argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Policing and Crime Bill — House of Lords, 2016-11-02
Topic: Health
Elspeth Howe (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, I have added my name to amendments in this group. I will speak specifically to Amendment 190, which we have already heard a fair amount about. It seeks to prohibit anyone detained under Sections 135 and 136 of the Mental Health Act being taken to a police cell. Regardless of their age, no one should be made to feel like a criminal simply for being unwell I will focus on the emotional impact that being detained in a cell has on people in crisis and question some of the assumptions about the need for the use of police cells for mental health provision. Those who are picked up by the police under the Mental Health Act are detained because there is a real risk of harm to themselves or others. However, they have committed no crime. These are people in need of health support and are detained so that a mental health assessment can take place When in a mental health crisis, one is likely to feel frightened, overwhelmed and extremely distressed. One’s behaviour may seem aggressive and threatening to others. That is part of mental illness. Nevertheless, such people still need support and compassion. Health-based places of safety need to be equipped to manage someone’s challenging behaviour, and some areas are able to do this already. We heard about Merseyside from the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, The experience of being held in police cells is distressing, and often it is the most vulnerable who end up in a cell; yet being held in a prison cell and treated like a criminal can only make matters worse. The Government’s impact assessment on the Bill details the experiences of some of those who have been detained in police cells. Many speak of feeling cold and hungry, being left alone, strip-searched and having their personal possessions removed. Indeed, in one case the light fittings were removed from the cell to prevent self-harming, leaving the person, who was experiencing a mental health crisis, completely in the dark Clearly the use of police cells is never appropriate for people with mental health crises and we need to challenge the assumption that sometimes they are. I hope these amendments, so ably moved by the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, will persuade the Minister that the use of police cells when dealing with people with a mental health crisis is no longer acceptable and that she will therefore accept the amendments.
Assisted Dying (No. 2) Bill — House of Commons, 2015-09-11
Topic: Health
Barbara Mary Keeley (Labour, Centre-left): If we are to live in a society that values and cares for each individual regardless of the state of their health and disability, it is difficult to see why we should be relaxing our stance on suicide. The Not Dead Yet UK network of disabled and terminally ill people tells us that not one organisation of disabled people supports assisted suicide, and Richard Hawkes, the former CEO of Scope, has said: "Why is it that when people who are not disabled want to commit suicide, we try to talk them out of it, but when a disabled person wants to commit suicide we focus on how we can make that possible?" The campaign to legalise assisted suicide reinforces deep-seated beliefs that the lives of disabled people are not worth as much as other people’s We must also consider the question of the involvement, through the Bill, of the doctors who would have to assess the person and administer the drugs to assist their suicide. The British Medical Association has a clear policy against physician-assisted suicide and the Bill before us, as do the college of GPs and the college of physicians. The BMA says that it opposes all forms of assisted dying, supports the current legal framework, which allows compassionate and ethical care for the dying, and supports the establishment of a comprehensive, high-quality palliative care service. Many of us here today have spoken very strongly about our support for palliative care, and the hon. Members for Totnes (Dr Wollaston) and for Central Ayrshire (Dr Whitford) have given us their reasons, as a former GP and former surgeon I want to end on that point about social care, because much of my work here has been focused on social care and carers. I believe I agree with the hon. Member for Totnes: improving palliative care is a real alternative to the Bill. We should bring in free social care at the end of life, because the denial of care should not be driving people to take their own lives I want to make a final point about the last implications of changing this law. At the moment, it is clear that we want to prevent people from committing suicide and that society should help and support those reaching the end of their life. Passing the Bill would change that and set a dangerous precedent.
Coronavirus — House of Commons, 2020-03-09
Topic: Health
Martin John Docherty-Hughes (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): The other day, the Prime Minister said on morning television, "perhaps you could take it on the chin, take it all in one go and allow the disease to move through the population without really taking as many draconian measures." Can the Secretary of State advise the House that that is not the Government’s official position?
Assisted Dying (No. 2) Bill — House of Commons, 2015-09-11
Topic: Health
Gordon Marsden (Labour, Centre-left): We debate this subject on the anniversary of 9/11, the day on which over 3,000 people had their lives snuffed out in an instant, so it is not surprising that we are debating many deaths and citing our personal experiences, such as my experiences with my parents at the end of their lives and of seeing people in Trinity hospice in Blackpool, and so many other individual examples. Of course there are good intentions on all sides, but good intentions are not enough. The balance of probability that my hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton South West (Rob Marris) mentioned is not enough to prevent us from going down a road not to hell but to dangerous and difficult decisions I listened with great respect to the comments of the former DPP, my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Keir Starmer), but drew a very different conclusion—that hard cases may make bad law, but they do not necessarily make bad individual judgments. That is the point. It is not right, in my view, that we should assume that we should just accept the right of Parliament to delegate to the DPP these difficult decisions where the detail has to be tried and tested to a generic principle The issue of capacity is clearly worrying many people here, and rightly so. I was a Parliamentary Private Secretary in the Lord Chancellor’s Department when that was brought up. It is a fluctuating issue, and that is why Scope and Mencap are very concerned about it. We have already heard about the large proportion of medical professionals who would not be prepared to take forward the procedures in this Bill, even if they were not flawed. What does that say about the small pool of people who will have to deal with this? Words matter, as George Orwell said, so we should be using the appropriate terms. This is about assisted suicide, not assisted dying. It is not about medication—I am not going to use the word "poison"—but administering something to someone that will kill them. These are important issues John Donne famously said, "No man is an island"— and no woman, for that matter. It has been suggested today that the decision that we make is simply for the individual. It is not simply for the individual—it is for the families who are impacted by it, for the doctors who have to go through agony trying to decide what to do about it, and for all of us in society who will take the consequences on board. That is why I shall vote against the Bill.
Care Quality Commission Review: Deaths in the NHS — House of Lords, 2016-12-13
Topic: Health
Ilora Gillian Finlay (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, given the lamentably low involvement in investigations of families and others who loved the person who died, how will their experience be audited and monitored in future? As the Minister rightly said—I declare an interest as chairman of the National Mental Capacity Forum—such families often describe not being listened to during the period of illness prior to death, and then not being listened to around the time of death. Without auditing their experience of their involvement in investigations, there is a danger of it being tokenistic and that nothing will really change in the longer term, even though they have a great deal to offer. Will the Minister commit to involving some of the bereavement groups that might provide support and independent monitoring of people’s experiences, and undertake to catalogue centrally the reasons that emerge from such investigations? Only then will we understand if trends really are occurring across the country that need to be dealt with at national level, rather than allowing things to slip at local level.
Commonwealth in 2020 — House of Commons, 2020-03-09
Topic: Defense
Carol Frances Monaghan (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): We are hearing from members of the armed forces and the Royal British Legion that these people have been recruited because we are not meeting our own recruitment targets here in the UK. We are going out to these countries and actively recruiting: promising the earth and then delivering very little for their families. It really is not how we should be operating.
NHS Reform — House of Commons, 2015-07-16
Topic: Health
Benjamin Peter James Bradshaw (Labour, Centre-left): How will the Secretary of State pay for his very laudable objective of seven-day working when he has lost control of NHS finances? Contrary to what he claimed about the situation in Devon, as things now stand our patient care is suffering, waiting times are rocketing and we are facing a £434 million deficit.
NHS Reform — House of Commons, 2015-07-16
Topic: Health
Michael Joseph Patrick Kane (Labour, Centre-left): I echo the comments of the hon. Member for Altrincham and Sale West (Mr Brady). Despite a public consultation wanting five major trauma receiving sites in Greater Manchester and Wythenshawe hospital being the public choice, it did not receive specialist status at the end of the Healthier Together process yesterday. What assurances can the Secretary of State give the people of Trafford and south Manchester, particularly in relation to the 18 specialisms that are underpinned by Wythenshawe being a major trauma receiving site?
NHS Reform — House of Commons, 2015-07-16
Topic: Health
Dennis Edward Skinner (Labour, Centre-left): As someone who has spent quite a bit of time going to hospitals over the past 16 years, I have learned a little about it. I suspect that some people, like the doctors who the Secretary of State wants to collaborate with, just might have reflected on why this Tory Government are more concerned with getting in agency nurses and doctors than giving nurses a decent pay increase. Has it not crossed his mind that by telling nurses they are worth only 1% more, he will finish up with more agency nurses? The truth is that doctors see this happening every day. The main reason is that the Government have tried to reform and privatise the NHS for the past five years. The doctors and the nurses do not trust him—it is time he got out.
Covid-19: Next Phase — House of Commons, 2020-06-23
Topic: Health
Joanna Catherine Cherry (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): I thank the Minister for his answer, but after the end of the Brexit transition period, all four health services in the UK and Northern Ireland will face increased bureaucracy and increased costs to import drugs from Europe. On top of that, it has been estimated that a trade deal with the United States of America could increase the drugs bill from £18 billion to £45 billion. How will the Secretary of State prevent these extra costs from hampering NHS capacity?
Covid-19: International Response — House of Lords, 2020-05-18
Topic: Health
Peter Hain (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, this invisible universal virus can affect everyone in every part of the world. So much for the bellicose trumpeting of "Britain going it alone", torn free from Europe, the world’s largest and most powerful economic bloc with a huge policy reach, as if the days of Empire can be reincarnated in today’s multipolar world of big powers led by self-styled big men like Xi, Modi, Trump and Putin In 2009 Gordon Brown saved the world economically by leading the G20 in a joint public-investment-driven recovery from the global financial crisis and prevented a huge global recession from becoming a catastrophic depression but, instead of a co-ordinated international response to the Covid-19 outbreak, countries have manoeuvred for national advantage, competing rather than co-operating over PPE, testing and tracing, Britain woefully failing on all three. Instead of learning with several weeks’ forewarning from Asia, most successfully South Korea with its concerted testing and tracing, lockdown and quarantine, western countries—notably the UK, Italy, Spain, France and the US—all have official death tolls far exceeding those in comparator Asian states, with the UK worst of all in Europe and the US the worst in the world As no-deal Brexit beckons, the UK even failed to take advantage of joint EU procurement of PPE, our nationalist zealots instead espousing British exceptionalism and national self-sufficiency. Why have we not joined Germany, Italy, France, Norway and the EU Council and Commission in their call the other week for treatments and vaccines to be shared equally? It is tragic that instead of co-operating to protect the most vulnerable worldwide, countries seem to be racing to get a vaccine for themselves to win commercial and geopolitical benefit.
Learning Disabilities Mortality Review — House of Lords, 2018-05-09
Topic: Health
Judith Anne Jolly (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, I declare my interest as chairman of a learning disability charity that provides services for 2,500 adults in England. This report makes for uncomfortable reading for anyone involved in the sector and it should shock the general public. We are judged by how well we as a society care for those who are weak and vulnerable. On this count, we have failed. Each year, the deaths of 1,200 people with learning disabilities are avoidable. The standard of their care is not fit for purpose. There are not enough learning disability specialist nurses in the NHS and support staff are no longer being funded to support people with a learning disability in a healthcare setting I have three questions for the Minister. Do either the Department of Health and Social Care or Health Education England collect figures on how many health professionals attend training in dealing with people with a learning disability? What guidance is given to staff about the provision of written material in an accessible format? Finally, once admitted, learning disabled patients lose their funding from the local authority so they have no one who knows or understands them and they are left frightened and alone. Does the Minister believe this should be the case?
Contaminated Blood Scandal: Interim Payments for Victims — House of Lords, 2022-07-20
Topic: Health
Joanna Penn (Conservative, Centre-right): The assurance I can give noble Lords is that we are extremely cognisant of the time pressures in this scenario. We know that those infected and affected have been waiting for decades, so we are aware of the time pressures and are working as quickly as we can on the recommendations from Sir Robert’s study. The work of the inquiry continues, and its chair has made it clear that he is aware of the need to conduct it as quickly as the thoroughness that is needed will allow.
Covid-19: International Response — House of Lords, 2020-05-18
Topic: Health
Leslie Turnberg (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, it is clear that in tackling a global pandemic, we need a global response. However, I want to raise a different international issue that is a little nearer to home and a little narrower, because nowhere do we see the international dimension more clearly than in our own National Health Service. Some 28% of our medical staff and 13% of all NHS workers come from other countries. Many of them are from black and minority ethnic groups, so they are particularly vulnerable, more so than many others. Yet they do such a wonderful job that every Thursday evening we come out and clap for them. Given that, it might be thought that we treat them well, but I fear that that is not entirely the case The Royal College of Physicians tells us that not only do people from abroad have to pay the punitive costs of visas, which might be expected, they also have to pay a £400 a year immigration health surcharge for each family member to help pay towards the costs of the National Health Service. They are being asked to pay for the healthcare that they themselves are providing for us, and that health surcharge is shortly to rise to £624 a year. This is a ludicrous situation where up to a quarter of our doctors are being asked to pay for the care that they are giving to the rest of us. I ask the Minister to press her colleagues in the Department for Health and Social Care to rescind this tax which these incredibly valuable staff are being asked to pay.
Covid-19: International Response — House of Lords, 2020-05-18
Topic: Health
Richard Oliver Faulkner (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, this week, the World Health Assembly is meeting in Geneva. This should be an ideal and invaluable opportunity to exchange ideas on best practice and experiences of coping with the Covid-19 pandemic. One would have thought that, in this of all years, the WHA would wish to hear from those who have done best in tackling the crisis. By any objective analysis, Taiwan—I declare my interest as our Government’s trade envoy—has done exceptionally well. As soon as confirmation of the new virus was received on 31 December, Taiwan began implementing quarantine of direct flights from Wuhan. On 2 January, it established a response team for the disease, based on test, trace and isolate. Yesterday was the 10th successive day that Taiwan reported no new Covid-19 cases, keeping the number of those infected at 440. The number of deaths from the virus, in a country of 23 million people, is reported as just seven Despite this outstanding record, the WHO refuses to issue an invitation to Taiwan to take part in this year’s assembly. It is disregarding the right to health of 23 million Taiwanese people and ignoring the huge assistance being provided internationally, including the provision of 50 million masks and other medical supplies to countries all around the world, including Africa and the Middle East, and assistance to medics working with Syrian refugees. One million of these masks came from Taiwan to the UK Therefore, I hope the Minister will endorse what her noble friend Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon said in the House on 10 February: "we continue to support representations that the Department of Health has made directly in lobbying for Taiwan’s participation in the World Health Organization. We are also working with like-minded countries, including the United States and Australia, to ensure that, at the World Health Assembly which takes place in May this year, Taiwan is represented."—[Official Report, 10/2/20; col. 2072.] I hope that she can confirm that that is still the Government’s position.
Climate Change and Flooding — House of Commons, 2015-12-15
Topic: Defense
Margaret Greenwood (Labour, Centre-left): On that point, does my hon. Friend agree that this is a timely opportunity to look again at the funding of fire services up and down the country? On Merseyside, we have certainly seen extreme cuts, and the whole model needs revisiting.
Integrated Review — House of Commons, 2020-11-19
Topic: Defense
Ian Blackford (Scottish National Party, Centre-left): I thank the Prime Minister for advance sight of his statement In the SNP, we support a refocusing on the contemporary threats that we face. We need to readjust our defence capabilities for the modern world and it is especially important that a focus is given to issues such as cyber-security, but what we do not accept are the priorities of this Government and the threat of the disbanding of historic regiments such as the Black Watch. Disbanding the Black Watch would show that the promises made to Scotland during the Scottish independence campaign have been broken, buried and forgotten by this Government. We were promised 12,500 personnel stationed permanently in Scotland; the number remains well below 10,000. Such broken promises not only mean fewer jobs in Scotland, but undermine Scotland’s security interests. Billions of pounds of taxpayers’ money are still being spent on Trident nuclear weapons. Scotland remains overwhelmingly opposed to weapons of mass destruction on the Clyde. We need to respond to today’s challenges rather than on vanity projects The SNP also has serious reservations regarding such a windfall to defence spending during these unprecedented times of hardship for so many. This review will reportedly see the UK as Europe’s biggest defence spender, when just three weeks ago this Government refused to provide free school meals for children during the holidays. We have learned that the UK Government are considering cutting the overseas aid budget by billions of pounds. The Prime Minister may use the term "global Britain", but on these Benches we believe the Prime Minister has his priorities all wrong. The Tories have closed the Department for International Development, one of the most successful Departments of Government, in order to politicise instead of focusing it on sustainable development goals In our submission to the integrated defence review, we have put forward sensible suggestions on how to meet the modern-day threat picture, but not to the detriment of our historic regiments in Scotland. I ask the Prime Minister today: will he rule out scrapping the Black Watch—[Interruption]—and cuts to international aid spending? [Interruption.] It is an absolute disgrace, in the face of the threats, that we get contempt yet again from the Defence Secretary and his colleagues on the Tory Benches. It is shameful, and he really ought to grow up and show some respect to the regiments of Scotland With independence, Scotland can have a foreign policy that reflects our values and interests and a defence capability that matches capabilities to threats. With our submission to this review, we are looking to play a constructive role in informing UK policy, but we will be setting out how Scotland can play a full role as a normal, law-abiding and values-driven independent country on the world stage.
Mental Capacity (Amendment) Bill [HL] — House of Lords, 2018-10-22
Topic: Health
Elizabeth Barker (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): No, I have not lost confidence in that; I simply wish to undertake further discussion, given that—I say it again—it looks entirely likely that mental health legislation may be changing. I think, in light of that, that it is a wise discussion to have.
Mental Capacity (Amendment) Bill [HL] — House of Lords, 2018-10-22
Topic: Health
Judith Anne Jolly (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): I thank the Minister and others who have spoken on this group. We all want to ensure that the new mental capacity Act—presumably of 2019—works and that the Department of Health and Social Care monitors its implementation. I know that we on these Benches look forward to working with the Minister and others between now and Report to ensure that the Bill is actually fit for purpose. I gently suggest that a longer time gap than is usual between Committee and Report might be needed. I guess that those conversations might need to be held with the usual channels but, in the meantime, I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.