Gen Kitchen

Long-term Medical Conditions

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Efford. It is my first time speaking from the Front Bench, so please bear with me if I get my papers mixed up. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Bury St Edmunds and Stowmarket (Peter Prinsley) for securing this debate, and for speaking so passionately on the subject, using his decades of experience of caring for patients in the NHS. I also thank all the other Members for their insightful contributions, and the Backbench Business Committee

Long-term Medical Conditions

I was coming on to Baroness Louise Casey’s report to the Prime Minister. I will try to get an answer from the Departments she is working with. Hon. Members will be aware that we have launched the independent commission into adult social care as part of our critical first steps to delivering a national care service. It is chaired by Baroness Louise Casey and reporting to the Prime Minister. The commission will make clear recommendations for how to rebuild social care systems to meet the current a

Long-term Medical Conditions

Thank you. In fact, the waiting list has been cut by over 200,000 since we came into office. Another topic touched on a lot was social care, its effective use and access to it. Effective and accessible social care is crucial for people with long-term conditions.

Long-term Medical Conditions

I acknowledge that those with long-term health conditions such as arthritis will rightly be very worried about what is happening, considering that only a Green Paper, rather than a Bill, has been published. I assure my hon. Friend that the Department of Health and Social Care and the DWP are committed to supporting disabled people and those with long-term health conditions. There is already a range of support that is online and working, but we want those who are in work and can stay there to do

Long-term Medical Conditions

I agree, and I will come to comorbidities and some of the strategies in the 10-year plan later in my speech. My hon. Friend the Member for Scarborough and Whitby (Alison Hume) spoke about endometriosis. I was very sorry and dismayed to hear about her constituent Angela Tiernan, who has endometriosis in her chest cavity. I assure my hon. Friend that urgent action to tackle gynaecological care is taking place through the elective reform plan, and we are having significant successes in that area. I

Planning and Infrastructure Bill (Seventh sitting)

I know we vote on new clause 104 later. But will we vote on amendments 75 and 82 now?

Planning and Infrastructure Bill (Seventh sitting)

Is it not that they are grouped together, so we vote on them as a group?

Planning and Infrastructure Bill (Seventh sitting)

So therefore we have been going through the groupings, rather than the amendment paper.

Planning and Infrastructure Bill (Seventh sitting)

But we have not voted on amendment 5.

Planning and Infrastructure Bill (Seventh sitting)

Further to that point of order, Dr Huq. Opposition Members are very interested in their amendments, but I am keenly and acutely interested in Government amendment 48 and schedule 3. Government amendment 48 is on page 10 of the amendment paper. We have been going through the groupings of amendments on the selection list, and in previous sittings, when we have voted on amendments, we have voted on the groupings, rather than following the amendment paper. I am concerned that if we are now following

Easter Adjournment

It is a pleasure to close the debate. I will try to do so very swiftly, Madam Deputy Speaker, and I wish you and all those listening a very happy Easter. Let me begin by paying tribute to the hon. Member for Harrow East (Bob Blackman), and thanking him and all the members of the Backbench Business Committee for the work that they do in bringing so many important issues to the notice of the House. Let me also pay tribute to the late Sir David Amess, whose plaque on the wall behind me is a reminde

Engagements

Q1. If he will list his official engagements for Wednesday 22 May.

Internet Connectivity

13. In Wellingborough and Rushden, organisations such as Serve and the Teamwork Trust offer digital support for the excluded, but for low-income households, access to the internet through libraries and schools is a key tool for employment and betterment. In rural towns such as mine, what is the Department doing to ensure that low-income households have access to digital services?

Engagements

I, too, welcome the hon. Member for South Thanet (Craig Mackinlay) back to the House and wish him well in his duties. I associate myself with the Prime Minister’s remarks. The Association of Dental Groups, in its May 2022 report, identified my Wellingborough constituency as one of England’s dental deserts. I welcomed the Prime Minister’s grand scheme to send dental vans to constituencies like mine but, months on, he is having to U-turn because there are not enough vans. Why can he not address th