Dan Aldridge MP: speeches

Speeches

• 28 Apr 2026 · UK-India Technology Security Initiative · Hansard source

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  I thank my hon. Friend, who accompanied me to India. It was a phenomenally insightful visit. The human connection is not incidental to this debate; it is the very foundation of it. I use this opportunity to give a special shout-out to people such as Akhilesh Madhav and his family, who chose Weston to work in our NHS, to care for our people and to raise their children. Akhilesh and his friends and colleagues do more than just work and live in Weston-super-Mare; they are tireless community builders and campaigners, setting up new organisations such as FYI-Weston, which hosts wonderful, inclusive events, bringing people together from across our community to connect, learn, make friends and often do business, linking our two great countries. I also give a shout-out to Sanju Varghese, who along with his friends created the charitable Weston Association of Malayalees, a forum to help Malayalees from Kerala in India to engage with local communities through acts of service. The association is always out with local groups, litter picking and fundraising for local causes. Our shared stories go back generations, with a complex history, but firmly focused on the future and a desire to create opportunity and prosperity. They are all examples of how the relationship between the United Kingdom and India is not, in essence, a relationship between two Governments, two economies or even two sets of interests; it is actually a relationship between people and communities. We share a history, a legal tradition, a language and deep cultural ties. It is a friendship with deep roots, which is now growing into something genuinely transformative.

• 14 Apr 2026 · Cancer Treatment · Hansard source

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  Weston-super-Mare is a growing, thriving town with a population comparable to the city of Bath, yet cancer patients regularly make a round trip of 90 minutes by car or more than three hours by public transport to Bristol to get their treatment. After his own difficult battle with cancer, my constituent John Kiely is leading an inspiring campaign to finally bring a radiotherapy machine to Weston general hospital. A feasibility study is under way, so can Ministers outline how we can secure the support that we need to make his campaign a reality and improve the treatment experience for my constituents?

• 30 Oct 2025 · Ageing and End-of-life Care · Hansard source

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  I thank the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) for securing this debate. It has been a pleasure to see his passion for his community and for the people of Northern Ireland, especially as a member of the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee. Care at the end of life and ensuring dignity, compassion and community in every chapter of life is so incredibly important. I pay tribute to Weston Hospicecare, and particularly to Paul Winspear and his amazing team, who are an extraordinary example of what compassionate, community-based care can achieve. Their current director of patient services, John Bailey, retires in December after 30 years of dedicated services. Paul, the chief exec, describes John as a “truly exceptional” person, and I absolutely agree. Founded in 1989, Weston Hospicecare supports more than 1,000 patients and families each year, serving a population of around 225,000 people from Clevedon to Burnham-on-Sea and from Cheddar to Weston-super-Mare, Worle and the villages that surround my constituency. It is hard to find somebody in my town whose life has not been touched by Weston Hospicecare’s dedicated team; my family is no exception. Weston Hospicecare helped us during some of our darkest times. I have a personal mission to help safeguard the future of this important facility. Its dedicated team provides in-patient, day hospice and community nursing services alongside physiotherapy, counselling and bereavement support, all free of charge. Weston Hospicecare truly embodies the spirit of my home town—caring, community-minded and determined to do the right thing—but it is important to acknowledge the pressures that it faces daily. Weston Hospicecare receives only around 18% of its operating costs from the NHS, compared with a national average closer to 29%. The rest must be raised through community fundraising, shops and donations. The generosity of our community is remarkable, but it is being stretched to its limit, despite some of the most innovative approaches to fundraising that I have witnessed. I am genuinely, truly impressed by what Weston Hospicecare has been able to achieve. Over recent years, hospice funding increases have fallen well behind inflation. The national living wage increase has rightly lifted incomes, and I am entirely in favour of it, but that and other factors have increased staffing costs for many hospices. Weston Hospicecare faces an annual deficit of £500,000—roughly 10% of its £6 million budget—and it has had to dip into reserves, which now stand at less than six months’ cover. For such vital services that mean so much to my community and to the communities around us, we must find a better way. Despite that, Weston Hospicecare continues to deliver outstanding value. It provides care for patients with complex, multi-morbid conditions who would otherwise occupy hospital beds or require costly community nursing, and it is relieving pressure on the NHS in my town. Weston Hospicecare saves the health system money while delivering really outstanding outcomes for patients and families. The Government’s recent £75 million capital investment in hospices has been so important. Weston Hospicecare has benefited from it, and is particularly grateful for it, as am I, but we all recognise that while one-off capital investment is welcome, it cannot by itself secure the future. We need a sustainable commissioning model and fair funding for the essential, specialist care that hospices provide, while allowing them to continue raising community funds for services that are so often seen as optional, but which are in reality vital, such as family support, bereavement care and the holistic and therapeutic services that help people to live and die well. This issue is also about the wider fabric of our communities. In coastal towns such as Weston-super-Mare, where we have higher proportions of older residents, fewer large employers and sometimes higher levels of isolation, hospices—in particular my hospice—are part of what hold our communities together. They offer not just care and employment, but training, volunteering and opportunities for young people to build meaningful careers in care. One of my best friends, John Williams, has been a carer his whole life. All too often, what I consider to be a vocation—a profession—is undervalued. That is something that we must change. When we talk about ageing and end-of-life care, we must see it not as a burden, but as a mark of who we are—a society that values every life at every stage, and sees worth in all human life. Weston Hospicecare is a beacon of that principle, and with the right long-term funding framework, I believe it and other providers like it across the country can continue to serve our communities for decades to come.

• 16 Oct 2025 · Business of the House · Hansard source

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  Many will have been engrossed by the programme “The Summer I Turned Pretty”. Personally, I am team Conrad. He has shown a new audience that therapy is accessible to young men in a world that still shames our emotions. Will the Leader of the House allocate time for a debate on improving access to therapy and mental health support for men?