Lords
Proceedings
14 July 2026
Autism: Parenting Support Programmes
My Lords, in responding to the Question from the noble Baroness, Lady Leaman, the Minister confirmed that the Government have not assessed the adequacy of parenting support for families following a diagnosis and do not hold national data on either provision or waiting times. Does the Minister’s depa…
Lords
Committee Stage
9 July 2026
Modern Service Framework for Dementia and Frailty
My Lords, I, too, thank the noble Lord, Lord Weir of Ballyholme, for securing this important debate. I also thank all those who sent us briefings, as well as all noble Lords who have spoken in this debate.
Dementia remains one of the greatest health and social care challenges facing our country. As…
Lords
Proceedings
6 July 2026
Fracture Liaison Services
My noble friend Lord Black specifically asked about fracture liaison services implementation plans, timelines and milestones on progress towards universal coverage in 2030, to which the Government have committed. To double-check, does the Minister agree with the principle that there should be a publ…
Lords
Proceedings
6 July 2026
National Maternity and Neonatal Investigation
My Lords, I thank the Minister for the Statement and the noble Baroness, Lady Amos, and her team for the thoroughness and compassion with which they have conducted this important investigation. Above all, our thoughts must be and are with the women, babies and families whose experiences lie at the h…
Lords
Proceedings
2 July 2026
Children’s and Young People’s Mental Health Services
My Lords, the report contains a wealth of information and new data on referral patterns, waiting times and outcomes. I welcome the Minister’s response that it will feed into the forthcoming mental health strategy. How is the Minister’s department using this information to target resources and to ide…
Lords
Proceedings
1 July 2026
Pharmacy Closures
My Lords, has the department undertaken any analysis of the characteristics of pharmacies that are most of risk of closure to understand whether geography, deprivation, the ownership model or dispensing volume are the principal drivers? Does she agree that having this data might help the department …
Lords
Proceedings
1 July 2026
IVF Treatment
My Lords, I begin by thanking and paying tribute to the noble Baroness, Lady Nargund, and to her co-authors of this fascinating paper. Clearly, it shows that IVF is an area in which innovation is important but so too is the need for evidence. At a time when add-ons have sometimes quite fancy scienti…
Lords
Proceedings
30 June 2026
Extreme Heat: Resilience of NHS Infrastructure
My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister for answering the Question of the noble Earl, Lord Russell, on new-build hospitals, but there is clearly a question about existing hospitals and facilities. I wonder what plan or strategy there is, and whether it is written down, to identify hospitals that do …
Lords
Proceedings
29 June 2026
Nottingham Maternity and Neonatal Services
My Lords, I thank the Minister for the opportunity to ask questions on this Statement on the report, which raises many troubling issues. I add my thanks to Donna Ockenden and her team for their extraordinary work in conducting what has been the largest review of maternity services in the history of …
Lords
Proceedings
18 June 2026
Prostate Cancer Screening: AI
My Lords, I will follow up on that reference to the TRANSFORM trial. Black men are around twice as likely to develop prostate cancer and to die from it, yet historically they have been underrepresented in many screening and research programmes. The Minister mentioned the TRANSFORM trial, which hopef…
Lords
Proceedings
17 June 2026
Integrated Care Boards: Budgets
My Lords, I will follow up on the question asked by the noble Baroness, Lady Gerada, on the Health and Care Act 2022. I remember that during the debates on the Bill there were calls for many specialisms to be represented on integrated care boards. In order to avoid unwieldy boards, we compromised on…
Lords
Proceedings
16 June 2026
Compassionate Use Medicine Schemes: VAT
My Lords, I thank the Minister for accepting this Urgent Question repeat. Life science companies have warned that the decision to charge VAT on early access and the innovative medicines that they provide free of charge could lead to them ending providing these free treatments to patients before rout…
Lords
Proceedings
15 June 2026
Rare Cancers: Diagnosis and Treatment
My Lords, a number of life sciences companies have warned that the recent HMRC VAT rulings on compassionate use and early access medicine schemes, which can result in companies being charged VAT even where they provide medicines free of charge, could lead to them withdrawing programmes that provide …
Lords
Proceedings
15 June 2026
Mental Health Conditions: Diagnoses
My Lords, I begin by thanking my noble friend Lady Maclean for securing this important debate. The question before us is not whether mental health conditions are serious or deserving of support, because we all agree that they are. Nor should we overlook the very real impact that anxiety, depression …
Lords
Proceedings
9 June 2026
Lord Mandelson Humble Address
My Lords, following up on the question from my noble friend, the Minister said that deciding which messages to release was official led, if I completely understood that correctly. Is she able to tell the House what criteria or guidance were given to officials so that they could decide which messages…
Lords
Proceedings
3 June 2026
Alzheimer’s Disease: Diagnosis and Access to Experimental Drugs
My Lords, NHS England’s target is for at least 67% of people with dementia to receive a formal diagnosis, yet we know that many areas struggle to meet that benchmark. Given what noble Lords have said about early intervention, but also that new Alzheimer’s treatments are most effective in the earlier…
Lords
Proceedings
2 June 2026
Prostate Cancer Screening
My Lords, I pay tribute to the noble Baroness, Lady Royall, for championing this issue. Today’s announcement that Black men will be offered prostate cancer screening in the TRANSFORM trial is very welcome, given that Black men are around twice as likely to develop prostate cancer and die from it. So…
Lords
Proceedings
2 June 2026
Breast Cancer Screening: Women Over 70
My Lords, I thank the Minister for sharing her personal experience; I am sure our thoughts are with her. The Government have rightly said they want a shift from treatment to prevention, and the Minister will know that one element of prevention is testing and early diagnosis. We know that about one-t…
Lords
Proceedings
20 May 2026
King’s Speech
My Lords, I thank the Minister for the clear way in which she introduced the debate. We all know that our country faces profound and growing challenges in health and social care. As the leader of the Opposition made clear in her response to the gracious Speech in the other place, we are entering a p…
Lords
Proceedings
19 May 2026
El Niño: Impact
My Lords, I am not going to ask the Minister about the weather for the weekend. I am going to ask her about a debate around how we tackle wildfires. There is a view that in order to tackle wildfires we have to remove scrub, but at the same time people believe that that reduces biodiversity. There is…
Lords
Proceedings
23 April 2026
Women’s Health Strategy
My Lords, I thank the Minister for tabling the Statement. I am sure that the ambitions for the renewed women’s health strategy will be supported by noble Lords from all Benches. I know that the Minister recognises that women have too often felt unheard, as conditions such as endometriosis and chroni…
Lords
Oral Questions
21 April 2026
Midwives: Graduate Guarantee
I was about to answer the noble Lord’s first question by talking about retention and then he helpfully raised retention. Retention rates for existing midwives are improving, as is the number of midwives. That includes a mentoring scheme, strengthening advice and support on pensions, flexible retirem…
Lords
Debate
20 April 2026
Tobacco and Vapes Bill
My Lords, I again thank your Lordships’ House for its attentive scrutiny throughout the passage of the Bill. I pay tribute to the Front Benches and to noble Lords on all sides of the House.
I say to the noble Lord, Lord Naseby, that, as I have explained and his own Front Bench has confirmed, these …
Lords
Oral Questions
15 April 2026
NHS Adult Gender Identity Clinics
The noble Lord makes a number of points. Let me be quite clear that surgical interventions are only for adults—that is for those aged 18 and over. As I said in my answer to the noble Baroness, Lady Maclean, I also refer to the fact that the strong safeguards in place include, among a whole range of …
Lords
Committee Stage
15 April 2026
3 contributions
Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Regulated Activities) (Amendment) Regulations 2026
I am sorry to interrupt but there is a Division in the House. The Committee will adjourn for 10 minutes.
My Lords, I am most grateful for the debate today. I will make a few general points.
I very much welcome the points and the concerns that noble Lords have been willing to outline. I also want to acknowledge that I have heard the understanding of why we are doing this. I know that we all understand …
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