Gregory Stafford MP: speeches 2025

Speeches

• 7 Jan 2025 · National Cancer Plan: Brain Tumours · Hansard source

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  15. What steps he is taking to ensure that brain tumours are included in the national cancer plan.

• 7 Jan 2025 · Tobacco and Vapes Bill (First sitting) · Hansard source

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  Q Do you have any concerns about the impact of the Bill on vapes as a smoking cessation tool? As my hon. Friend the Member for Sleaford and North Hykeham said, vaping in children is abhorrent, and I am glad that the Bill is addressing that, but how can we ensure that, as a cessation tool, vapes remain part of the panoply of options for smokers who are trying to give up? Professor Sir Chris Whitty: That is a very important question. I think everybody would agree on two things, and then there is a way of making sure that we get to the exact middle point of this argument. First, as you imply, in this country—it is not universally true—there is a strong view that we should try to continue our support to allow current smokers who are finding it very difficult to get off because of their addiction, which has taken away their choice, to move to vaping as a step in the right direction. I think that is broadly accepted in this country. As I say, there are some countries where that is not accepted so, to be clear, that is not a universal view. At the other extreme, as you imply—or state directly, actually—I think everybody would agree that the marketing of vapes to children is utterly abhorrent. I think almost everybody would agree that marketing vapes to people who are current non-smokers, given that we do not know the long-term effects of vapes because we have not had them for long enough, is a big mistake. We should not allow ourselves to get into a position where, in 20 years, we regret not having taken action on them. The question then is: how do you get the balance? In my view, this is sometimes made more complicated than it needs to be. I think it can be very simply summarised: “If you smoke, vaping is safer; if you don’t smoke, don’t vape; and marketing to children is utterly abhorrent.” That is it, although it is sometimes made a lot more convoluted. Our view is that the Bill gets that balance right. In general, if people’s profession is getting people who are current smokers off, they tend to be more at the pro-vaping end, because they see the dangers for current smokers. People who deal with children, such as Dr Johnson, who has taken great leadership in this area and is very much in the centre of her profession, and the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health take a very strong anti-vape view, because they have seen the effects on children. It is getting the balance between those two, and I think that the Bill does that. But—and it is an important but—the Bill takes powers in this area, and that means that if we go too far in one direction or the other, there is the ability to adjust that with consultation and with parliamentary secondary legislation. That allows for the ability to move that point around if it looks as if we have not got it exactly right. It may also change over time as the evidence evolves.

• 6 Jan 2025 · NHS Backlog · Hansard source

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  Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

• 6 Jan 2025 · NHS Backlog · Hansard source

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  I welcome this debate, although we have had a number of health debates over the past few sitting days that have crystallised the real problem that we see in the NHS. It is stark that none of the Government Members have mentioned covid thus far and its massive impact. [ Interruption. ] The hon. Member for Carlisle (Ms Minns) is pointing at herself; she might have mentioned it, but she did not set out the absolute devastation that covid wreaked on our services. Before I came to the House, I worked for the Getting It Right First Time programme, an NHS England programme that was initially funded by my right hon. Friend the Member for Godalming and Ash (Jeremy Hunt) when he was Health Secretary, and again when he was Chancellor of the Exchequer. The programme made a significant difference in getting rid of “unwarranted variation” within the NHS, because while there is some amazing service, treatment and patient care in the NHS, we have to admit that there is also some poor and inefficient patient care. The Getting It Right First Time programme tried to improve patient care and ensure that the worst-performing trusts were brought up to the level of the best-performing trusts; I hope that the programme will continue to try to achieve that under the current Government. Areas for improvement include high-volume, low-complexity work, such as cataract, hip and knee operations. There are massive backlogs of such procedures in the NHS that could be cleared if some failing trusts reached the level not of the top-performing trusts, but of the top quartile, or the top 10%.

• 6 Jan 2025 · NHS Backlog · Hansard source

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  I accept that the pressure on the NHS went way beyond covid, as the hon. Gentleman will remember, but to use the Secretary of State’s term, covid was the point at which the NHS was “broken”, and it is taking a long time to recover. The Government are right to push for more localised services, and to bring services closer to the patient. Access to GPs is a fundamental part of that, but we know that GPs are overstretched. The previous Government really pushed Pharmacy First, which was a superb programme. This Government want to go further with it, but there are disincentives for general practitioners to embrace Pharmacy First. What will Ministers do to ensure that there is no financial disincentive to work with pharmacies? If we are to deal with the backlog, there has to be a financial incentive. What was concerning about today’s statement from the Secretary of State was the lack of genuine reform. There was a lot of rehashing of previous policies, perhaps eking them out a tad further than the previous Conservative Government did, but I think the Secretary of State himself said that if anyone is able to reform the NHS, it is a Labour Government. While I was quite interested in what he was saying as shadow Secretary of State, I have been deeply disappointed by what he has said since. It appears to me that unfortunately the union paymasters and the inertia in the NHS have captured him and his Front Bench. I hope that I am wrong, and that the Minister will tell me differently this evening, but that is what I have seen. Locally, the reality is that there is a problem with being able to bring services closer to home. My hon. Friend the Member for Runnymede and Weybridge (Dr Spencer) mentioned the problem of accountability for ICBs. I have the fortune, or misfortune, depending on how one looks at it, of having three ICBs in my constituency. To use a previously mentioned term, there is a lot of unwarranted variation in how they deal with my constituents, and with me as a Member of Parliament. A big issue in Bordon is that we want a brand new surgery in the area, but there has been no conversation with the ICB about how that might go ahead. Likewise, we are really keen for Haslemere hospital to move from being a district hospital to having an urgent treatment centre. It is vital that we get that moving. The community hospital in Farnham could also be somewhere treatment is done closer to home. I urge the Government not to sit back, but to use their majority and reform the NHS for the benefit of all our constituents.