Danny Chambers MP: speeches

Speeches

• 3 Sept 2026 · Vaccination Rates: England · Hansard source

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  It is an honour to serve under your chairship, Mrs Barker. I congratulate the hon. Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Danny Beales) on securing this important debate. It seems that every time I open my social media feed or emails, I am being sold some supplement or superfood to boost my immunity. We know that the most effective way of boosting our immunity is vaccination. Vaccines can achieve something even more extraordinary: they can actually eradicate diseases from the face of the earth. During the 20th century alone, we lost hundreds of millions of people to smallpox until it was eradicated in 1977. Rinderpest, a cattle disease, was wiped off the face of the Earth by vaccination—the second disease to be removed from our planet. Polio is on the brink of eradication. I recently spoke at a Winchester rotary event about polio eradication, organised by two of my constituents, Gillian Russell and Professor Kordo Saeed, both of whom contracted polio when they were children and have lifelong disabilities as a result. It is important to remind everyone that this is about preventing not just deaths, but disability and ill health that can last a lifetime. We saw the power of vaccination during the covid-19 pandemic. A century earlier, during the 1918 influenza outbreak, which killed 50 million people, there were no flu vaccines or antiviral treatments. There were not even antibiotics to treat the secondary infections. During covid, we initially had only the same blunt tools—isolation and restriction on gatherings—to try to control the disease, but then the vaccine came out. It saved a huge number of lives and gave us a route out of lockdown. We got back to seeing our families, socialising, going back to work, running our businesses and just living our lives. But there is a danger that vaccines can become a victim of their own success. We have become so unfamiliar with some diseases that we have forgotten how serious they really are. That is why falling childhood vaccination rates should particularly concern us. When politicians like Donald Trump and parties such as Reform platform anti-vaxxers, parents rightly become worried. They all want to do the best for their children, but when dangerous, provocative and downright false information is platformed, the truth is pushed further and further away from those looking for answers. Centuries ago, hospitals were filled with iron lungs for children with polio, and graveyards were filled with children under five years old who died from entirely preventable diseases. Vaccines have saved more lives than any other medical intervention in history. They are the closest thing that we have to a safety blanket from disease, and we must not allow dangerous and divisive figures online or in politics to drive people away from science and evidence-led healthcare. Science produces solutions, answers and evidence, but politicians and politics can determine whether they are trusted.

• 16 Jul 2026 · Health Bill (Sixteenth sitting) · Hansard source

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  I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time. The new clause would require the Secretary of State to conduct and publish a review into the yearly number of deaths in the UK related to antimicrobial-resistant infections. I declare an interest as the secretary of the all-party parliamentary group on antimicrobial resistance. AMR is a major threat to public health globally and domestically, and it is already contributing to an estimated 35,200 deaths every year in the UK. AMR is a bit like a silent pandemic. It gets little media attention, but given the prediction that 39 million people worldwide will have died of AMR by 2040, it will eventually be pushed right up the political agenda. This is not simply a matter of people dying from infections that could not be treated; nearly all the advances in modern medicine over the last 50, 60 or 70 years would be null and void. It would be too risky for someone to have something like a hip replacement, because of the risk of getting an infection that could kill them; they would be better off living with a painful arthritic hip than taking the risk of dying from sepsis. It is the same with things like heart disease, while giving birth will once again become one of the most dangerous things a woman can do if we lose the impact and effectiveness of antibiotics. The Government invested more than £560 million in AMR programmes between 2020 and 2024, so it is reasonable that Parliament should receive an annual assessment of AMR-related deaths to ensure that that significant public investment is delivering results, represents value for money and is targeted where it can have the greatest impact. We cannot effectively tackle what we do not measure, and an annual review of deaths linked to AMR would provide a clear, consistent picture of the scale of the problem and enable Parliament and the public to track whether policies are working. Better data leads to better targeted interventions. We know that rapid diagnostic tests and different types of decontamination will be hugely important in tackling AMR, along with potential future technologies such as phage technology. Surveillance has already identified significant variations by age, deprivation and geography. Understanding where deaths are occurring, and in who, would help direct resources to the communities and services that are most affected. AMR threatens the effectiveness of modern medicine, including surgery, cancer treatment and routine healthcare. An annual review of AMR-related deaths would ensure that this growing public health threat receives the attention and urgency it deserves. The reason I am determined to push it up the agenda is that the national cancer plan does not specifically mention AMR or infection, but it is the second biggest cause of death in cancer patients. At the moment, it is not pushed up the political agenda enough.

• 14 Jul 2026 · Support for Pig Farmers · Hansard source

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  It is an honour to serve under your chairship, Sir Christopher. I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Gordon and Buchan (Harriet Cross) for securing this timely debate. I grew up on a sheep and beef farm, and when I was about 11 years old, I bought 13 pigs from market to take home. They became more like pets; I used to play football with them—

• 14 Jul 2026 · Support for Pig Farmers · Hansard source

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  No, I used to play football matches with them. They were a lot of fun, and I learned that of all livestock, they are potentially the most intelligent and certainly some of the most affectionate animals. I had a particularly interesting visit to Sparsholt agricultural college in Winchester with the National Pig Association. I used to love going there when I was a vet to treat the animals; now I go there as an MP to look at its teaching and facilities. It has a fantastic indoor, high-welfare unit that delivers piglets without the use of farrowing crates, and I pay tribute to the staff there for their teaching and the welfare standards that they maintain. To touch on something that many Members have spoken about today, one of the top issues threatening the pig industry is biosecurity at the border. I have been to Dover and met the vets and border inspectors there who look at the potentially illegal meat coming in and the tonnes of it that get seized. The crazy thing is that currently, if I were caught smuggling meat into the UK, I could not be arrested and my vehicle could not be seized, but the meat would be confiscated and my vehicle would have to be cleaned, because it would be a biosecurity risk. The only deterrent to trying to smuggle illegal meat into the UK would be that I might get my van cleaned for free at the taxpayer’s expense. That is absolutely ridiculous. I totally understand that enforcing biosecurity at such a busy border is difficult and comes with huge challenges, there are not even suitable deterrents in place for people who get caught. I urge the Minister at the very least to look at implementing some. One thing that the pig industry has done phenomenally well is to reduce antibiotic use by 72% since 2015—just over 10 years. That is hugely important, not only for animal welfare, but for public health. Antimicrobial resistance is like a slow pandemic; it never gets media attention, but it will kill 39 million people by 2050 if we do not take action. It is important that we do not undercut our high animal welfare and farming standards with products from countries that have lower standards. Countries that use antibiotics as growth promoters are not only farming with lower welfare standards, but contributing to this huge public health crisis, so we must do our bit to tackle that issue. The hon. Member for Doncaster East and the Isle of Axholme (Lee Pitcher) mentioned labelling. It is hugely important that we can identify where meat has been produced. Consumers are currently being hoodwinked; they believe that they are buying products from animals reared in the UK, but it turns out that they were only processed in the UK. They want to support British farmers and high animal welfare standards, so it is completely wrong that they are being hoodwinked into buying products that potentially undermine UK standards. My hon. Friend the Member for West Dorset (Edward Morello) made a very important point about the lack of small abattoirs in the UK. Their closure is a huge animal welfare issue, as animals have to be transported further than necessary to be slaughtered, and a huge economic problem too. I urge the Minister to see how the Government can work with the pig industry to move away from the CO 2 stunning of pigs. It is a big welfare concern, and the British Veterinary Association and others are keen for the industry to make a sustainable transition away from it. It causes a lot of concern to a lot of constituents, and it really upsets me as a vet. Finally, I urge the Minister to meet the National Pig Association as soon as possible to look at supporting UK farmers, maintaining high animal welfare standards and improving our nation’s food security.

• 7 Jul 2026 · Health Bill (Twelfth sitting) · Hansard source

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  This subject is of particular interest to me. For quite a few years I was a trustee of a charity that supported evidence-based medicine and quality improvement. The hon. Lady talked about a no-blame culture. We now tend to use the term “just culture” but it is the same kind of thing: we must have a safe space for people to come forward, like in the airline industry. We want to encourage reporting not only of mistakes but of near misses so that improvements can be delivered without tragic incidents having to take place. If we are to create a culture in which people will come forward to admit even potential mistakes and near misses, they cannot in any way fear punitive punishment under regulations. Does the hon. Lady agree that folding HSSIB into the CQC will make it difficult to create a culture in which people feel confident enough to want to come forward with and overtly discuss mistakes and errors?