Oral Answers to Questions

Ian Paisley Excerpts

Wednesday 5th November 2014 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I pay tribute to my hon. Friend and the all-party group for the work that they do. I know how close this issue is to his heart and how much he feels this personally. The difficult situation here is that the one-year survival rate for those diagnosed with pancreatic cancer is about 20% and the five-year survival rate is only 5%, and that is not good enough. We are spending more money on research. We are investing a record £800 million over five years in a series of biomedical research centres, including the Liverpool pancreas biomedical research unit. We need the research to go in and for these new treatments to be properly tested so that we can improve these cancer survival rates as we have for other cancers.

[Ian Paisley (North Antrim) (DUP)]

Four weeks ago, a 150-year-old industry in my constituency announced that it will be pulling out of Northern Ireland, with the loss of 900 jobs—the equivalent of 32,000 jobs in the United Kingdom. To say that is a body blow would be an understatement. Will the Prime Minister agree to meet me and industry leaders to see if we can find a strategy and a way of keeping some of those jobs in Northern Ireland?

[The Prime Minister]

I am very happy to discuss this with the hon. Gentleman. Perhaps on a forthcoming visit to Northern Ireland, we might be able to meet in Ulster and discuss these issues. I think the issue he refers to is also plain paper packaging, where I want to see us make progress; I think there are important health benefits there. I am happy to discuss the issue with him.