argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Armed Forces Act (Continuation) Order 2022 — House of Lords, 2022-07-05
Topic: Defense
Vernon Coaker (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, we of course fully support this SI so that the Armed Forces Act 2006 can remain in force. It gives us a chance once again to offer the Armed Forces our full support and acknowledge all that they do, as the Minister said. The order is essential for the Armed Forces to be maintained as disciplined bodies. Indeed, it is as a result of this discipline that our Armed Forces are so successful in the discharge of their duties, whether at home or abroad, which she outlined for us. The need for our Armed Forces has been brought into sharp focus by events in Ukraine following Russia’s illegal invasion We are all proud of the way in which our country has supported Ukraine, and we need to ensure that it goes on as long as necessary. I ask the Government continually to explain to the British public the importance of our efforts and that we are defending democracy and freedom in eastern Europe, and for the rest of Europe and ourselves. Their fight is our fight. There will be other occasions to discuss this more broadly as well as the recent NATO summit in Madrid, the new strategy that emerged from it, defence spending and the future of our Armed Forces, including the mistake, as we see it, of reducing our Army by 10,000 troops, a decision which needs to be reviewed I have one specific question relating to the order. It is about Article 1(2), which states: "This Order extends to England and Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland, the Isle of Man and the British overseas territories" I understand that, but can the Minister explain why it continues: "(except Gibraltar) and the Channel Islands"? We have a base in Gibraltar and our Armed Forces serve there, and I assume that there are some Armed Forces activities in and around the Channel Islands, and I wonder why they are not included I thank the Minister for her comments. As she said, we are rightly proud of our Armed Forces, whether they are supporting local communities, delivering aid or defending human rights, democracy and freedom in Europe and beyond. We will never take them for granted. They are respected across this Parliament and across the world, and for that we are humbled and grateful.
Prisoners (Disclosure of Information About Victims) Bill — House of Lords, 2020-07-01
Topic: Health
Elizabeth Barker (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Bull, and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Hope of Craighead, for the clear way in which they introduced the Bill and for signalling their intention not to push this amendment to a vote When we discussed this matter at an earlier stage of the proceedings, I explained that I am one of a number of Peers who has taken part every time we have discussed mental capacity legislation since its pre-legislative state in 2004. I remain concerned that mental capacity legislation is not widely understood or implemented in a variety of professions—even in the medical profession, where one might think that it would be. Given the incidence of mental illness in the prison population, one would think that such legislation is widely understood by practitioners. When we carried out the review of the Mental Capacity Act, that turned out not to be so. I do not doubt that the Parole Board should be as free as possible to exercise judgment. It is not for those of us outside who do not have access to all the facts of a particular case to second-guess it. My questions during earlier stages of the Bill were about the training of professionals in the criminal justice system, particularly the Parole Board, and the reliance on Mental Capacity Act advisers, Mental Health Act advisers and so on. I have not had answers to those questions; therefore, like the noble Baroness, Lady Bull, I remain concerned that there is a gap in the legislation Like others who have spoken to Mrs McCourt, I really want this legislation to work and I do not wish to see gaps through which people who have the capacity and have information but are withholding it can slip. The noble Baroness, Lady Bull, made a valid point. I understand that the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen, will resist putting these words in the Bill, but can he tell us what regulations and guidance will arise as a result of our discussion?
Covid-19: Response — House of Lords, 2020-05-19
Topic: Health
Judith Anne Jolly (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, with many GP appointments now held online, the public are going to their local pharmacies for advice as never before. Pharmacies have received from the department little or no support with reconfiguring their premises, many have had no support sourcing PPE and staff are not automatically considered for routine testing. Have the Government forgotten the pharmacy profession? Will additional support be made available to our high street pharmacies as they continue to serve patients throughout the Covid-19 pandemic?
Data Protection Bill [HL] — House of Lords, 2017-11-06
Topic: Health
Ralph Matthew Palmer (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I offer a slight contrast to that. I hope that this clause will help with a couple of sorts of problems that I have come across over the last 20 or 30 years. One concerns children at university who become suicidal and their parents are never told because everybody believes they have a duty of confidentiality and cannot communicate with the parents. A friend of mine got very close to going over the edge but fortunately one of his friends told his parents and then everything got sorted out. Suddenly regarding parents as aliens when someone is 18 and in severe psychological difficulty is an uncomfortable effect of the way that current regulations are perceived. I hope that this provision might loosen things up Another aspect is dealing with schoolchildren with eating disorders. Many aspects of eating disorders present as social interactions with other children. However, if there is an absolute prohibition on discussing someone’s condition with other children, even the children who share a bedroom with them in boarding school, that seems to me destructive of the interests of the child. Therefore, I would like to see—and I hoped that I was seeing—a slight broadening of the current regulations which might lead to arrangements which allowed the best interests of the patient to come into effect rather than a strict adherence to the dogma of, "We can’t tell anybody".
Overseas Operations (Service Personnel and Veterans) Bill — House of Lords, 2021-04-26
Topic: Defense
Denis Tunnicliffe (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, we are very disappointed that the Government have rejected our amendment to Part 2 of the Bill. We still believe that it is simply wrong for those who put their life on the line serving Britain overseas to have less access to compensation and justice than the UK civilians whom they defend, or indeed than their colleagues whose service is largely UK based. The amendment was designed to ensure that claims by troops or former service personnel were not blocked in all circumstances after six years, as they would otherwise be under the Bill This provision also directly breaches the Armed Forces covenant, as the director-general of the Royal British Legion confirmed. He argued: "I think it"—by implication, the Bill— "is protecting the MOD, rather than the service personnel".—[Official Report, Commons, Overseas Operations (Service Personnel and Veterans) Bill Committee, 8/10/20; col. 86.] While our concerns have not gone away, we recognise that the Government have shown absolutely no desire to change this, so we will not ask the other place to think again with another vote. However, we strongly urge the Government to think further on this matter, and we will return to it as soon as possible For now, I want to thank colleagues for their unwavering support for our amendment, especially the noble and gallant Lords, Lord Stirrup and Lord Boyce. Having created such a widely based coalition against this part of the Bill, the Government should think long and hard and use the opportunity of the Armed Forces Bill to correct this deeply unwise feature of this one.
Covid-19: Update — House of Lords, 2021-04-20
Topic: Health
Prem Sikka (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, 4.7 million people in England are waiting for routine operations and procedures. Some 388,000 have been on waiting lists for more than a year. Even with the extra £7 billion a year, it is estimated that it will take five years to clear the backlog. Can I urge the Government to declare an NHS emergency, equivalent to that of Covid-19, provide additional resources to the NHS, and inform the House of the targets they will set for reducing the waiting list?
Licensing Act 2003: Post-Legislative Scrutiny (Licensing Act 2003 Report) — House of Lords, 2017-12-20
Topic: Health
Anne McIntosh (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I take this opportunity to thank all who have contributed to the debate and my noble friend the Minister for responding. Clearly, this is a subject to which we will return, and the committee will once again wish to record its disappointment that many of our recommendations have not been snatched up, including the need for urgency on the MUP and the need to look at reducing the number of retail offers, which I believe the evidence will show compellingly have worked in Scotland. As emerged from contributions from the noble Baroness, Lady Eaton, the noble Lord, Lord Smith of Hindhead, and others this evening, the committee is not persuaded of the effectiveness of late-night levies or early-morning restriction orders. I am delighted that the Government will look more closely at BIDs as an alternative in this regard I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Blair, is proved wrong and that we will not see more serious incidences of air rage. I take note of what my noble friend said regarding existing rights for pilots to expel someone from an aircraft who is plain drunk. There is increasing evidence this year that passengers are drinking duty-free before they even board an aircraft. That is causing enormous concern and needs to be watched. Our primary concern is passengers, but I do not believe that crew, many of whom are quite young in some carriers, should be placed in a difficult situation in this regard I yield to no one in my admiration for the noble Lord, Lord Brooke, and his campaigning zeal on the health aspects, closely followed by the noble Baronesses, Lady Watkins and Lady Henig—there was a bit of competition on the committee in that regard. We just need to find another mechanism to use rather than the licensing aspect I echo the disappointment of the noble Lord, Lord Foster, at the resources being put out to enforcement. The noble Baroness, Lady Eaton, talked about funding for local authorities. Although the committee no longer meets, I am sure we will seek to use other mechanisms such as questions to keep the matter under review I wish all of you, including the staff of the House, a merry Christmas, mindful of those who will have to work, including in the health service and the Armed Forces, during the Christmas period and beyond.
Health Infrastructure Plan — House of Lords, 2019-09-30
Topic: Health
Francis Hare (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, I thank the Minister for presenting this important sum of money to the health service. I am a patron of Best Beginnings, a perinatal service supporting mothers around the births of their children. I will stretch a little beyond the Statement and ask him about the future for health visitors. Since health visiting was placed under local authority responsibility and taken out of direct health service responsibility in 2014-15, there has been a serious decline in health visitors. It seems as though the Government have their chequebook out at the moment so, as he begins his brief, will he consider looking at the future for health visitors and what might be done to stem their loss?
Covid-19 Update — House of Lords, 2020-11-03
Topic: Health
Malcolm Bruce (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, yesterday the Prime Minister, in his characteristic style, said that the same terms would be available to Scotland if it went into lockdown later than England, yet this seems to be have been qualified by Robert Jenrick today, who said that it was a matter for the Chancellor. Scotland is watching to see whether the current restriction levels will bring about a sustained fall in the infection rate or whether more stringent measures will be needed. I am happy to acknowledge the £7.2 billion of additional support provided by the Treasury to Scotland, but we do not want a lockdown just to qualify for furlough, so clarity is needed. Will the same support now being given to England be available to Scotland if it has to follow the same route on a later timescale beyond 2 December?
Yemen: Humanitarian and Political Situation — House of Lords, 2017-11-20
Topic: Health
Tariq Ahmad (Conservative, Centre-right): The noble Lord raises a very valid point. Obviously, the disease that has followed the conflict is down to a lack of sanitation and clean water. The noble Lord points to statistics, and it is true that the situation on the ground gets worse not just every week but every day. I assure him that our priority in humanitarian terms is to look at providing appropriate vaccines, but the focus is also very much on water and sanitation—the issue that he rightly raised.
Covid-19 — House of Lords, 2022-01-06
Topic: Health
Natalie Evans (Conservative, Centre-right): The virtual wards are different from the Nightingale surge hubs. The hubs will create up to 4,000 beds if needed, and will be facilities that take patients who, although not fit for discharge, need minimal support and monitoring while they recover. The virtual wards involve people who are able to return home to have treatment through virtual interaction with medical professionals. They are different things done in different ways for different patients in different situations so that they can be properly treated in an appropriate manner.
Covid-19 — House of Lords, 2022-01-06
Topic: Health
Natalie Evans (Conservative, Centre-right): My understanding is that discussions are taking place in the JCVI and among scientific advisers but, in terms of things that have come politically, the answer is: not as far as I am aware. It is being looked at. The one thing that is happening is that those people who have specific immunity issues are being offered a further, fourth, jab after 12 weeks but, to be honest, that generally does not have a clear-cut science to it at the moment, if the noble Lord sees what I mean. It is being looked at but I am afraid that I cannot set out a position for him today.
Covid-19 — House of Lords, 2022-01-06
Topic: Health
Natalie Evans (Conservative, Centre-right): I agree with the noble Baroness’s last point but I think that she miscategorised me slightly. I did not say that antivirals were the only answer; I said that they are one part of a suite of things that we need to be doing, from ventilation through to hygiene and cleanliness. There is a whole range of things that we will need to do, but she is absolutely right: we need to understand how we can live with Covid and not continually chase our tails, because we can see the damage that it causes.
Health and Care Bill — House of Lords, 2022-01-31
Topic: Health
Syed Kamall (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I thank all noble Lords for their contributions to this debate. We are looking to move towards a more integrated care system for precisely some of the reasons that noble Lords have laid out: that a patient is discharged by a hospital but it is not done in an integrated way. As the noble Baroness, Lady Wheeler, said, during the pandemic local authorities and the NHS developed innovative ways to support better discharge from hospital to community care, and what we want to see is discharge to assess as one model. In some cases, it might be the best model: for example, where people are over the age of 80, the longer they stay in hospital, the more you see muscular deterioration. That is one of the reasons given for why, in some cases, discharge to assess might be the most appropriate.
Covid-19: Vaccinations — House of Lords, 2021-01-13
Topic: Health
Richard Oliver Faulkner (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I am happy to join others in congratulating the Minister on how he has delivered news about the vaccines to your Lordships’ House and to everybody concerned with the rollout. I wish it well in every possible respect. However, I am sure he will agree that, as it will take a little while before the vaccine has the beneficial consequences we want, it is essential that we do not drop our guard now. In that context, I return to a subject I asked him about two weeks ago: the mandatory wearing of face coverings. I asked him then what guidance the Government could give to public-spirited people who try to encourage others who are not wearing face masks in places such as shops and on public transport about whether they are right to do so? Can he give some comfort to those of us who want to intervene but are frankly deterred by the reaction we are likely to get? It is good news that the supermarkets are operating a new policy, and I welcome the announcement by the Metropolitan Police Commissioner. I would like a bit of a lead from the Government as well.
Covid-19: Vaccinations — House of Lords, 2021-01-13
Topic: Health
Jeffrey Rooker (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, I declare an interest as someone who is shielding. I too congratulate everybody involved in the vaccine project. The Minister alluded to the targets; I have to assume that we are going to vaccinate 350,000 today, so that we can maintain the target. That is really important. On the rural aspect, I live in Shropshire. Those who run Shropshire live in the north and tend to forget south Shropshire, so the issue of rural vaccination is pretty crucial. But can I make one final point relating to the point that my noble friend Lord Winston raised earlier on? I am in a position to ask the Minister a question today only because I gave my informed consent on three or four occasions in the last 12 months. I did not look on that as a specific performance contract by the NHS; I looked on it as allowing the NHS to do things to my body to help me survive. If they come along and change their opinion about the way they want you to survive, we should go along with their advice.
Health and Care Bill — House of Lords, 2022-01-31
Topic: Health
Daniel Moylan (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, before my noble friend sits down, on behalf of people who are currently suffering from pancreatic cancer or who might be diagnosed with it in the next few months, is anything going to happen faster in relation to dissemination of knowledge and prescription of PERT as a result of this debate than would have been the case had we not raised this with him?
Health and Care Bill — House of Lords, 2022-01-31
Topic: Health
Syed Kamall (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I will speak to two minor technical amendments, Amendments 232 and 312. These amendments, which are made to Clause 111, in relation to HSSIB, and Clause 136, in relation to international healthcare agreements, do not impact the policy of either clause. They simply amend the drafting so that references are made to an Assembly Bill rather than an Assembly Act in relation to Northern Ireland. I beg to move the first of these minor technical amendments, Amendment 232.
Covid-19 — House of Lords, 2021-02-11
Topic: Health
Robert Maurice Lipson Winston (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, the Minister knows that I have great respect for him, but I want to put a slightly colder note into this debate, which also reflects on the debate about the previous Statement. We have heard a lot of hugely optimistic and very confident statements from Members of the House and the Secretary of State. It strikes me that we must be a bit more cautious. As the Minister knows, the one country that has conducted more vaccinations than us, proportionate to the population, is Israel. It has also had a complete lockdown of airports, so that there is no ingress at all into the country. Yet puzzlingly, and not even the Israelis can explain this, the infection rate has not gone nearly as well as predicted or expected. Can he comment on that Furthermore, what does the Minister intend that the Government should do with regard to poor students returning, as they need to, for their exams? These students are deeply needed by the country and, if they have a good experience here, they were support us in the future when they are adults and working. I would be very grateful for his answer.
Covid-19 — House of Lords, 2021-02-11
Topic: Health
Jonathan Toby Harris (Labour, Centre-left): The variants of concern are already here, so self-isolation is vital for those who test positive in the community, yet many fail to do so because they will lose wages. Four million people in the UK have had Covid. The NAO says that the Government have spent over £270 billion on the pandemic so far. That is the equivalent of £67,500 per person infected. If that is the cost of each person who is infected by those who do not self-isolate, how low would the R number have to be for it not to be cost effective to pay at least £1,000 to everyone who tests positive, to ensure that they self-isolate?
Covid-19 Update — House of Lords, 2021-02-04
Topic: Health
Robert Maurice Lipson Winston (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, the Minister also hits the nail on the head when he talks about a highly infectious new variant that is resistant to the vaccine. As he knows, the scientists have been pointing out that we will be living with this virus for a very long time, and other viruses like it will emerge in due course. I refer to an answer he gave me last week when I asked about antivirals. There are a number of antivirals in development at the moment in this country that look very promising, an interferon beta-based compound by Synairgen and ACTIV-2, which could be used for ambulant patients in the early stages of the disease. If we got people as soon as they had symptoms and tested positive, we could do a great deal of good and reduce the risk of mutation in the population. Have the Government any plans to do what they did excellently with vaccines: pre-order antivirals as they come through phase 3?
Covid-19 — House of Lords, 2020-09-23
Topic: Health
Joan Walmsley (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): My Lords, is the noble Baroness aware that there has been a considerable rise in mental and emotional ill health since the pandemic began? Many people are fearful, anxious and depressed. In the Government’s messaging on the virus, does she agree that there needs to be a balance between frightening people about the seriousness of the disease so that they will obey the rules and reassuring people that, if they do obey the rules, they will probably be okay? Does she think the Prime Minister got that balance right yesterday? I am afraid I do not.
Health Measures at UK Borders — House of Lords, 2021-02-04
Topic: Health
Philip Alexander Hunt (Labour, Centre-left): That was exciting, my Lords. Can the Minister say what the delay is in putting the hotel quarantines together? The Government have known about the problem of the variant in South Africa for weeks—since well before Christmas. They have been advised by SAGE and NERVTAG about the need to take action, yet this morning we heard from the chief executive of the Best Western hotel chain, which has global experience of running these operations, that there has been virtually no detailed discussion with that company—or, I assume, with other companies. What on earth is the delay?
Health and Care Bill — House of Lords, 2022-01-26
Topic: Health
Syed Kamall (Conservative, Centre-right): I do not see it as a fix. The consultation was much wider than just NHS England. In November 2020, NHS England ran a public consultation on the structure of ICSs, including NHS staff, patients and members of the public.