Life Sciences

John Bercow Excerpts

Monday 5th December 2011 Commons Chamber

[Andy Burnham (Leigh) (Lab)]

May I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his statement and start by setting out two points of common ground with the Government? First, we too have pride in Britain’s life sciences industry and its strength. We agree that the industry needs Government support and focus if its potential to contribute to the country’s industrial future is to be maximised. Secondly, we agree that there are huge potential benefits to British patients from closer collaboration between the NHS and the industry. We all want patients to have the quickest possible access to the latest life-saving and life-enhancing treatments.

It was for those two principal reasons that Labour, when in government, prioritised the life sciences sector and established the Office for Life Sciences. In Lord Drayson, we created a life sciences Minister who was a contact point for the industry—someone of huge experience and with real personal commitment to the industry. One of our criticisms of this Government is that they have allowed the momentum that Labour had established in promoting the industry to fall away. Progress has stalled because of the Government’s failure to understand that economic growth needs a proper partnership between the public and private sector and because of the combined effect of a number of their policies. Such policies include: damaging 15% real-terms cuts to the science budget; the loss of the regional developments agencies, many of which were heavily involved in this area; cuts to regional investment; and the destabilising effect of the unnecessary reorganisation of the NHS, particularly the disintegration of the strategic health authorities, which played a role in promoting research. The unexpected closure of Pfizer earlier this year exposed a Government asleep at the wheel and was a wake-up call, and now we see a Government playing catch-up.

Although we welcome their belated recognition of the importance of the sector, there are sensitive issues involved and Ministers need to tread carefully so as not to undermine public trust. What they are fond of calling red tape are, to others, essential safeguards. Some areas will always need proper regulation and the use of patient data is most certainly one of them. As we have heard from patients groups today, some have been caused real anxiety by this media-briefed statement from the Government and the lack of accompanying detail.

Ministers need to be aware that people with terminal illnesses and long-term conditions will react differently from others to a statement of this kind, so for them we seek direct assurances today from the Secretary of State that he failed to give in his statement. Will all patients have the ability to opt out of the sharing of their data, even in anonymised form? Surely that fundamental principle of consent should form the bedrock of any new system, and that control of data should be possible in today’s information age. If the Secretary of State cannot give that assurance, why not? How can he justify that?

Did patients’ representatives walk away from the Department of Health working group on these important matters and, if so, why? One representative said on the radio this morning that the whole process “stinks”. Does the Secretary of State not accept that he and his Department will need to do better than this to uphold public confidence in the process or risk undermining trust in the whole principle? What safeguards will there be to ensure that patient data are stored securely? Does he not need to articulate a more positive statement of patients’ rights in this important area, rather than the loose opt-out he proposes in the NHS constitution?

Is it the case that the anonymity of data cannot always be guaranteed? If so, what are those circumstances and, again, why not? Even within anonymised datasets, particularly dealing with small numbers of very specific conditions, it is possible to identify individual patients. What steps are being taken to guard against those risks? Will the Secretary of State give a categorical assurance that data cannot be used for purposes other than research—passed on to third parties or used by the same company to target people for other products and services?

Today’s announcement also needs to be considered in the context of the Government’s reorganisation of the NHS. Does not a more market-based health system with a greater number of private providers create much greater challenges for the control of data? I had many dealings with senior figures in the pharmaceutical industry in my time as a Minister. They were clear that it was the national structure of the NHS, and the ability to collaborate and share information across a whole health system, that was a huge attraction to the industry and a competitive strength for this country.

Does not the Secretary of State’s Health and Social Care Bill risk turning the NHS into a competitive market, where collaboration is discouraged in an any-qualified-provider free-for-all? So how can he guarantee that that competitive strength will be there in the future and will continue to be used by the pharmaceutical industry? Although he will not admit it today, were not many of the measures he has announced, particularly the expansion of telecare, made possible by the steps that we took to invest and modernise NHS IT?

More broadly, this announcement raises questions about the Government’s policy on the involvement of the private sector in the NHS. The Government need to set out what, if any, limit they see on the involvement of the private sector in the NHS. The Prime Minister has said that he wants the NHS to be a fantastic business. Let me quote from a recent leaked document on NHS commissioning, “Towards Service Excellence”. It says:

“The NHS sector . . . needs to make the transition from statutory function to freestanding enterprise.”

It is no wonder that, on the back of these worrying words, the British Medical Association has adopted a position of outright opposition to the Secretary of State’s Bill. Our worry is that, in their desperation to develop a credible industrial strategy, Ministers seem ready to put large chunks of the NHS up for sale.

Patient data are not the Secretary of State’s to give away. The NHS is not his to sell. The truth is that the Government are running huge risks with patient confidentiality and patient safety by opening up the NHS to the private sector and reorganising at a time of financial stress, but we do not yet know the full scale of those risks.

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I am pretty sure that the shadow Secretary of State is on his last sentence, which is almost certainly a short one.

[Andy Burnham]

It is.

The great irony is this: while Ministers are happy to offer up other people’s data, they continue to withhold the NHS risk register, which shows the risk they are running with our NHS. Is that not why people are increasingly asking what the Secretary of State has to hide?

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Skinner]

Yes, but in a free health service, not a privatised health service, which it will be—

[Mr Speaker]

Order. The hon. Gentleman has made his point.

May I say gently to the Secretary of State that we are enjoying the full product of his lucubrations, but I think just a snapshot will do. We can get by with that. [Interruption.] The Minister of State, the right hon. Member for Chelmsford (Mr Burns), can look it up in his dictionary later. That is fine.

[Mike Crockart (Edinburgh West) (LD)]

Key to the strategy announced today is the ability to translate primary research into early adoption and commercial outcomes. Does the Secretary of State agree that Edinburgh’s BioQuarter is uniquely placed to do that, as it already shares a campus with the state-of-the-art royal infirmary of Edinburgh and is hopefully soon to be joined by the excellent sick children’s hospital, providing a base for the commercialisation of the innovative work being carried out by Edinburgh’s universities?