are against collective provision.

The hon. Member for Southport (John Pugh), who has tried his best to make something out of this mess, was right when he told the Liverpool Daily Post a number of weeks ago:

“If the Conservatives had gone to the country at the last election and said ‘we want a market-based health system’ they would have lost the election badly.”

The Conservatives knew that, which is why they covered it up.

The Government have shown contempt for the House, because even before they reached for the pause button, changes were taking place. Before we have even agreed the Bill, they have all but abolished 151 primary care trusts, with tens of thousands of people being made redundant. They are being replaced by 279 clinical commissioning groups, and strategic health authorities have been set up.

The new national commissioning board, which has not yet been agreed in law, has already got a chief executive, a finance director and seven board members, recruited at salaries of up to £170,000. That is before we have even passed the Bill. If that is not contempt, what is?

Worst of all is the Government’s contempt for the people to whom we look to deliver our services. The Government say, “We know best,” but anybody who was in the Chamber last week to hear the Government’s contempt for the work of Dr Chand, who did his best to ensure that the House looked again at the Bill, will know how the Government feel about health workers in this country.

Who are these people who know so much better than the doctors, nurses, general practitioners, consultants, radiographers, occupational therapists and porters? What is their background? There are researchers, a teacher, and a sales and business manager. In the Lords there are former Army people, journalists, lobbyists, MEPs and researchers, and people who worked at Tory HQ. Do they all know so much better than the people to whom we and the people we represent turn every day of the year to take care of us?

Who is against the Bill? Almost everybody, including the British Medical Association, the Royal College of Nursing, the Royal College of Midwives, the Royal College of Radiologists, the Royal College of Physiotherapists, and the Royal College of Paediatricians and Child Health, the Faculty of Public Health and the GPs. I could be here all night going through the list, but the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats know it.

[Susan Elan Jones (Clwyd South) (Lab)]

There was one small omission from my hon. Friend’s list of the many opponents of the Bill: the agent of the right hon. Member for Bermondsey and Old Southwark (Simon Hughes), who is also deputy leader of the Liberal Democrats. Mr Gary Glover, on his Twitter account, said:

“Lib Dems have accomplished almost nothing on the NHS Bill.”

Surely the truth is that Lib Dems could accomplish rather a lot, because they could help us to defeat the Bill tonight.

[Mr Anderson]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. As an eternal optimist, I continue to hope against hope that the Lib Dems will see the light tonight, but my guess is that they probably will not. They have shown contempt even for the democracy within their own party. They claim to be determined to be bound by the democratic decisions of their own party. They have not been. They have ignored their party. When they came to Gateshead two weeks ago, they said they would stand up to the Bill, but they have not. It is the double-talk and spin that we are all used to.

Two days ago, I visited my general practitioner, and on his practice nurse’s wall was a poem by Michael Rosen, the children’s poet laureate, who, in 2009, wrote a poem called “These Are The Hands”. It read:

“These are the hands

That touch us first

Feel your head

Find the pulse

And make your bed.

These are the hands

That tap your back

Test the skin

Hold your arm

Wheel the bin

Change the bulb

Fix the drip

Pour the jug

Replace your hip.

These are the hands

That fill the bath

Mop the floor

Flick the switch

Soothe the sore

Burn the swabs

Give us a jab

Throw out sharps

Design the lab.

And these are the hands

That stop the leaks

Empty the pan

Wipe the pipes

Carry the can

Clamp the veins

Make the cast

Log the dose

And touch us last.”

These are the people we should have been listening to. These are the people who have been ignored constantly by the Government parties. And these are the people who will never ever forgive them for what they are doing tonight. When the election comes, they will be thrown out where they belong.

Alcohol Strategy

Susan Elan Jones Excerpts

Tuesday 7th February 2012 Westminster Hall

[Dr Wollaston]

That is a valuable point and clear evidence that marketing encourages children to drink, to start drinking younger and to drink more when they do. We should protect young people—that is an absolute duty of the state.

On education, the most important point is clear labelling. The drinks industry has made some progress, but if it does not meet its targets the issue should be mandated so that people can be clear about how many units they are drinking and receive advice on the sensible limits.

[Susan Elan Jones (Clwyd South) (Lab)]

The hon. Lady is making a powerful case and she can rest assured that most Members present do not think that she is anything like Eliot Ness. On her point about labelling, many of us were rather disappointed that more was not done on the subject of food labelling. Is there a case for us to do what is done in New York state in terms of food labelling, where an outlet that has more than two branches labels the calorie intake? That gives people a choice and also provides information.

[Dr Wollaston]

That is an excellent point, and I thank the hon. Lady for making it. Certainly, many young women drinkers would be deterred if they realised what the calorie content is for some of the popular alcohol mixer drinks. That might help to stem the rise in vodka mixer drinking among young women.

Organ Donation

Susan Elan Jones Excerpts

Wednesday 30th November 2011 Westminster Hall

[Glyn Davies]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for that intervention, because I would not want there to be a misunderstanding. I gave a direct quote from the organ donation taskforce set up by the previous Government, which said that there was no evidence of an increase, and indeed some danger that there might be a negative effect. I used that quote as a challenge to those who are suggesting that the taskforce report shows positive support. I did not suggest that presumed consent will decrease the level of donation.

[Susan Elan Jones (Clwyd South) (Lab)]

It strikes me that the hon. Gentleman is saying that we have a choice – either presumed consent and no awareness-raising, or awareness-raising in the hope that that will generate more organ donation. From our nation of Wales, in the UK, we know that one person a week dies because they cannot have a transplant. I was on the Welsh radio programme “Dau o’r Bae” recently when one of the hon. Gentleman’s colleagues, the Rev. Felix Aubel, was adamantly in favour of presumed consent, and felt that there were very few ethical considerations against. There is quite a diversity of views, but I would contend that there is not the polarity that the hon. Gentleman suggests.

[Glyn Davies]

I thank the hon. Lady for her contribution, but I have not thought of this as being in any way a political issue. I know that there will be members of my party who will take a different view. For me, this is an issue purely outside party politics.