Dementia Care

Luke Evans Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Dr Luke Evans (Hinckley and Bosworth) (Con)]

I think we have established that dementia is a thief, not once but twice: first of the mind, then of the memories, leaving the greatest pain not with the sufferer but with those who remember. I thank the hon. Member for South Devon (Caroline Voaden) for securing such an important debate and for speaking so passionately and openly about her story, as did many across this House. I also thank the Alzheimer’s Society, Alzheimer’s Research UK, Dementia UK and all those people who advocate for dementia and their families. As we have heard, there are 1 million people living with dementia in the UK, and that figure is projected to rise to 1.4 million by 2040. One in six hospital beds are occupied by dementia patients, and dementia sufferers are three times more likely to see their GP. Modelling suggests that 70% of care home residents are people living with dementia.

In this House I often enjoyed the tired lines from the then Opposition about how the Conservatives never did enough on x or y or z. As Labour Members are ably demonstrating, it is easy to stand across the aisle and say that nothing is ever enough, but as they are learning, delivering in the real world is far harder than demanding from the sidelines. On dementia, the Conservative Government led from the front with more funding, better diagnosis and a national commitment to change lives. We all agree that we must continue to do more, but to do that we need direction and action, and that is what we are exploring here today, almost one year on from the introduction of a Labour Government.

[Debbie Abrahams]

Can the shadow Minister remind us about the commitment in the 2019 Conservative manifesto on the dementia moonshot and tell us if and when that was delivered?

[Dr Evans]

If the hon. Lady will bear with me, I am going to canter through what we have done in the past 14 years, because it was, after all, under the premiership of Lord Cameron that the challenge on dementia set the ambition for England to be

“the best country in the world for dementia care and support and for people with dementia, their carers and families to live”.

So, on to the point. In 2012, the then Prime Minister set the challenge to make us a global leader and increase awareness and research. This included the dementia friends initiative—a public campaign to boost understanding, over 1 million dementia friends trained by 2015 and increased research funding, which doubled from 2010 to 2015. In 2015, the Prime Minister’s challenge on dementia 2020 set national goals for diagnosis rates, care quality and research impact, including a national target for dementia diagnosis rates of 66.7%, which was met in 2015.

In 2016 and 2017, the UK Dementia Research Institute, launched under Theresa May, was a flagship initiative backed by £290 million from the Government and charities. This actually delivered £300 million in dementia research and innovation by March 2020, a full year ahead of schedule. We had the NHS long-term plan in 2019, which committed to enhancing diagnosis. In 2019 we also had the dementia moonshot pledge from Boris Johnson, with an extra £160 million. This was followed up in 2022 with the Dame Barbara Windsor dementia mission—a £95 million fund to accelerate research into treatment and early diagnosis. Of course, the pandemic hit and we had the recovery, and that is why the Government set out the 2023 major conditions strategy, which would have included dementia.

There is therefore a question for this Government as to the priority they have given to dementia since taking office, and it is worth looking at why concerns are being raised. This Government, rightly so in their own right, did not opt to proceed with the major conditions strategy. That might surprise some Members, as we heard the current Minister, the hon. Member for Bristol South (Karin Smyth), who is in her place, call for a dedicated dementia strategy a number of times when she was in opposition. Only last year, she said the following in a Westminster Hall debate on new dementia treatments:

“As my hon. Friend the Member for Oldham East and Saddleworth said, it is disappointing that the Government shelved the plans for a dedicated dementia strategy. England remains the only nation without a specific dementia plan. That is very short-term thinking, and it would be interesting to hear from the Minister about that. In 2022, I said:

‘We cannot give confidence to people suffering with dementia and their carers without a much clearer plan that is in place very quickly.’—[Official Report, 14 June 2022; Vol. 716, c. 141.]

That remains the case today.” —[Official Report, 11 January 2024; Vol. 743, c. 192WH.]

So I would like to ask the Minister: does he stand by these comments and can we therefore expect a dedicated dementia strategy? It is easy for the Conservative side of the House to understand that governing is difficult. Good intentions make fine Opposition speeches until they collide with reality. Does the Minister plan to carry on with a dedicated strategy, and would he be kind enough to confirm that today?

On the topic of strategies and comments made by Labour Ministers before they took office, I note that in a Westminster Hall debate on inequalities in dementia services only in May last year, less than a week before the general election was called, the shadow Health Minister and now the independent hon. Member for Gorton and Denton (Andrew Gwynne) promised a carers strategy. He said that carers are

“a vital part of the fight against dementia, and they will be at the heart of Labour’s plans in Government. There will be a carers strategy under the next Labour Government, because we value the vital work our carers do. It will be a cross-Government strategy with the Department for Work and Pensions, Department for Education and the future of work review all feeding into it along with the Department of Health and Social Care. There is a brighter future for those living with dementia and their families and carers. Labour will deliver it.”—[Official Report, 16 May 2024; Vol. 750, c. 228WH.]

That is a laudable aim.

However, since the election, it appears that all is not quite as it seems. In an oral question in the other place in November, Baroness Merron made it clear that she had

“not committed to a national carers strategy”,

stating,

“I do have to say to the noble Baroness that I have not committed to a national carers strategy. However, in our joined-up approach, we will certainly be looking at what is needed. That will be very much part of our considerations on the workforce strategy, which Minister Karin Smyth will be leading on. It is crucial to the delivery of services.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 19 November 2024; Vol. 841, c. 107.]

I therefore ask the Minister today whether specific plans are still in place for a national care strategy.

[Joe Robertson]

As my hon. Friend knows, at the beginning of the year, the Government and NHS England removed dementia from their planning guidance, which sets their priorities for the year ahead. Crucially, they removed the diagnosis targets. That was a cruel blow to people living with dementia and their families. Will the Minister give his view on the Government removing dementia from their targets and priorities?

[Dr Evans]

I am grateful, first, for my hon. Friend promoting me and, secondly, for his expertise in this area because I understand that he has worked with Dementia UK. He is absolutely right—he has beaten me to the chase. One of the real concerns that charities and patients have raised is exactly that: the removal of this crucial diagnosis target. We only need to look at Wales where that was not the case. The national diagnosis rate is 56%—10% lower than in England.

On top of that, the Government are presiding over a major top-down restructuring with cuts to integrated care boards and NHS England, while forcing through devolution on the 21 county-run authorities responsible for social care, while raising taxes in the employment national insurance contribution on care providers, which will get passed on to local councils, while raising taxes on the very dementia charities and others that provide support, while ditching the fast-track social work scheme as we learned last week, while terminating the NHS and care volunteers response that helps support care, and while scrapping the cross-party talks on social care and instead swapping it to an independent commission led by Baroness Casey, who still seconded to the Home Office. We can all see what is being taken away and taxed. It is what is going to benefit dementia support and care that is much harder to spot.

In the rough and tumble of this place, it is not lost on me how much this issue touches the Minister himself. He has spoken bravely and openly about his family’s struggle, and I have the utmost respect for him and what he has been through, and I have been through similar with my grandmother Dot. I do not question his heart; I simply gently challenge the Government on their policies to achieve better dementia care for all.

To that end, I have a couple of questions. Will the Government commit to setting a new target to increase dementia diagnosis rates across England? With integrated care systems facing restructuring and budget resolutions, how does the Government plan to hold local systems to account on dementia diagnosis, especially across the NHS and social care? We have seen in Wales how irregular data collection on dementia diagnosis affects overall diagnosis rates. What steps will the Government take to improve the quality of data in dementia diagnosis, particularly when it comes to follow up? Given the growing prevalence of dementia in our care homes, what steps will the Government take to support providers and ensure that the social care workforce is trained effectively to meet the needs of care users?

With the upcoming spending review and the long-awaited 10-year plan for the NHS expected in the next couple of months, I trust the Minister sitting in front of me. He is the right person to highlight to the Government the seriousness and importance of tackling dementia, just like the last Government understood.

I return to where I started: dementia steals the most from those left remembering, because the greatest heartbreak is losing someone who is still here. But with compassion for families, dignity for those who suffer and the relentless pursuit of a cure, we can offer not just care, but hope.