Speeches by Stafford.

“Once again, I congratulate the hon. Member for Edinburgh South West (Dr Arthur) on bringing this essential Bill before us and thank him for the hard work he has done to make sure we get to this place. As I have said many times in this House, early detection saves lives, but without meaningful progress in research we wi…”

“To your delight, I am sure, Madam Deputy Speaker, and to the delight of the whole House—especially that of the Government Whips—I am not going to speak for very long on Report, although I am not promising not to speak for some time on Third Reading. I wish to briefly speak to amendments 5 and 8 tabled by my hon. Friend…”

“When do you think you will achieve the 700,000 extra appointments? By what date?”

“How many have been rolled out so far?”

“Minister, in yesterday’s press release about the consultation, talking about the NHS dentistry system, you said, “We have already started fixing this, rolling out 700,000 urgent and emergency appointments.” That is not true, though, is it? There has actually been a delay in rolling out the 700,000 appointments. Why has…”

“Presumably, if this is seen to be a success, it is something the Government would want to continue year on year. Has any assessment been made of the cost of that, as opposed to, for example, educational assistance for parents to teach their children how to brush their teeth?”

“I think you have said that that would cover about 600,000 pupils. Presumably that will not all happen on 1 or 2 September or whenever people go back to school. What is the period in which you think you will reach 600,000 young people? And again, what is the monitoring process to ensure that that target is reached?”

“Have you identified the areas or the schools where that intervention will go in?”

“Let us move on to the second part of your statement, Minister. In your press release, you state, “We have already started fixing this”, and the quote goes, “bringing in supervising tooth-brushing for 3 to 5 year olds in the most deprived areas of the country.” Now, putting aside whether you think it should be schools o…”

“Will you publish either to the general public or to this Committee, from ICB to ICB, how far they have got down that route? Because I think it will be very helpful for us as a Committee to be able to understand whether this is succeeding or not.”

“Obviously, you have stated that you will be monitoring that. What happens if individual ICBs—Joe has talked about Hampshire and Isle of Wight, which also covers part of my patch—are not meeting the requirement? What is the sanction? What support will the Department be giving to ensure they can meet that?”

“The Lord Chancellor rightly rejected murderer Alan Jermey’s Parole Board request for open conditions, for which his daughters and I are extremely grateful. I understand that Mr Jermey is now legally challenging the decision, so will the Lord Chancellor revisit my request for a meeting with her about this issue?”

“I held a pub and hospitality roundtable in my constituency, where publicans stated that the changes in the Budget had been worse than covid for their balance books and the viability of their businesses, because at least during covid the then Conservative Government gave relief and help to them; this time, they have rec…”

“In Farnham, the Nelson Arms pub uses zero-hours contracts, and it needs them. I spoke to a staff member who said that the reason he was so keen on them is that he is actually a paramedic, and between his shifts he worked at the pub. That worked for him and the pub, because it gave them both flexibility.”

“The Minister may be aware that the outline business case for improvements to the A31 at Hickley’s Corner in Farnham will come before her in a couple of months’ time. While I understand that she cannot make any promises now, will she at least agree to look kindly on that application and meet me to discuss it?”

“Thank you. Do you want to come in, Jolanta?”

“Henry.”

“Thank you.”

“I am going to ask some questions around the waiting for assessment period. I am sure you agree that you would want greater support for young people and families while they wait for the assessment. How can services improve information and support during that waiting time?”

“It sounds like you have been doing very good work in that period. Presumably, you are an example of good practice that is not necessarily replicated across the country. What would be a good first step for all services to improve support and information during the waiting for assessment period?”