Cass Review

Debate between Victoria Atkins and Lia Nici

Monday 15th April 2024 Commons Chamber

[Victoria Atkins]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his advocacy on this issue. I very much hope that all Members will be able to use the evidence produced in this review and report in future debates about legislation so that we can all make informed and correct decisions.

[Lia Nici (Great Grimsby) (Con)]

Let’s be honest, Secretary of State, this excellent review exposes institutionalised grooming and abuse by so-called “professional” medical people. What is she going to do to make sure that people pushing this from day one are, as a minimum, now going to be on the sex offenders list and taken off being able to practise as medical people?

[Victoria Atkins]

I thank my hon. Friend and near neighbour for that. She is right, as is my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Sir William Cash), to emphasise that this is about not just the debate within the NHS, but what happens online. I know that parents of children affected by this are very aware of the online “grooming”, as they describe it, of children on social media. I do not want to trespass for the time being on the regulators—we have already had some constructive conversations with them—but the will of the House is clear that we expect the report to be followed and clinicians to act on the basis of that evidence.