NHS Corridor Care
Alison Bennett Excerpts(2 weeks, 5 days ago)
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Alison Bennett (Mid Sussex) (LD)
I begin by thanking the hon. Member for Tooting (Dr Allin-Khan) for setting out so brilliantly, with her professional expertise and human touch, what it means for corridor care to be a normal habit across the NHS in all parts of the country—not just in the winter, with winter pressures, but throughout the year. She made many good points, and I hope I can add some context with the stories I have gathered in Mid Sussex, from constituents who have experienced corridor care first-hand, whether as patients or staff. They have shared some of the most frightening, painful and vulnerable moments of their lives with me. First, I thank them, and to those whose stories I cannot share today due to a lack of time, I apologise.
Many of those people wanted the House to be told one thing before anything else: the staff who cared for them were extraordinary. They spoke of nurses who never stopped smiling despite being exhausted, doctors who apologised because they knew patients deserved better, and paramedics who stayed compassionate under impossible pressure. One constituent arrived at the Princess Royal hospital in Haywards Heath after falling and breaking both a shoulder and a kneecap. It was a Friday night, and A&E was overflowing. After X-rays, they spent hours on a trolley in a corridor beside the nurses’ station because there was nowhere else for them to go. They told me that the nurses were attentive and kind throughout the night. They checked in constantly and did everything they could. However, kindness cannot create another treatment cubicle, compassion cannot magic up another doctor, and dedication cannot create a bed that is simply not there.
Another constituent, Chris Philpot, shared an experience that I found impossible to forget. Following a ruptured appendix and serious complications, he spent 19 hours on a trolley in the corridor at the Royal Sussex county hospital. During that time, he watched an elderly lady have her blood pressure taken while resting her arm on his leg because there was nowhere else to support it. No privacy, no dignity—that is not the standard of care patients should expect in modern Britain.
Dr Danny Chambers (Winchester) (LD)
My hon. Friend has just highlighted a point that was mentioned by the hon. Member for Tooting (Dr Allin-Khan). That kind of experience causes concern not only for its lack of dignity, but for infection control, antimicrobial resistance and hospital-acquired infections. That kind of treatment not only has a lack of dignity, but can be lethal. That is a huge public health issue, which my hon. Friend’s specific example highlights.
Alison Bennett
I agree with my hon. Friend. What we see time and again is that one problem becomes another until eventually the patient pays the price. My constituent, Catherine Jeater, has seen corridor care as a patient and as a relative of a patient. She watched her father being treated for appendicitis in an emergency department that was so overcrowded that patients were double-parked on trolleys, changing into hospital gowns in full view of strangers. Months later, while undergoing chemotherapy herself, she attended the Princess Royal hospital with a chest infection. Because she was immunocompromised, she should have been isolated. Instead, she received intravenous antibiotics sitting on a chair in a corridor, because no cubicles were available. She told me the staff were amazing, but she also made it clear that amazing staff should never have to work in those conditions
Perhaps the most difficult responses I have received were from the healthcare professionals themselves. One doctor told me that they regularly examine patients in corridors. Another said that corridor care is not just an A&E problem, and that it is now normal for people to be on trolleys in non-clinical areas throughout the hospital. That means there are no curtains to provide privacy, no piped oxygen and no name above the bed, and patient safety is inevitably compromised. A senior nurse described to me the moral injury that they and their colleagues face every day, having to try to deliver the best care possible in terrible conditions, all the while apologising for something that is beyond their power to fix. They have to do that every single day. I am not personally enjoying this third heat wave, but imagine A&E departments without air conditioning: they become furnaces. Imagine trying to treat incredibly frail patients when the temperature in a corridor is 40°C. Another clinician wrote something that stopped me in my tracks. They said that corridor care had become so common that they were teaching medical students and junior doctors how to provide it—and that is not just during winter pressures, but all year round.
This should trouble every single one of us. We are training the next generation of clinicians to adapt to something that should never have become normal in the first place. The real danger is not simply that corridor care exists, and not that we begin to accept it, but that we shrug our shoulders and tell ourselves that this is just how the NHS works now. The solutions are not easy—hospitals cannot fix this on their own—but we do need to get it right. We need to invest in capacity, in workforce, in social care, and in reducing waiting lists so that treatable conditions do not turn into emergencies.
Alison Bennett
I am sorry, but I will not, in the interests of time.
This is happening not because our NHS staff are failing, but because they are being asked to deliver excellent care in circumstances that make excellence almost impossible. My constituents have not shared these stories because they have lost faith in the NHS; they have shared them because they believe that the NHS can and should be better than this. Let me therefore end with a plea that we never describe corridor care as the “new normal”, because there is nothing normal about receiving intravenous antibiotics during chemo in a corridor. There is nothing normal about waiting 19 hours on a trolley. There is nothing normal about losing your privacy, your dignity, and sometimes even your safety, simply because there is nowhere else to go. The NHS was founded on the belief that every person matters. We need to make that happen once again.
Heart Disease and Stroke: Premature Deaths
Alison Bennett Excerpts(3 weeks, 4 days ago)
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Alison Bennett (Mid Sussex) (LD)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship this afternoon, Dame Siobhain. I congratulate the hon. Member for South Ribble (Mr Foster) on securing this important debate and thank him for sharing his story. Like so many families across the country, mine has its own history of heart disease, either with tragic, early death or, for my father, a triple heart bypass in 2012. He celebrated his 80th birthday this year.
Reducing premature deaths from heart disease and stroke is one of the defining public health challenges facing our country. It is also one of the greatest opportunities. We know what works and where the risks lie; the question is whether this Government are prepared to invest in preventing illness rather than simply responding to it once people become sick. Cardiovascular disease remains the second biggest cause of death in England; every day, around 390 people die from a heart attack or stroke. Heart and circulatory diseases are responsible for one in four premature deaths, while more than 6.4 million people in England are living with cardiovascular disease.
It is particularly concerning that progress has stalled. After years of improvement, premature mortality from cardiovascular disease has begun to rise again. The latest figures show that rates have returned to around where they were over a decade ago. Behind those statistics are families who have lost loved ones far too early; many of those deaths could have been prevented.
Perhaps the greatest injustice is that outcomes are not evenly distributed. People living in the most deprived communities are twice as likely to die prematurely from cardiovascular disease as those in the least deprived areas. If we are serious about reducing premature deaths, we have to be serious about prevention. Too often, prevention is spoken about warmly but funded poorly. We hear Ministers say that they want to shift healthcare from hospital to community and from treatment to prevention. Those are welcome ambitions, but ambitions alone do not reduce blood pressure, identify atrial fibrillation or prevent strokes.
The reality is that the NHS and local government continue to struggle to fund many of the programmes that are proven to save lives. Freedom of information data published earlier this year reveals that more than 70 local authorities are limiting the number of NHS health checks that GP practices can carry out because of financial pressures. The programme designed to identify people at risk of heart disease, stroke, diabetes and kidney disease, which is credited with saving hundreds of lives every year, is being rationed because councils simply cannot afford it. That is the direct consequence of years of underfunding in public health.
A straightforward first step would be restoring the public health grant to its 2015 level, which would give local authorities the resources they need to expand NHS health checks and deliver wider prevention programmes that reduce smoking, improve physical activity and help people to manage the risk factors that lead to cardiovascular disease. The Liberal Democrats have also proposed widening access to blood pressure checks by making them routinely available in community settings such as pharmacies and libraries.
An estimated 7 million people are living with undiagnosed high blood pressure. Many of them have no idea that they are at increased risk of suffering a devastating stroke or heart attack. Detecting hypertension earlier is one of the simplest and most cost-effective interventions available. However, prevention is about much more than screening alone. If we want to tackle heart disease properly, we must also be far more ambitious in addressing obesity and the wider causes of poor health.
The evidence is clear that obesity is closely linked to deprivation. A poor diet often begins in childhood, and families facing food insecurity are more likely to rely on cheaper foods that are higher in fat, salt and sugar. That contributes to stark inequalities in health outcomes later in life. That is why we believe that more children living in poverty should receive free school meals. We would also do more to protect children from the relentless marketing of unhealthy food, including supporting councils to restrict outdoor junk food advertising and maintaining stronger protections on television advertising.
For those already living with heart disease or recovering from a stroke, continuity of care is equally important. The Liberal Democrats want everyone living with a long-term condition to have a named GP. Continuity improves outcomes, reduces unnecessary admissions and ensures that patients receive co-ordinated care over many years, rather than fragmented treatment from multiple clinicians. Recovery following a stroke also deserves much greater attention. Around 60% of stroke survivors leave hospital with a disability. Rehabilitation cannot be treated as an optional extra. Every stroke survivor should have access to personalised, high-quality rehabilitation services that help them regain independence and improve their quality of life.
Finally, I want to touch on emergency care. When someone has a stroke, every minute matters. Rapid assessment and treatment can mean the difference between a full recovery and lifelong disability. I pay tribute to Olivia, the wife of the right hon. Member for Rayleigh and Wickford (Mr Francois), for the work that she and her team do at Queen’s hospital. I pay tribute to all practitioners carrying out the same work across the country.
Ambulance delays and overcrowded emergency departments continue to place patients at unnecessary risk. We know that too well in my village, where, a few years ago, we lost a dear friend far too young as a result of a slow ambulance response time. We need action to reduce ambulance handover delays, expand staffed hospital bed capacity, improve social care so that patients can be discharged safely, and ensure that every A&E waiting room has a qualified clinician able to identify patients whose condition is deteriorating while they wait.
Preventing premature deaths from heart disease and strokes will require action across the whole health system. It means investing in prevention rather than allowing it to become the first casualty of financial pressures. It means tackling the inequalities that leave poorer communities carrying the greatest burden of disease. It means strengthening primary care, community services, rehabilitation and social care rather than focusing solely on elective waiting lists.
The Darzi review warned:
“Care for cardiovascular conditions is going in the wrong direction.”
That warning should not be ignored. If the Government are serious about achieving their ambition to reduce deaths from heart attacks and strokes, they must match warm words with sustained investment in prevention, public health and community care. The best way to reduce premature deaths is not simply to become better at treating illness; it is to prevent people from becoming ill in the first place. I look forward to hearing the Minister’s response.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Mrs Sharon Hodgson)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship today, Dame Siobhain. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for South Ribble (Mr Foster) for securing this debate on such an important issue. I also commend him on sharing his own personal experience with his diagnosis of a congenital heart defect. I thought, as he was speaking, that it just goes to show that we should never judge solely based on how someone presents on the outside, because we never know what is going on inside; I know he served in the Royal Engineers, and he is also very fit and active. He rightly highlighted why this Government are determined to tackle cardiovascular disease head on through earlier prevention and diagnosis, because that is what is really going to make the difference.
I also thank all hon. Members for their valuable contributions this afternoon. It is clear that far too many lives are still being cut short by cardiovascular disease. In recent years, heart disease and stroke caused around 33,000 premature deaths per year, and it is the second leading cause of death in England after cancer.
The hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) gave a powerful speech, bringing this issue into stark focus with regard to Northern Ireland. I have to say, I share his pleasure in spending so much time in these important debates in Westminster Hall; he and I are usually the common denominator. I want to refer to some of the things that he said, specifically about the ticking time bomb that cardiovascular disease can be. He mentioned that 225,000 people—one in 10—in Northern Ireland live with heart and circulatory conditions. That was very sobering; this is not a niche condition at all. He said that it accounted for 24% of deaths in Northern Ireland—one in four—and that most of those were premature. As always, I will commit to ensuring that key learnings and best practice are shared between both our health services and, indeed, with the other devolved Administrations. I always learn a lot from the hon. Member’s contributions, so I thank him for them. That is why, as part of our 10-year health plan for the NHS, we have committed to shifting from sickness to prevention and to ensuring that fewer lives are lost to the biggest killers, including cardiovascular disease.
I have made so many notes, but the trick is now whether I can find the right note for the right person and not just forget about them all; I am trying to be too clever for my own boots here. The hon. Member for Mid Sussex (Alison Bennett) who speaks for the Lib Dems, spoke a lot about prevention and about the shift from treatment and sickness to prevention. She asked me whether the public health grant would go back to 2010 levels. I cannot commit to that. Obviously, something did happen in 2010 and, as much as I like and admire the shadow Secretary of State, the right hon. Member for Daventry (Stuart Andrew), there were big cuts to the public health grant—although I think the biggest cut was in 2015. However, we have provided the first three-year public health grant settlement in over a decade. That will give surety and confidence to the local authorities and public health directors in all our areas for the three years.
Alison Bennett
For the record, my request was that the public health grant be restored back to 2015 levels, not 2010 levels.
Mrs Hodgson
Right, the hon. Lady said 2015. I am being too clever for my own boots. I wrote down 2010, but of course, as I said in correcting myself, the big cut was in 2015. I am pleased that the hon. Lady has corrected the record for us all.
As I say, we have set an ambitious goal to reduce premature mortality from heart disease and stroke in the under-75s by a quarter in the next 10 years. As part of the first wave of the new generation of modern service frameworks, we will publish a cardiovascular disease modern service framework soon.
My hon. Friend the Member for South Ribble asked me about that, and I shall move on to answer his questions. He asked when; the answer is soon. The Department and NHS England have engaged widely to consider a range of conditions that are most likely to drive progress on the Government’s ambition and the CVD MSF—if Members do not mind me using the acronym to save words—will set out 12 high impact priority action areas, descriptions of how unwarranted variation should be addressed and a road map for the next 10 years. The framework will be backed by clear accountability and routine monitoring of progress using existing NHS performance and oversight arrangements.
To support the delivery of the framework across the system, we will launch a series of ambitious strategic partnerships between Government, the NHS, industry and the voluntary sector. We thank the British Heart Foundation for its support and participation as a task and finish group member for the CVD MSF.
My hon. Friend the Member for South Ribble asked about type 2 diabetes. I pay tribute to and thank his friend Jared, who is with us today, and who I am aware is a type 1 diabetic. Type 2 diabetes is very prevalent in cardiovascular disease. We are taking steps to reduce overall prevalence of type 2 diabetes by supporting programmes such as the NHS health check and the highly effective “Healthier You” NHS diabetes prevention programme. I will talk more about obesity prevention and the obesogenic environment if I have time.
My hon. Friend the Member for South Ribble asked me about cholesterol. We know that addressing raised cholesterol is key to preventing CVD. Statins cut CVD risk in just four to six weeks, and are readily available and quite cheap, as interventions go. As of December 2025, 85% of people with CVD were being treated with cholesterol-lowering therapy, including statins, across England. He also asked me about arterial fibrillation. The Government recognise the importance of optimising arterial fibrillation treatment. As of December 2025, 92% of those with high-risk arterial fibrillation were being treated with anticoagulants, which was an increase from 87% in March 2020.
National Maternity and Neonatal Investigation
Alison Bennett Excerpts(3 weeks, 6 days ago)
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James Murray
I thank my hon. Friend for his emphasis on the need for us to tackle the deep-rooted cultural problems in maternity services. He talks about how the only ideology that we should follow should be based on science and evidence. I agree with him on the importance of science and evidence, and of making sure that women are aware of the risks and benefits of the different options available to them, so that they can make informed choices. I add that the only ideology I would be comfortable signing up to is one that says that women must be listened to. That is a principle that I think we can all agree on, and we should make sure that it is embedded in our maternity services.
My hon. Friend mentions investment in technology, including the single patient record. The single patient record can be of real benefit and make a difference, particularly in maternity services, and it will be enabled by the NHS modernisation Bill that is going through Parliament. I want to make sure that the single patient record is available to maternity services as quickly as possible. I am happy to share a copy of the report with the Scottish Government.
Alison Bennett (Mid Sussex) (LD)
The Secretary of State’s announcement of 1,000 extra midwives is welcome, even if the funding is temporary. However, this is a review of maternity and neonatal services. In Baroness Amos’s review of Sussex, she noted that in the 12 months ending in October 2025, only 50.1% of shifts at the Royal Sussex county hospital in Brighton were staffed according to British Association of Perinatal Medicine guidelines. What provision is the Secretary of State making to ensure that neonatal staffing is safe?
James Murray
I thank the hon. Lady for welcoming the additional 1,000 positions to make sure that newly qualified midwives can find a way to contribute to the NHS. She raises staffing and training, as other Members have rightly done. The taskforce will consider questions about ensuring that we have the right staffing in place, with the right training to support it, ahead of the publication of the national action plan at the end of the year.
Diethylstilbestrol: Intergenerational Impact
Alison Bennett Excerpts(4 weeks ago)
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Jessica Toale
Yes, I agree that research is needed and that is one of the things that DES campaigners are calling for.
One of those 300,000 women was Rita, the mother of my constituent, Jan Hall. Rita was prescribed DES when she was pregnant with Jan, but when Jan was just a toddler, Rita died of breast cancer. She was only 32. Jan herself later developed cervical cancer in her twenties. Because of the surgeries she had to undergo, she was told she may never be able to have children. She lived not only with that physical consequence, but with decades of uncertainty, fear, grief and anger. Her daughters have experienced significant gynaecological health problems, and now Jan worries about her grandchildren as well.
Jan is not alone. Across the country, men, women and their families have come forward to share their stories and their experiences as victims of this scandal. Some of them are in the Gallery with us today and have allowed me to share some of their painful testimonies.
Alison Bennett (Mid Sussex) (LD)
One of the people in the Gallery is my constituent, Heather Farrant, who came to Parliament today with two of her three daughters. She has lived with the lifelong consequences of her mother’s exposure to DES. Will the hon. Lady commend Heather and all the campaigners for their bravery in speaking so publicly about something that has been hidden for a long time? Until Heather came to speak to me in my surgery, I had not heard of DES, and without those campaigners, we would not have known about it and been able to raise it here today.
Jessica Toale
It was a pleasure to meet Heather today, along with all the other campaigners. I thank them all for having shown such strength in coming forward to share their stories.
One of the cruellest impacts of DES, which sets it apart from other medical scandals, is that its consequences do not stop with the women who were prescribed it or their immediate children. There is growing evidence of intergenerational impacts affecting grandchildren, and possibly beyond. We do not yet know how far those consequences reach. That uncertainty is part of the harm that the families face.
Research suggests that women who took DES during pregnancy—the DES mothers—may face around a 30% higher chance of breast cancer. Female babies exposed in the womb—DES daughters—have around 40 times the risk of developing clear cell adenocarcinoma of the vagina and cervix. They also face increased risks of reproductive complications, including infertility, ectopic pregnancies, premature births and a range of other conditions and complications that we are learning about all the time.
Clare, who is in the Gallery today, described being robbed of her fertility and suffering ovarian failure, and later developing an autoimmune inflammatory condition. At the age of 18, Juliette, who is also with us, was rushed to A&E with severe haemorrhaging after a reaction to the contraceptive pill, and she has stage 4 endometriosis. Anne-Marie, who is also with us, was taken off the pill due to stroke risk and has described being housebound due to the gynaecological issues she has faced. Many of them describe managing complex hormonal challenges and, later in life, debilitating menopausal symptoms. That is a common experience for a lot of these women.
Nottingham Maternity and Neonatal Services
Alison Bennett Excerpts(1 month ago)
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James Murray
My hon. Friend is absolutely right to point to regulatory failure, which has been drawn out very strongly by Donna Ockenden’s report. For me, what is completely unacceptable is that in their response to what has happened in Nottingham, they have sought to protect their own. That is something we must change, because it is only through effective regulation that we can have true accountability, and it is only through true accountability that we can get action and change.
Alison Bennett (Mid Sussex) (LD)
I thank Donna Ockenden, the hon. Member for Sherwood Forest (Michelle Welsh), and the Nottingham families for all the work they have done to bring us today’s report about what went on across Nottinghamshire. It is truly shocking. At the same time, they were also supporting Sussex families to get their own justice when those families were repeatedly begging the right hon. Member for Ilford North (Wes Streeting) to appoint Donna Ockenden to review what happened in Sussex. I thank them for their support for other families right across the country.
When the Secretary of State was appointed to his role, I shared with him a letter I had written along with Sussex and Leeds MPs, asking for the duty of candour to be written into the terms of reference of the Leeds and Sussex reports. I am so grateful that he has announced today that the Hillsborough law will apply once it is enacted. That is very welcome, but that law has not yet been enacted, and it was delayed in the last Session. Does the Secretary of State know when the Hillsborough law will be enacted, and if he is not clear on that, will he commit to pushing at Cabinet to make sure it becomes law as soon as possible?
James Murray
I thank the hon. Lady for welcoming our decision about applying the duty of candour to future maternity reviews and inquiries, including those in Sussex and Leeds. We have always been clear that the Public Office (Accountability) Bill—the Hillsborough law—is an important priority for this Government. As soon as it is in law, we will ensure that the duty of candour is applied. Our commitment today is to ensure that NHS staff, current or past, cannot refuse to take part in what the lead investigator wants in future inquiries.
Puberty Blockers
Alison Bennett Excerpts(1 month ago)
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Alison Bennett (Mid Sussex) (LD)
This debate is on a subject that, it goes without saying, is emotive and complex. We must therefore as always endeavour to have this conversation with compassion and empathy. The Liberal Democrats’ position is clear and simple, as reflected in our amendment to the motion: any medical treatment and the approval of any clinical trial, including the one we are discussing, must be led by expert medical advice. It should not be led by personal belief, no matter how sincerely and passionately that belief is held. Politics has a place, but not in questions of medical trials and clinical consensus—those are better left to experts.
The Cass review, originally commissioned by the Conservatives, was clear that there was a need to gather more evidence. The safety of young people is paramount, and the experts involved in this space know that better than anybody; they work with these children day in, day out and understand the risks of both action and inaction. That is why we supported the previous decision to pause the trial after the MHRA raised concerns, and why we now support the decision to start it again.
We will listen to the experts and the clinicians, but to build trust in expert advice we need transparency and clarity, and throughout the process, we have pushed for exactly that. We want the expert opinions on the public record, as that allows us as politicians, as well as the wider public, to approach this issue with clarity and facts, not ideology or misunderstanding. That is why we called for the Government to publish how the MHRA arrived at its decision when concerns were first raised, and yesterday we called for the Secretary of State to confirm that the MHRA had confirmed that its concerns had been substantially addressed. Transparency is needed so that people can be confident that clinical advice is being followed.
Alison Bennett
I am afraid that I will not.
Liberal Democrats have been arguing for many years that improved access to better specialist healthcare services for children and young people struggling with their gender identity is extremely important. Those young people have been badly let down by low care standards and extremely long waiting lists. The closure of the Gender Identity Development Service made it clear beyond doubt that change was needed. We have consistently campaigned for real action to tackle the shocking waiting times across the NHS, including for gender identity services.
Liberal Democrats welcome the move to create new regional centres to offer this care to the young people who need it. There is a need for multiple geographically dispersed clinics so that care is closer to those who need it, but roll-out has been slow, and more needs to be done to tackle the waiting lists—quite simply, a three-year average wait is not acceptable. For the centres to run effectively, we must support the specialists who provide children and young people with high-quality, compassionate and clinically appropriate care.
Treatment, first and foremost, should be based on talking therapies. Space and time to talk through feelings is vital for young people struggling with their gender identity. It is a deeply complex set of feelings, and questioning and understanding one’s identity is never an easy thing, especially for a child, but for talking therapies to be an effective first step, children must be able to access them when they need them, not after years on a waiting list.
The debate is about access to a form of healthcare—one that is led by doctors and clinicians—and, as for any other form of healthcare, we must listen to the experts: the people who have spent years training and years delivering care.
Alison Bennett
I will not.
We must never lose sight of the fact that at the core of the debate is young people’s wellbeing and health. It is not about ideology; it is about what is best for young people. The Government must always prioritise clinical evidence and put the interests of patients at the heart of care.
Madam Deputy Speaker
I call the Chair of the Women and Equalities Committee.
Spinal Muscular Atrophy: Newborn Screening Test
Alison Bennett Excerpts(1 month ago)
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Alison Bennett (Mid Sussex) (LD)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Mundell. I thank the hon. Member for Sunderland Central (Lewis Atkinson) for opening this debate so well. I am grateful to the petitioners for securing this debate, including the 287 constituents in my own patch, and to the many families, clinicians, charities and campaigners who have worked so hard to raise awareness of spinal muscular atrophy and the importance of newborn screening. I would like to say a big thank you to them, and I truly mean that.
This issue goes to the heart of what our health service should be about: identifying serious conditions as early as possible, ensuring equal access to life-changing treatment and giving every child the best possible start in life. Spinal muscular atrophy, or SMA, is a devastating genetic condition, as the right hon. Member for Melton and Syston (Edward Argar) so eloquently set out when he shared that letter. It causes progressive muscular weakness and can have a profound impact on almost every aspect of a person’s life. Many people with SMA face significant mobility challenges, difficulties with breathing, and bone and joint complications such as scoliosis.
An SMA diagnosis can be life changing for whole families. It brings uncertainty, anxiety, and in many cases, the prospect of intensive and lifelong care needs. Historically, SMA was one of the leading genetic causes of infant mortality. Before effective treatments became available, up to 90% of babies with the most severe forms of the condition would die or require permanent ventilation before the age of two. That stark statistic reminds us just how serious this condition can be.
Thankfully, the picture today is different. Thanks to years of scientific research, medical innovation, and the determination of patients, families and campaigners, we now have treatments that can dramatically alter outcomes for children diagnosed with SMA. These advances represent one of the great success stories of modern medicine, but there is one crucial factor that determines how successful those treatments can be: timing. The earlier SMA is diagnosed, the better the outcomes. In many cases, treatment before symptoms develop can prevent irreversible damage to motor neurones and dramatically improve children’s future quality of life. Earlier diagnosis can mean the difference between a child learning to walk independently or their never achieving that milestone. That is why newborn screening matters, as all hon. Members who have taken part in today’s debate have made so clear.
The debate is about ensuring that children can benefit from treatments at the point when those treatments are most effective; it is about giving families the opportunity that comes with early intervention; and it is about ensuring that where a child is born does not determine whether they have access to life-changing care. That is why there is understandable concern about the current rollout of the in-service evaluation for SMA screening. The principle behind the evaluation is sensible, and gathering evidence and ensuring that the NHS is prepared for wider implementation are important objectives. However, the rollout to date has been inconsistent and incomplete. Some parts of the country have been included, while others, as we have heard, have not.
Families living in areas such as Oxfordshire currently have no access at all to the programme. My hon. Friend the Member for Henley and Thame (Freddie van Mierlo) has campaigned tirelessly on behalf of his constituents affected by this issue. In response to a parliamentary question that he submitted, it was confirmed that the current in-service evaluation will offer screening to about 400,000 babies. By comparison, a national screening programme would cover approximately 650,000 babies every year. In other words, under the current arrangements about one third of babies born each year will not be covered by the evaluation.
That inevitably brings up questions, and not just those asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Twickenham (Munira Wilson), who rightly said that services for rare conditions should cast the widest net possible. Why should access screening depend on geography? Why should one family benefit from early detection, while another family living elsewhere does not? If the evidence increasingly points to the importance of early diagnosis, how can we possibly justify such uneven access? Too often in our NHS, patients and families face postcode lotteries. Whether it is on access to dentists, GPs, mental health services or specialist treatment, geography can end up determining outcomes.
The Government and NHS England have acknowledged concerns about the rollout. We welcome indications that NHS England is considering whether implementation can move faster, and whether the evaluation could potentially be extended more widely. That is encouraging, but families and clinicians need greater certainty. At present, there is a lack of clarity about how long the evaluation will run, when additional sites may be added, and when a final decision on a national screening programme can be expected. Those are issues that it is reasonable to ask questions about, and people deserve answers to such questions.
The Minister might point to the need for robust evidence before national implementation. Of course evidence matters and of course changes to screening programmes must be safe, effective and carefully planned, but if the stated purpose of the in-service evaluation is to gather evidence, surely there is a strong case for gathering that evidence from as broad and representative a population as possible. A wider rollout would not only improve equity of access; it would also strengthen the evidence base on which future decisions will be made.
James Naish (Rushcliffe) (Lab)
A couple of my constituents with direct experience of SMA got in touch with me. The thing that they identified as being most difficult about the current arrangements with the in-service evaluation is the lack of detail about how long it will take. Does the hon. Lady agree that if the Minister could provide a level of clarity about the length of time that the ISE will run, that might give us the sense that there is forward momentum on this issue?
Alison Bennett
The hon. Member makes the good point that often the uncertainty and the unknown length of time for which people are in limbo matter, and I hope that the Minister can address his question when she responds to the debate.
In conclusion, the story of SMA over recent years is ultimately one of hope. Medical science has transformed what was once considered an overwhelmingly bleak diagnosis. Children who previously would have had very limited prospects now have opportunities that simply did not exist a generation ago, but those opportunities depend on timely diagnosis. The treatments exist, the evidence is growing and the need is clear. The challenge now is to ensure that every child has the same chance to benefit from those advances, regardless of where they happen to be born. Families affected by SMA deserve urgency, clarity and, above all, a system that acts as quickly as science now allows. I look forward to hearing the Minister’s response.
Access to Dental Services: West Sussex
Alison Bennett Excerpts(1 month, 1 week ago)
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Alison Bennett (Mid Sussex) (LD)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship on Sussex Day, Sir Desmond. I start by congratulating my hon. Friend the Member for Chichester (Jess Brown-Fuller) on securing this important debate on access to dentistry services in West Sussex. I also thank my fellow West Sussex MPs, my hon. Friend the Member for Horsham (John Milne) and the hon. Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Alison Griffiths), for taking part in the debate. Of course, I particularly thank the hon. Members for Strangford (Jim Shannon) and for Upper Bann (Carla Lockhart), and my hon. Friend the Member for North Cornwall (Ben Maguire), for their interest in the debate and for making links between our experience in West Sussex and their experiences in their constituencies.
My constituents in Mid Sussex know all too well about the challenge of accessing dental services both for them and their children. An incredible 133,560 children covered by the NHS Sussex integrated care board did not see a dentist last year. That is 41% of them. The figure was even worse in 2024, with more than 140,000 children not seeing a dentist. Dozens of my constituents have contacted me to say that their local dentists are no longer taking NHS patients, leaving them and their children without the vital preventive dental care that they need and that we know saves the NHS a fortune down the line.
Recently, a constituent contacted me after spending months trying to find an NHS dentist. Practice after practice told her the same thing—that no NHS places were available. Faced with either a long wait or private fees she simply could not afford, she was left with nowhere to turn. Sadly, as we have heard during the debate, that story is anything but unique.
Carla Lockhart
I apologise for intervening again, but I want to make a point about cancer patients, similar to the one made by the hon. Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Alison Griffiths). The teeth of cancer patients are heavily impacted by the strength of the drugs, so does the hon. Lady agree that the Government need specifically to consider how they can support cancer patients post-treatment and that cancer patients should be able to access free dental care quickly and efficiently?
Alison Bennett
The hon. Lady makes a really good point. We know that cancer treatment is a real priority for this Government and it certainly makes sense that her suggestion is considered.
I hear from parents who are worried about finding appointments for their children; I hear from pensioners who are living with pain while waiting for treatment; and I hear from families who are forced to choose between paying for private dental care and paying for other essentials. There is currently only one dental practice in Burgess Hill accepting under-17s and the same is true in Haywards Heath; they are the two main towns in my constituency. For too many people in Mid Sussex, access to an NHS dentist feels less like a right and more like a lottery.
When discussing this crisis, we often hear the phrase “DIY dentistry”. Its use has become so commonplace that we risk forgetting what it actually means. It means people pulling out their own teeth with pliers, or gluing crowns back into place. It means people attempting to treat serious dental problems themselves, because they cannot access professional care. A recent survey found that around 7% of UK adults had attempted some form of DIY dentistry. Over a third of those had tried to extract a painful tooth themselves; others had attempted to drain abscesses or repair fillings at home. People are doing these things because they are in pain and because they feel that they simply have no alternative.
The scale of the challenge to turn that situation around is enormous. As my hon. Friend the Member for Chichester noted, recent NHS figures show that around 60% of adults have not seen a dentist in the last two years, and over 5 million children did not see a dentist at all in the year to June 2025. Tooth decay remains the most common reason for hospital admission among children aged six to 10. That is truly shameful.
The previous Conservative Government left NHS dentistry in a deeply fragile state. Years of neglect and a fundamentally flawed dental contract drove dentists away from NHS provision, leaving patients to pay the price. Although the current Government inherited this crisis, they simply cannot inherit the excuses. The public were promised 700,000 additional urgent dental appointments, yet only around 100,000 have been delivered so far. Ministers might point to commissioning figures, but patients judge success by whether they can get an appointment when they need one. Far too many people across West Sussex still cannot do so.
I welcome any increase in dental places, and the Government have made moves in that respect. However, I am sure that we all accept that there will be a long pipeline before the trainees of today become the fully fledged dentists who are able to carry out work doing NHS contracts.
More importantly, training more dentists alone will not solve the problem. The dental contract remains broken, as we have already heard today. Dentists continue to tell us that the current system discourages them from doing NHS work and fails to reflect the complexity of the treatment that they provide. Unless the Government are prepared to commission and fund more NHS dentistry, increasing the number of dentists will not automatically increase access for patients. That is why contract change is so important.
In April, Ministers announced a consultation on changing the contract, with proposals expected before the summer. Midsummer’s day is next week. Patients waiting in pain cannot afford further delays, and dentists who are considering their future in the NHS cannot afford further uncertainty. The Government must set out a clear timetable for reform and ensure that implementation is not kicked into the long grass.
The Liberal Democrats believe that there is a better way forward. We have proposed a £750 million dental rescue package to end dental deserts and restore access to NHS dentistry. We would guarantee access to an NHS dentist for everyone requiring urgent or emergency care. We would fix the broken dental contract, expand training places, continue recognition of EU-qualified dentists and put proper workforce planning into law. We would also guarantee free dental check-ups for children, pregnant women, new mothers and those on low incomes while investing in prevention and oral public health, because if we are serious about solving this crisis, we must stop treating dentistry as an afterthought.
This debate is about real people in Mid Sussex and across West Sussex and the country. It is about the parent in Haywards Heath who cannot find an NHS dentist for their child, and the older resident in Burgess Hill who is living with pain while waiting for treatment. It is about families who are doing everything right, but finding that accessing basic NHS dental care is increasingly impossible. No one in Mid Sussex should ever be forced into DIY dentistry, and no child should end up in hospital because routine dental care was unavailable.
I would be grateful if the Minister could address three points. First, when will the Government publish and implement proposals for dental contract changes? Secondly, how will Ministers ensure that additional training places result in greater NHS capacity, rather than simply increasing the number of dentists working outside the NHS? Thirdly, what specific action is being taken to tackle unmet dental need and dental deserts in areas such as West Sussex? People in Mid Sussex and across our region deserve access to timely, affordable NHS dental care. I hope the Government will respond to this crisis with the urgency it demands.
Allied Health Professionals
Alison Bennett Excerpts(3 months ago)
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Alison Bennett (Mid Sussex) (LD)
I am grateful to the hon. Member for Thurrock (Jen Craft) for opening the debate, and to the hon. Member for Dudley (Sonia Kumar) for her work on the APPG and as a physiotherapist.
Medical staff in my constituency and across the country are the backbone of our national health service. While doctors and nurses are often front of mind when the public think about the NHS workforce, as we have heard this afternoon an army of highly skilled professionals keep our health services running every single day. They save lives, provide comfort in moments of fear and, as set out so brilliantly by the hon. Member for North Durham (Luke Akehurst), aid rehabilitation, enabling people to get back to their normal lives.
Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)
I am conscious that this debate is on a devolved matter, but I thought it worth mentioning that the Allied Health Professions Federation held a hustings for the Scottish Parliament elections earlier today. Topics included having input from health professionals during primary care and the crisis in vacancies. On rehab, does my hon. Friend agree that we need to ensure that allied health professionals get the access they need to, for example, care home patients, so that we can get those people out of hospital and into the right setting to receive the care that they need?
Alison Bennett
My hon. Friend is right. We know that with the right support, often from allied health professionals, people do not need to present at A&E and they can get out of hospital and into suitable accommodation with the right level of support much more quickly, which is better for them as individuals and also supports the NHS in carrying out its functions more efficiently.
Many of our allied health professionals—the third largest professional group in the NHS—do amazing work, as we have heard. They are central to prevention, diagnosis, treatment and public health. As pressures on our health and care services have grown, their role has become indispensable. From the paramedic first on the scene in an emergency, to the radiographer enabling rapid diagnosis and the physiotherapist helping someone regain their independence, those professionals are there at every stage of the patient journey. They are often the difference between life and death, between recovery and long-term disability, between dependence and independence, yet their contribution is overlooked.
After years of mismanagement, our NHS has been left on its knees. Nowhere is that more visible than in our emergency departments. We have seen avoidable deaths in A&E waiting rooms, we have seen patients waiting hours for ambulances, and we have seen the shocking normalisation of corridor care—patients left on trolleys without privacy, dignity or proper attention. There are now even reports of people receiving end-of-life care in hospital corridors. This is a health system under intolerable strain. Public confidence is being shaken. It is no surprise that two thirds of people are worried about long A&E waits.
The data is stark. Last year saw the worst level of 12-hour trolley waits ever recorded. On average, hospital trusts are now seeing thousands of patients waiting more than 24 hours in A&E every year. That is unacceptable. The Liberal Democrats have been leading the call to end corridor care within a year. We believe the crisis can be tackled, but only with serious, practical action. That includes creating a bank of safety net social care places and expanding step-down care for patients who are medically fit to leave hospital but still need support.
At the heart of the solution are allied health professionals. By delivering rehabilitation packages through physio- therapists, occupational therapists and others, we can help people leave hospital sooner, recover more quickly, and regain their independence at home. That is better for patients and it is essential for freeing up hospital capacity and ending the gridlock in A&E.
Will the Government commit to ending corridor care and 12-hour waits this year, and will they back that commitment with real investment in community care, social care and the allied health workforce? If we are to rely on those professionals—as we must, and as we already do—we need to support them properly. Right now, working conditions across the NHS are driving morale into the ground. Staff face inflexible rotas, burnout and, shockingly, workplace violence. That is not sustainable for them or for the patients they serve.
The Liberal Democrats have a number of proposals that we would be grateful if the Minister considered. We would establish a truly independent pay review body. We would expand access to affordable childcare so NHS staff can balance their family with their careers. We are also calling for action on everyday costs such as reducing car parking charges at hospitals. Those are practical steps that would make a real difference.
There are also growing staffing pressures among the allied health professionals. The Library reports that there has been a 57% increase in allied health professional full-time equivalents over the last decade, with the number of employees rising from 75,000 to 118,000. However, in conversations with the Royal College of Podiatry, it described high vacancy levels for NHS podiatry positions, a declining pipeline of applications to study podiatry programmes in England and rising demand for podiatrists’ services, all the while with the draw of working in the private sector. In physiotherapy, eight in 10 physiotherapists report that they do not have enough staff to meet demand, yet many services are facing recruitment freezes. Those contradictions speak volumes.
The long-delayed national workforce plan must finally deliver for allied health professionals. It must address regional shortages and embed these roles fully into workforce planning from the outset, not as an afterthought. If the Government are serious about shifting care into the community and focusing on prevention, investment in AHPs is essential. Too often, we see a gap between rhetoric and reality. While Ministers talk about prevention, funding decisions continue to prioritise short-term fixes elsewhere.
Our NHS is one of this country’s greatest achievements, but it cannot function without the people who sustain it. Allied health professionals are highly trained, autonomous practitioners. There are nearly 118,000 of them working across the NHS in England. They are central to modern, multidisciplinary care and to the future of a sustainable NHS. If we want a health service that prevents illness, reduces inequalities, and supports people to live healthier, longer lives, we must recognise and invest in their contribution. We must continue to fight for an NHS that works for patients, and we will continue to stand up for the staff, especially those too often overlooked, who are doing everything they can to get our NHS back on its feet, because they deserve nothing less.
Wheelchair Provision: Independent Review Body
Alison Bennett Excerpts(3 months ago)
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Alison Bennett (Mid Sussex) (LD)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Dr Murrison. I thank and congratulate the hon. Member for Bexleyheath and Crayford (Daniel Francis) for securing this important debate and setting out so clearly and in such detail why this matters.
Access to a wheelchair is essential for many disabled people’s quality of life. It enables independence, supports physical health and allows people to participate in daily activities, work and their community. This debate is about whether the current system is capable of delivering that access consistently, fairly and effectively, or whether there is merit in establishing an independent national review body to help achieve that goal.
As we have heard this morning, when access to a wheelchair is delayed or when equipment is unsuitable the consequences are serious. People can become housebound or bedbound and their health can deteriorate, leading to preventable complications, and in some cases avoidable hospital admissions.
Across England, wheelchair services remain inconsistent. Too often, access depends on where someone lives. Long waiting times are widely reported, with some individuals waiting months and, as we have heard, in some cases over a year for appropriate equipment. For something so fundamental to mobility and dignity, that level of delay is unjustifiable.
The impact extends beyond the individual who needs the wheelchair. Family carers provide vital support to their loved ones. Without a suitable wheelchair, carers may need to help with lifting and movement, increasing the risk of physical injury to themselves. There are also clear effects on mental health and wellbeing, both for carers and for the user of the wheelchair, and those are linked to the loss of independence and reduced privacy resulting from unsuitable equipment.
These issues point to broader structural challenges. The Liberal Democrats believe that everyone should be able to live independently and with dignity; yet the current state of wheelchair provision reflects wider pressures within the health and social care system—pressures that contribute to inconsistency, delays and gaps in accountability.
There have been efforts to improve services, including the NHS’s wheelchair quality framework, which sets out important principles and standards. However, it is reasonable to question whether guidance alone is enough to drive meaningful change, particularly in a system facing financial strain and ongoing reorganisation. Frameworks can outline expectations, but they do not ensure delivery.
Wheelchair services are frequently delivered by private contractors on behalf of the NHS. In some cases performance has fallen short, as we have heard this morning, with long waiting times, poor communication and limited flexibility for patients. Where oversight is weak or fragmented it becomes harder to ensure the consistent high-quality provision that people deserve. This is where the question at the heart of today’s debate becomes especially relevant. There is a strong case for a more co-ordinated national approach that ensures clear accountability, consistent standards and better use of data to monitor performance and outcomes.
An independent national review body overseeing wheelchair provision could offer solutions. It could provide clear accountability at a national level, helping to ensure that responsibility for performance does not become diffused across multiple organisations. It could support more consistent data collection, addressing current gaps in understanding around demand, waiting times and user experience. It could also strengthen the oversight of providers, including private contractors, ensuring that poor performance is identified and addressed more effectively. Importantly, it could help to ensure that best practice is shared and implemented more uniformly across the country, reducing the postcode lottery that currently affects so many people.
Establishing a new body is not a solution in itself. The body’s effectiveness would depend on its powers, its independence and how it integrates with existing structures. However, given the persistent challenges in wheelchair provision, it is entirely reasonable to assess whether such an approach could deliver improvements that existing mechanisms have struggled to achieve.
The issue is closely connected to wider policy challenges affecting disabled people, which extend beyond the responsibilities of the Department of Health and Social Care. For example, the Access for All scheme of the Department for Transport will make railway stations more accessible but I know from my Mid Sussex constituency that the promise of step-free access at Wivelsfield station, made under the last Conservative Government, was not funded and the upgrade has been cut by this Labour Government. The Access to Work scheme of the Department for Work and Pensions can help people with physical and mental disabilities get or stay in work but, as I previously set out to the Minister in this Chamber back in March, the wheelchair that one of my constituents needs has been delayed by years due to the DWP’s bureaucracy and “computer says no” attitude. All such schemes should work together to enable disabled people to live fulfilling lives. By extension, where the schemes are working properly, timely access to support would reduce pressure on other parts of the NHS, as we know is desperately needed. At present, provision is too variable and too slow.
In considering the potential merits of establishing an independent national review body, the key question is not whether change is needed, because it clearly is, but how best to deliver it. A national body could provide the focus, oversight and accountability that are currently lacking. My Liberal Democrat colleagues and I urge the Government to look into the arguments voiced in this debate and assess whether an independent national review body overseeing wheelchair provision is the best way to achieve the improvements that are so clearly needed. Those improvements are achievable but require sustained attention at a national level. For the many people whose independence depends on something as fundamental as a wheelchair, that change cannot come soon enough.