Oral Answers to Questions

Patrick Grady Excerpts

Tuesday 17th October 2023 Commons Chamber

[Steve Barclay]

First, we have got more than £1 billion of investment in an additional 5,000 permanent beds going into the NHS estate as part of our urgent and emergency care recovery programme. More widely, the Government are committed to the biggest ever investment in the NHS estate, backed with more than £20 billion—the biggest of any Government. Of course, we will not take lectures from Labour, which bequeathed the NHS the consequence of expensive private finance initiative deals that many trusts are still paying for to this day.

[Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (SNP)]

5. What recent assessment he has made of the impact of the UK’s departure from the EU on trends in the level of recruitment in the health and social care sector.

[Gavin Newlands (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (SNP)]

6. What recent assessment he has made of the impact of the UK’s departure from the EU on trends in the level of recruitment in the health and social care sector.

--- Later in debate ---

[Patrick Grady]

If everything is as rosy as the Minister says, why did a spokesperson for the Nuffield Trust say last year that

“greater costs, more paperwork and uncertainty over visas because of Brexit have been among the biggest barriers to recruiting and keeping EU and EFTA doctors”?

Cannot she admit that Brexit is exacerbating difficulties with recruiting appropriate staff for the NHS across the whole of the UK? Scotland did not vote for Brexit. Why are we having to pay the price?

[Helen Whately]

I suggest it is really time that the hon. Gentleman stops blaming Brexit. He should in fact look to his SNP colleagues in Holyrood and ensure that they make Scotland’s NHS a better place to work. If he had listened to my answer, he would have heard me say that since Brexit we have recruited more than 13,000 more doctors to the NHS in England. In fact, we are doing so well that we recently recruited a doctor from the SNP Benches. [Laughter.]

Hospice Services: Support

Patrick Grady Excerpts

Wednesday 14th June 2023 Westminster Hall

[Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (SNP)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Nokes. I, too, congratulate the hon. Member for Eastleigh (Paul Holmes) on securing the debate, and echo the tributes and condolences that have been paid to his chief of staff, and all those who knew her.

Many, if not most, people will know, or know of, someone who has passed away in the care of a hospice. The hon. Members for Blackburn (Kate Hollern), for City of Chester (Samantha Dixon), for Bolton South East (Yasmin Qureshi), for Torbay (Kevin Foster) and for Worcester (Mr Walker) all spoke of their personal experiences. I have spoken previously of Liz Quinn, a long-standing activist in Glasgow Kelvin SNP, who spent her final days in the Marie Curie Hospice in Glasgow shortly before the 2017 election. In a debate in March I spoke about my good friend Melanie, who at that point was receiving care from the wonderful and dedicated staff at the Highland Hospice in Inverness. That care continued right up until the end, about a month or so later.

In many ways, that care provision has not stopped, because the hospice is still there to support Melanie’s husband, their son, and other family and friends. The compassion and support shown by the hospice movement, both before and after bereavement, is another of the aspects that make it such a special and valuable service. For that, we thank all those who work and volunteer for our hospices. The wraparound care—from the respite, which is beneficial to both the patient and their family, to ongoing support for their emotional wellbeing, practical advice for families dealing with finances, and signposting to other more specialised services, especially helping younger people and children to come to terms with trauma and loss—is all part of the service.

As we have heard, that incredible work is mostly done without reliance on public funding. Hospice UK estimates that up to two thirds of adult hospice income, and four fifths of children’s hospice income, derives from fundraising. Much like the hon. Member for Eastleigh, I hope to contribute in a small way by running the Loch Lomond 10K on Saturday for the Highland Hospice in memory of Melanie—perhaps we can swap JustGiving pages. We can aim to the heights of the hon. Member for Lancaster and Fleetwood (Cat Smith) by running a marathon eventually.

As the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) said, we ought to express our thanks to all the people who have raised funds in so many ways; whether that is through runs, bungee jumps, skydives or marathons, it is admirable and inspiring. But increasingly it is not enough. The cumulative impact of energy, food, staffing and other price rises have left the hospice sector across the UK budgeting for a deficit of around £186 million this year. It is becoming a literally existential crisis for many individual hospices. In particular, we should recognise the work of the all-party parliamentary group on hospice and end of life care. I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Darlington (Peter Gibson) for the report that was produced early this year.

Perhaps in some areas of the public sector, maybe even in health or wider services, there are possibilities to cut costs, but that is much more difficult for hospices. Medical machinery must be able to run 24/7 and 365 days a year. Temperature control—usually that means heating, although in the current season it may mean a little bit of cooling—is vital because maintaining comfortable temperatures for patients is a key aspect of palliative care, as is the provision of wholesome nutritious and tasty food.

The Government may have a target of reducing energy and food inflation, but that does not mean prices reducing; lower inflation just means prices rising a little slower. All that is driving wage inflation. Of course hospices want to be able to keep up with NHS pay rises. The better pay and conditions are for staff, the better level of service they in turn will be able to provide for those in their care.

We must acknowledge that there are staff shortages across the health and care sector as a result of the Government’s decision to force through a hard Brexit. We will never know how many trained and talented health and medical workers arrive here on small boats because the Government refuse to ask them—they would prefer to put them up in hotels or deport them to Rwanda than let them put their skills to use in hospices or hospitals.

The risk of all those challenges is a reduction in a service that everyone who has spoken in this debate agrees is of immense value on so many levels, but reduced provision is not going to mean that there is reduced demand. In fact, Sue Ryder has calculated that demand for palliative care in England is likely to rise by 55% in the next 10 years. If the hospice sector cannot provide the care, the costs will still have to be met from somewhere, either by the NHS directly, by other social care providers, by local authorities or ultimately by the families of the people who need the care themselves. They will have to take time out of the workforce to become full-time carers or pay emotional, psychological or even physical costs to their own wellbeing as they try to cope without professional support. That in turn simply increases costs for social security or the NHS. Therefore, in a way, providing adequate support for palliative care now also has longer-term preventive effects in the future.

The sector has made its funding requirements clear to the UK and Scottish Governments. Those include at least £30 million to offset energy costs above and beyond what is provided through the energy bills discount scheme. Sue Ryder sees the need for a step change in the funding approach, saying a commitment to fund 70% of total palliative care costs is the minimum required to ensure the sustainability of the sector in the medium term. In his intervention, the hon. Member for Wimbledon (Stephen Hammond) made an important point about budgeting certainty.

The Government must take this seriously. Access to care and compassion at the end of life should not have to be fought for or seen as some kind of luxury. If Westminster Hall debates are to have any kind of impact, it should be to give notice to the Government of the challenges that lie ahead and an indication that our constituents are paying attention. Sixteen Back Benchers in a Westminster Hall debate—it is a pretty good show these days. That is to say nothing of the eight different interventions. That suggests the seriousness with which the Government must take this issue.

Many people in Glasgow North are thankful for the support that the hospice sector has provided to their loved ones. I hope the Minister, when she responds, will agree that a cost of living crisis should not be allowed to turn into a cost of dying crisis.

Hospice Sector: Fiscal Support and Cost of Living

Patrick Grady Excerpts

Thursday 2nd March 2023 Westminster Hall

[Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (SNP)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Paisley. I warmly congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for North Ayrshire and Arran (Patricia Gibson) on securing today’s very important debate and on her powerful opening speech.

The debate is particularly timely as yesterday Marie Curie launched its annual great daffodil appeal and, as my hon. Friend said, the all-party party parliamentary group on hospice and end of life care launched its significant report, “The Lasting Impact of Covid-19 on Death, Dying and Bereavement”. I particularly congratulate the hon. Member for Darlington (Peter Gibson) and Baroness Finlay of Llandaff on their work in producing that report. I note that the report is dedicated to the memory of the late member for Birmingham, Erdington, Jack Dromey, who chaired the APPG for many years with great passion, but did not live to see the report published.

Death is a fact of life; the mortality rate of the human race is 100%. More people are living longer, which means more people are dying later in life, and they are dying of more complicated and longer term conditions, which require more intensive care and support. That is often where the hospice movement comes into its own, because it provides a range of services to people, including respite care and wider support not just for residents, but for their families and friends. As the hon. Member for Twickenham (Munira Wilson) noted, the increasing complication in medical conditions is also true for those who lead shorter lives, and the children’s hospice movement does incredibly important work. As she said, children’s hospices are experiencing many of the challenges outlined today.

We have heard a number of moving stories and testimonies that speak to the value of the hospice movement today. Almost everybody will know somebody who has spent time, and perhaps passed away, in a hospice. I think of the late Liz Quinn, a tireless activist for the Scottish National party in Glasgow and real mentor to me over the years, who spent her final weeks, just before the 2017 election, in the care of the Marie Curie centre in Glasgow. Another close friend, Melanie, whose experiences I have shared in this house before and who has advocated for Marie Curie’s #DyingInPoverty campaign, has been living with terminal cancer and is now in the incredibly wonderful, compassionate care of the Highland Hospice in Inverness. I cannot speak highly enough of the support the hospice provides, not just to her but to her family and friends, such as myself.

I have not yet had the privilege of visiting the new Prince and Princess of Wales Hospice in Bellahouston Park in Glasgow, but a few years ago I visited its old facility on Carlton Place. The sense of peace, care and compassion was almost tangible. Many people in the west of Scotland also know the dedication of staff and volunteers at the St Margaret of Scotland Hospice in Clydebank. All this work builds on a tradition that dates back to the pioneering work of Dame Cicely Saunders in the 1960s, further to the work of Jeanne Garnier in 19th century France.

The specialist services provided by hospices come with specialist and specific costs. As everyone who has spoken already has said, energy is the first and foremost of those costs. Medical equipment needs to run 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and residents need to be kept warm and comfortable—that is one of the key aspects of palliative care. The steep increases in energy prices are having an immediate and significant impact. The Hospice UK briefing speaks of some hospices facing up to fivefold increases in energy bills.

Wider inflationary pressures are also having an impact. Food and nutrition are crucial in providing holistic care, helping people to maintain their strength as they live through what is often their final illness. Hospices need to be able to provide residents with nutritious meals of the best possible quality, but those costs are spiralling as well, potentially costing the sector as much as £100 million a year extra. On top of that, staff have to be properly remunerated. Hospice UK estimates that 71% of costs are related to staff. Every staff member will be feeling the individual and household pressures of the cost of living, and organisations want to be able to pay their staff a fair and decent wage. At the same time, as the hon. Member for Enfield, Southgate (Bambos Charalambous) drew out, there is a risk of a squeeze on fundraising and traditional sources of donations because of the financial pressures that many people are experiencing.

My hon. Friend the Member for North Ayrshire and Arran was not wrong to say that this is becoming an existential issue for many hospices around the country. If hospices cannot provide the service that they do, the cost will be borne elsewhere. It will have to be borne by the NHS more directly—people staying in hospital for longer, and patients not getting through as quickly as they might—or local care services will have to provide more intensive support for people in their own homes. Of course people should be supported to die in their home if that is what they want, but that is not done without cost, and that cost has to be met from somewhere. If it is not met by the local authority, the NHS or the hospice sector, it will be met by households, which in turn will lead to a further spiral.

Even when there are pressures on funding, we must think about the preventive elements of spending efficiently and effectively, whether it is the Department of Health and Social Care or the Treasury. The Treasury ultimately holds the purse strings, and Members were right to say that it would have been useful to hear from the Treasury, but I am sure that the Under-Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, the hon. Member for Harborough (Neil O'Brien), is capable. The Government speak with one voice, and I am sure he will pass all this on.

There has to be a recognition of the stark financial situation and action to address it. As others have said, hospices are not pubs or restaurants—they do not pass their costs on to customers. The next phase of the energy bills discount scheme has to recognise that and provide targeted support for organisations that need it most. The hon. Member for Twickenham is right: zoos, museums and botanic gardens play incredibly valuable and important roles for society and the economy, but it seems incongruous to say the least that they should qualify for more support than the hospice sector does under the Government schemes.

The Government must also think about how they can address staff and skill shortages. They do not like to hear it, but the reality is that Brexit has caused a black hole in labour supply in the United Kingdom. The Government have to invest both in medium and long-term training and skills development, so that hospices provide attractive careers for people who already live in the United Kingdom. It is inspiring to see the care that is provided in the hospice sector, and people should want to make that a career. It is a privilege to support people at the very end of their lives, but we cannot expect people to do that for free. They have to be rewarded, have their skills recognised, be paid a decent wage and be trained to an appropriate level, so the Government must invest in that area.

The Government also have to address short-term challenges, which means they have to be far more generous with their visa regime. They might even think about some of the asylum seekers, who may or may not have come here on small boats, who are currently sitting in cramped and crowded hotel rooms, playing cards and watching TV, who have qualifications and training in nursing and medicine. They want help the country that they have come to. They have fled persecution and want to make their homes here. I meet such people all the time, not just in my constituency but around the country. Perhaps the Government should think about allowing those people to contribute to our society, particularly the hospice sector.

The Government should think about what lessons they can learn from the Scottish Government’s approach. My hon. Friend the Member for North Ayrshire and Arran spoke about the investment that they are making in the hospice sector. They had a strategic framework for action and are now developing a strategy on palliative and end of life care. They are also providing £7 million a year to the Children’s Hospices Across Scotland movement. Parking places at hospices will be exempt from workplace parking levies, and there is an ambition to create a national care service that will ensure consistency and fairness at national level with services that are designed and delivered locally.

I want to end on the note of consensus that has come through in the debate so far by paying tribute to the incredible work of the hospice movement, which supports people through some of the most difficult times of their lives. I recognise that hospices are experiencing their own difficult times, so we have to do everything we possibly can to support them.

World AIDS Day

Patrick Grady Excerpts

Thursday 1st December 2022 Commons Chamber

[Lloyd Russell-Moyle]

It is remarkable. If we achieve that 2030 target in this country, and if we then achieve a roll-out of it globally—that is a lot of ifs—HIV will be the first disease that we have rolled back via treatment and prevention, rather than vaccines. It would be a world leader, and hopefully a pioneer in how we can treat and test other diseases, particularly with mass testing, which I will come on to in a second.

If all that happens, we will meet the 2030 target, but—as we always say—the Government need to do more. To start with, they need to expand opt-out testing. That has been trialled in areas with very high prevalence—that is, Brighton, London, Manchester and Blackpool. Not all of London was originally included in the opt-out testing, but it took the decision to expand that to all hospitals in London, sharing out the money. Remarkably, that has shown that, in non-high prevalence areas, the percentage of people coming back with an HIV-positive test is still significant. The argument, therefore, is to roll that out to all areas.

Over the past 12 months, we have seen real successes in opt-out testing in England. That happens when somebody is already having their blood taken in A&E and the vial is sent off for an additional test. We are testing for HIV and hepatitis B, unless someone opts out. No one is forced to do this, but I understand that very few people opt out.

The pilot’s results have been astonishing. In just three months, 102 people were newly identified, and 70 people were identified as having dropped out of treatment. If someone drops out of treatment, they are a risk not only to themselves, but to the wider community. Those people have been brought back into treatment and that has saved lives. The results are clear: opt-out testing is working.

On a side note, it is also possible to test for syphilis with the same vial. However, it was not possible to expand this to syphilis, because syphilis testing is paid for by local authorities, not by NHS England, and the local authorities were unable to identify where people were from, because hospitals are not coterminous with local authorities and it was too complicated. That seems ridiculous. We need the Government to sit down with local authorities or to provide for that through central funding. If we are taking the vial, we can run it through the same machine. If the only reason stopping us is bureaucratic, I do not see why we cannot do this. We should test people routinely for as many things as we can, if we know that it will help people’s lives. We know that there is a spike in syphilis in certain key populations.

If this vital programme is eventually expanded to all towns and cities with high prevalence, it will be a game- changer. Where London has expanded the programme, it has already been worthwhile financially in areas that do not have very high prevalence. The programme should also be expanded to sexual health clinics to ensure that everyone going to one is tested for HIV. This may be a surprise to many, but that is not always done routinely and it is not an opt-out system. Actually, an HIV test is becoming less, not more common, because more sexual health clinics are moving to online services. Online services have some great advantages, but one downside is that they require people to collect a vial of their blood, which often does not happen, or does not happen effectively, so HIV test rates are lower. We need to ensure that, when people attend a clinic, it is routine and there is an opt-out system. Some clinics do this already, but it is not universal.

I spoke about the HIV prevention drug, PrEP, in 2018. We have a come a long way since the PrEP impact trial. To remind colleagues, PrEP, which is a pill that people take daily, contains two of the three drugs that someone with HIV would have. In fact, I have now been reduced to two because the latest evidence shows that, when someone gets to “undetectable”, the drug load for people who have HIV can be reduced to, effectively, just the PrEP load. The drugs will not be exactly the same as I take for PrEP, but some people can maintain on those as well. So this is also about new interventions that can reduce the costs and the amount of drugs that we are providing.

PrEP prevents HIV and the pill is covered by NHS England, but thousands are still missing out. They are struggling to get PrEP appointments because of under-resourced sexual health services. That is laid bare in the latest report from the National AIDS Trust, the Terrence Higgins Trust, PrEPster, Sophia Forum and One Voice Network. Due to the fragmentation of services in England, the drug PrEP is paid for by NHS England. That is a real milestone for the NHS, and I congratulate the Government on getting that out eventually, after our interventions.

Anyone who is currently sexually active should be tested by sexual health services every three months, and anyone on PrEP should be tested every three months. In theory, therefore, there is no additional resource for sexual health services for someone on PrEP, because the only people on PrEP should be those who are sexually active, or drug-injecting users who should also be tested, and so on—we should not give it to people who do not need it. But our sexual health services in this country rely on balancing the budget through the fact that people do not attend as regularly as they should. Therefore, that limits the places for PrEP appointments and limits the people who can get access to the drug that the NHS is paying for, even though they are entitled to it and should be offered that level of service.

Awareness of PrEP is far too low and it cannot be given out by GPs, pharmacies, community or maternity services. That means that the burden is solely on local government-funded sexual health services. We all know what is happening with local government and probably do not need to go there today—that is a whole other debate.

If we are going to meet our 2030 target, it is vital that everyone who is at risk of acquiring HIV and who wishes to access PrEP can do so as a key tool in completely and effectively preventing new HIV transmissions when it is taken as directed. Over the past two years, the all-party group on HIV and AIDS has published three important reports. We published “Increasing and normalising HIV testing across the UK”—which I just touched on—and “Nothing about us without us”, which addresses the needs of black, Asian and minority ethnic communities in the UK. Those communities are some of the hardest-hit by HIV in this country and are the least likely to have HIV testing done routinely. The roll-out and trial of the saliva HIV testing, which the Terrence Higgins Trust did two years ago and last year, was particularly effective in those communities. It was seen as less invasive, more private, easier to get hold of and possible to do through online and postal services. The Government should consider whether that process should be normalised nationally or provided cheaply and accessibly.

Our other report, “HIV and Quality of Life—What do we mean? How do we achieve it?”, was published today, and my colleagues have been launching that in Brussels with our partners in Europe. Those reports have been made possible only through the evidence provided by the strong HIV sector that we have in the UK. Its continued insights and hard work are appreciated.

The latest data, however, is not quite as positive. There were 2,692 people diagnosed across England in 2021. That is up 0.7%, from 2,673 in 2020. Some might say that is a small amount but, in 2022, there was a fall of 0.2% and, in 2019, there was a fall of 33%. We are clearly plateauing and there is a danger that we are starting to get more diagnoses. That might be positive because we are delving down to the hardest-to-reach areas, but we need more evidence on why that has plateaued and why it is creeping up before we can be sure that that is something to celebrate, rather than to be worried about.

To keep on track, it is vital that we use every lever available to end HIV transmission and to ensure that we do not plateau, as the numbers show. As I said, we can end transmission by 2030 and I strongly believe that the UK will be one of the first countries to do so. We are a world leader. At the beginning of the week, I spoke to our London NHS colleagues, who said that it is the first time in their career that people have been phoning up from around the world to say, “How are you doing the opt-out testing? How are you doing the PrEP roll-out? We want to learn from you.” That is remarkable and we should be deeply proud of that. The head of UNAIDS came to London and Brighton and we showed her the HIV testing vending machines that we have in Brighton. She said, “I thought that I would never learn anything for the developing world from a rich country. I was here as a courtesy visit, but I have seen what you are doing and how we can roll that out to parts of Kenya and Uganda, and community settings around the world, with HIV testing vending machines that run using solar panels”.

[Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (Ind)]

I congratulate the hon. Member on all his work on the issue. Global leadership is incredibly important. He might be coming on to this point, but does he share the disappointment felt by a lot of people in the sector and the wider international development sector—perhaps even the head of UNAIDS—about the cut in the UK Government’s funding for the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria? That risks exactly the kind of backsliding that the hon. Member warns us about.

[Lloyd Russell-Moyle]

I agree exactly. I will come on to the Global Fund at the very end of my speech, but let me move on now to the picture globally, which I am afraid is totally different.

Back in 2018, I said that

“one young person every day is still diagnosed with HIV and young people continue to suffer some of the worst sexual health outcomes.”—[Official Report, 29 November 2018; Vol. 650, c. 496.]

The situation globally has become bleaker. Last year, an adolescent girl or young woman was newly infected with HIV every two minutes. In the past year alone, 650,000 people have died of AIDS-related illnesses and 1.5 million people became infected with HIV. Only half of children living with HIV have access to life-saving medication. Inequality between children and adults in HIV treatment coverage is increasing rather than narrowing.

Why are people still dying unnecessarily of AIDS? Why are there so many new HIV infections year after year, globally? It is too easy to put the blame on current crises such as covid and war; the reality is that we were already off target before many of those crises hit. The lack of a comprehensive healthcare system, a lack of education and the growing influence of evangelical Christian churches in Africa—often American-backed—have led to an environment that is hostile to an effective HIV response.

Uganda was the first country to host the world AIDS summit—it was a revolutionary leader. The same President is in power now, but has completely rolled things back. When Uganda hosted the world AIDS conference almost 30 years ago, condoms were given to every delegate and given out into community settings. When I went to Uganda only a few years ago to visit aid projects that we were paying for, I sat at the back of a classroom with Stephen Twigg, the then Chair of the Select Committee on International Development. We heard a teacher tell children that they could prevent AIDS if they washed the toilet seat and observed “sex only after marriage”. I am afraid that things have gone backwards because of the influence of some malign groups. It is concerning.

One of the inequalities standing in the way of ending AIDS is access to education, particularly for young girls. Six in seven new HIV infections among adolescents in sub-Saharan Africa occur among girls who are outside formal education. Enabling girls to stay in school until they complete secondary education reduces their vulnerability to HIV by more than 50%. All children, including those who have dropped out because of covid and those who were out of school anyway, should get a complete secondary education, including comprehensive sex education.

Huntington’s Disease

Patrick Grady Excerpts

Wednesday 9th November 2022 Westminster Hall

[Hilary Benn]

I am profoundly grateful to my right hon. Friend for attending this debate, and I agree completely with what she has said. I will come to the question of the needs both of people who have the disease and of those who care for them.

In short, those affected will lose the ability to walk, talk, eat, drink, make rational decisions and care for themselves. Partners and children are turned into carers, and children know that they themselves have a 50% chance of going through what they see unfolding in front of their eyes—a prospect that often results in self-harm, low esteem, low confidence, low mood, anxiety or depression.

Professionals, and indeed families, can sometimes mistake Huntington’s for other conditions such as Parkinson’s or Alzheimer’s. That is especially true when the family has no idea that Huntington’s exists in their family, and those living with it face a great deal of stigma and discrimination. It is not uncommon for a loved one to be wrongly accused of being drunk or on drugs due to their symptoms. The symptoms can start at an early age, and about 5% to 10% of sufferers experience them before the age of 20, although they usually appear between the ages of 30 and 50, and some 10% of sufferers develop them after the age of 60. The average survival time from first onset of symptoms is about 15 to 20 years.

Needless to say, people living with Huntington’s and their families face extraordinary challenges in their lives because the condition affects everyone who comes into contact with it: those experiencing symptoms and their families, those who have tested positive but do not yet have symptoms, and people at risk of developing it. Even those who test negative can suffer from survivor guilt, and in some cases might be ostracised by their families.

[Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (Ind)]

The right hon. Gentleman is making a powerful speech. As he is demonstrating, this debate is about raising awareness of the challenges, and I know from the constituents I have heard from that that is one of the key things that family groups would like to see happen. Even though health is a devolved matter, there is a consensus across the parties and throughout the UK that more needs to be done to ensure access to specialist services and to improve clinical research, and there are examples of collaboration, such as that between the University of Glasgow in my constituency and University College London.

[Hilary Benn]

I say to my hon. Friend, which he is on this occasion, that I am grateful for his attendance today and I agree with every point he has made. I will discuss research towards the end of my speech.

Young people who grow up in the shadow of Huntington’s face daunting choices about genetic testing and whether to start a family. Should a young person tell a new partner about the condition? When should they tell their partner? How will the partner react? Many young people care for relatives while worrying that they will get the disease themselves. A Huntington’s family member put it like this:

“Huntington’s is a thief that slowly steals your body, energy, health, family, friends and the person you used to be.”

Last year, a community survey undertaken as part of the Huntington’s Disease Alliance UK and Ireland Family Matters campaign—that is quite a title—found that 98% of carers felt that Huntington’s had negatively affected their loved one’s emotional wellbeing; 88% said the disease had changed their relationship forever; and 70% went so far as to say that the impact had been either extremely difficult or life ruining, saying, “It has ruined our lives.”

The disease has a huge effect on family finances and on the ability to work of the person and those who care for them. Sufferers eventually cannot hold down a job, their carer may have to give up their job to look after them, and all the while the bills mount. Income support and financial assistance to meet the cost of equipment and home adaptations is available, but it is limited and difficult to access. That is particularly the case for someone with Huntington’s who does not yet display physical symptoms, and is therefore incorrectly believed not to be symptomatic and not entitled to financial support. That means that people who display only the less visible symptoms—say, mental health or cognitive ones—cannot get the help despite their debilitating effect. That cannot be right.

Medical Cannabis under Prescription: Children with Epilepsy

Patrick Grady Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd November 2021 Westminster Hall

[Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (SNP)]

It is a pleasure, once again, to serve under your chairmanship this afternoon, Ms Bardell. I would not often say that I agree with every word said by a Conservative Member, but in the case of the hon. Member for South Leicestershire (Alberto Costa), it is accurate. He gave an incredibly considered speech. It is great to hear the consensus that exists in this room.

We have today’s debate, my hon. Friend the Member for Inverclyde (Ronnie Cowan) has a more general debate tomorrow on the medical use of cannabis, rather than in cases of epilepsy, and the hon. Member for Manchester, Withington (Jeff Smith) has introduced a private Member’s Bill on the issue. That shows the cross-party consensus, the momentum and the urgency of the issue. Everyone today is speaking about their constituents’ experiences. I pay tribute to all the families and campaigners who have come forward and are prepared to speak out. I met with some yesterday at the End Our Pain lobby. Plenty of my own constituents have lobbied on the issue, because they have been moved by the stories they have heard, and I have a particular case.

The name of the campaign, End Our Pain, says so much. It is the pain that the individual children, and the adults, are experiencing with their medical conditions. It is the psychological pain the families are going through as well, having to watch the physical pain that their children are suffering. All that pain can be, at the very least, mitigated, if some of the steps that we have heard about are properly taken.

I have spoken previously about my constituents John and Laura and their beautiful daughter Bláthnaid, who is affected by Aicadri syndrome, which is a very severe and rare form of epilepsy. There are only several thousand cases worldwide. It is very difficult for clinicians to know what might or might not work. It is incredibly distressing for both the parents and the children, who do not understand what is happening when they go through these seizures. Many of the conventional medicines that are tried have their own side effects that cause particular difficulties, or resistance builds up, which increases a different kind of suffering.

[Sir Mike Penning]

Is the hon. Gentleman aware that doctors are prescribing off-label drugs that work for adults, particularly steroids, to these children, but they are not willing to look at medical cannabis?

[Patrick Grady]

Yes, and a few years ago we had the Off-patent Drugs Bill, which sadly did not make as much progress as it could have done. That had the potential to give doctors more freedom, which is clearly one of the messages coming out of the debate. Of course there will be an element of risk, but there has to be a way of managing and mitigating it so that doctors can feel more confident about prescribing cannabis-derived treatments.

When my constituents see the positive effects that CBD can have, they wonder what effects a drug with THC might have. When they see the benefits to other children, even though every case and condition is unique, the potential must exist there, and when the alternative is to go private and pay incredible amounts of money, which is not without its own risk, the frustration becomes very real, so the Government have to speed up the trials and the opportunity for people to take part in them. They have to look at how the licensing can improve and how we can increase the confidence of doctors. Above all, they have to listen to the voices of parents and patients, and their carers and advocates in Parliament.

Dame Carol Black’s Independent Review of Drugs Report

Patrick Grady Excerpts

Wednesday 27th October 2021 Westminster Hall

[Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (SNP)]

It is a real pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Fovargue. I congratulate the hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton (Dan Carden) on securing this debate, on his courageous and dedicated approach, and on setting out so clearly the context of Dame Carol Black’s independent review. As he said, the whole point of commissioning reviews from independent experts is to provide a way forward, and not for them to simply sit on the shelf as the completion of a process when they should be the start of it. Precisely because they have been independent, they provide grounds for cross-party consensus that all of us, from all parties, can get behind. I hope that that comes out strongly from the debate today and in what we hear in response from the Minister.

It is not a secret that drug deaths in Scotland are unacceptably high and among the worst in Europe. I would imagine that most Scottish Members of Parliament will have come into contact with someone affected by, or connected to a death, whether that is a constituent or their family, a minister—some ministers in Glasgow have to conduct services far too frequently—or indeed through their own friends or family. Certainly, I have had all three of those experiences. Every death is a tragedy.

The First Minister has admitted that more should have been done, and that more needs to be done going forward. For me, that must include the adoption of the recommendations made by Dame Carol Black. It must include the kind of responses that my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh East (Tommy Sheppard) spoke about as regards reform of the Misuse of Drugs Act—clearly, after 50 years, a piece of legislation that is well past its sell-by date. It is clearly not doing what it was originally intended to achieve.

I welcome the steps that the Scottish Government have taken so far, in the additional funding they have announced—£250 million over the next five years to be spent in a range of different responses. They continue to look at some of the things that the hon. Member for York Central (Rachael Maskell) spoke about, such as prevention facilities or drug consumption rooms—depending on what we want to call them—and heroin-assisted treatment facilities. They are not quite within the devolved powers, but the Scottish Government will do what they can. Ideally, the UK Government will give them the powers if they are not willing to legislate in those areas.

Finally, I want to reflect on the recovery strand. The amazing charity Faces and Voices of Recovery UK, run by Anne Marie Ward, is based in my constituency. In 2018, it launched a charter, a declaration of recovery rights for people seeking to recover from drug and alcohol addiction. That declaration, and the early-day motion that I tabled at the time to support it, was signed by many Members of this House, on a cross-party basis. It was compiled after a year of consultations across the UK into what the charity identified, even then, as a drug death crisis.

The declaration states that all people in recovery have a right to recover from addiction, if they find themselves in that situation. It seeks to build communities of recovery and pledges that people who are current or former substance users should be able to live their lives free from stigma, with access to quality care, meaningful political representation—which is a duty on us all—and well-informed choice, and touches on a range of other important aspects.

It has support from a wide range of organisations, including the Scottish Drugs Forum, Alcohol Change UK, the Scottish Recovery Consortium, the National Association for Children of Alcoholics, and so on. It is based on the underlying principle that people in recovery have a right to respect and dignity, and to live free from stigma and discrimination. If the Minister is not familiar with that document, I am very happy to send her a copy, and I very much hope that she will familiarise herself with it and adopt its principles as part of the Government’s response to Dame Carol’s report.

Covid-19 Update

Patrick Grady Excerpts

Monday 5th July 2021 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

Yes, I can give my hon. Friend that assurance. The Education Secretary will be saying more later this week, but I can confirm to my hon. Friend that on 19 July it is our plan to remove bubbles and end the requirement for early years settings, schools and colleges to carry out contact tracing routinely. I will have more to say on how we intend to exempt under-18s who are close contacts from the requirement to self-isolate.

[Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (SNP)]

Given that masks help to reduce the spread of not just covid, but all kinds of respiratory diseases, is it not important to avoid mixed messages and encourage everyone to continue that kind of practice and the likes of good hand hygiene as a relatively routine part of a new normal, to stop coughs and sneezes from spreading diseases?

[Sajid Javid]

I think the hon. Gentleman is suggesting that people should have the freedom to wear a mask if they wish, but it should not be mandatory—it should not be mandated by law. There are countries—I lived in Singapore for three years—where people would wear masks if they were feeling unwell, out of respect for others. If people choose to do that here, that will be a good thing, but it will not be a requirement from the Government. As I said, in certain settings—crowded places such the tube in London—many people would choose to wear masks, despite its not being a legal requirement.

Covid-19: Government Handling and Preparedness

Patrick Grady Excerpts

Thursday 27th May 2021 Commons Chamber

[Matt Hancock]

I think that is one of the lessons. I do not need to push the Prime Minister on that; he is absolutely seized of the point. We will be developing the work on that next week at the Health Ministers G7, which is being held in Oxford, and then, of course, at the leaders’ summit which is being held in Cornwall later next month. My hon. Friend is absolutely right in the view he takes as to the importance of reforming and strengthening the global institutions, as well as learning the lessons here at home.

[Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (SNP)]

The Secretary of State spoke earlier about the donation of surplus vaccines and other PPE and medical equipment to India and other developing countries. How does that square with the Government’s determination to cut their overall contribution to international aid? Are those donations being counted towards the 0.7% or 0.5% targets and, if they are, can he assure us that that will not be to the detriment of other projects that were already committed towards those targets?

[Matt Hancock]

Of course we are donating items directly—for instance, to India, Nepal and others—but the single biggest global contribution that the UK has made is the Oxford vaccine, which is being delivered at cost by AstraZeneca around the world following funding from Oxford, AstraZeneca and the UK Government. That has already led to 450 million jabs globally, two thirds of which are in low and middle-income countries. Everybody, in all parts of this country, should be proud of that, and there was Scottish support in the development of that vaccine. Of course, we will do as much as we can within the official development assistance budget directly, but that decision to waive the intellectual property charge has been called for from others—from President Biden down—but it is something that we in this House and the whole country should be very proud of.

Covid-19 Update

Patrick Grady Excerpts

Tuesday 9th February 2021 Commons Chamber

[Matt Hancock]

Yes. We are working with GPs, with community parts of the NHS and also with local authorities to do this. As my hon. Friend may have seen, the Home Office has stated that the most important thing is that we vaccinate everybody who is present here, whatever their status or paperwork.

[Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (SNP)]

I am very glad to hear that exchange, because this is a considerable issue in Glasgow, with our large asylum-seeking population. Will the Secretary of State also tell us how his announcements about quarantining will be applied to people who arrive in this country seeking asylum and who probably do not have £1,750 in their back pocket? How will new arrivals be supported in the quarantine process?

[Matt Hancock]

A new arrival to the UK who has been in a red-list country in the past 10 days and who is not a resident of the United Kingdom or Ireland or a UK citizen will be denied entry and held in hotel quarantine until they can return to the country from which they arrived.