Budget Resolutions

Martin Wrigley Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd November 2026 Commons Chamber

[Dr Prinsley]

I am grateful for the hon. Lady’s intervention.

Keeping people healthy and at home, wherever possible, should be supported by our developing national care service. It is a simple but transformative move, and I am delighted that our Government will fund it.

In Suffolk, seven new NHS dental practices have been announced, including two in Bury St Edmunds. I applaud the organisation Toothless in Suffolk for its advocacy, but the dental contract must be reformed. Why has this been delayed? A new dental school is opening at the University of East Anglia, and we must ensure that graduates choose NHS dentistry, rather than private practice.

It was a privilege to serve on the Public Bill Committee for the Health Bill. I welcome the single patient record, alongside the retention of Healthwatch and the Health Services Safety Investigations Body. Patient voices and independent safety investigations must remain central. Some of our political opponents suggest that the NHS has had its day and advocate for an insurance-based system. I profoundly disagree. My father joined the NHS at its foundation in 1948, having served as an RAF medical officer. I spent more than 40 years as a surgeon, and my son works as an A&E doctor in London—78 years of continuous family service to the NHS. Perhaps the NHS is in my DNA. It is certainly in the DNA of the Labour party.

Finally, I want to say something about medical research. We celebrate Jenner, Lister and Fleming, but let us remember the extraordinary British scientists of my lifetime, including Nobel prize winners Crick, Hodgkin, Milstein, Nurse, and Hassabis, whose AlphaFold work revolutionised protein structure prediction. There are many others, including the grandfather of my hon. Friend the Member for Luton South and South Bedfordshire (Rachel Hopkins), the unsung Harold Hopkins. Their achievements remind us why supporting scientific research must remain a national priority. I remain a great optimist for our NHS—there is fresh hope for the future—but we must cherish our NHS. We must invest in it and protect it.

[Martin Wrigley (Newton Abbot) (LD)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Dr Prinsley]

It is my last sentence, but go on.

[Martin Wrigley]

The hon. Gentleman cherishes the NHS; does he agree that the single patient record, of which he speaks so eloquently, must be delivered by sovereign British technology?

[Dr Prinsley]

I do not claim to be an expert on the selection of software programmes for the single patient record, but I believe that a single patient record will be transformative. If we ever lost our NHS, we would never ever get it back.