Contribution
This Government aim to shift the focus from treatment to prevention, and it is in that spirit that I have tabled new clauses 90 and 91, which would strengthen the frameworks around health inequalities and address the wider determinants of health.
New data from Health Equals reveals a shocking reality: there is a gap of up to 18 years in life expectancy between different parts of the UK, and indeed between nearby neighbourhoods. Health Equal shows that in my constituency just a golf course separates two areas with an average life expectancy gap of eight years and 11 months. Reaching old age is somewhat of an aspiration in my more deprived areas. Indeed, in the most deprived communities people spend an average of just 52 years in good health. The stark inequalities are driven not only by healthcare, but by the wider determinants of health, including poverty, housing, education, employment and the environment.
Within Stoke-on-Trent, healthy life expectancy at birth has fallen by 6.6% for men in the last decade. For women, the picture is even worse, with a 9.6% fall in healthy life expectancy to just 53.5 years over the past 10 years. This Bill represents a real opportunity to enshrine in law a statutory duty for the Secretary of State to go beyond reducing inequalities in NHS access and outcomes, and to reflect wider cross-Government goals for health improvement.
Our health is shaped by the world around us—the food we eat, the money in our pockets, the air we breathe and the home we live in. In other words, every part of Government has an opportunity to influence people’s health. The purpose of new clause 90 is to ensure that the Government take greater responsibility for improving the nation’s health. That includes mitigating any increase in health inequalities, such as those seen in my constituency. The new clause would make improving health a duty, placing prevention on the same footing as treatment.
But a stronger duty alone is not enough. That is why new clause 91 would require the Government to publish a new health improvement and inequality strategy within six months. The strategy would include long-term targets for adults and children, public reporting on progress, a duty on Ministers across Government to have regard to the strategy, and independent accountability arrangements. The Minister, who has worked very hard on the Bill—I commend her for her engagement—has alluded to the fact that pre-existing guidance and processes are in place, and these are designed to tackle health inequalities, and she is right. However, I argue that they are clearly not working, because health inequality has increased. I ask again what the harm would be of embedding this duty in the Bill to tackle the most fundamental issue in health across England: health inequalities.
These amendments have cross-party support, and I note that they are also supported by the Health and Social Care Committee. I thank Health Equals for its work on these amendments. Again, I thank the Minister for her engagement and urge the Government to consider accepting these new clauses.
I will briefly mention new clause 109, which also stands in my name. It was written by myself and Haris Shuaib, with whom I worked on the standard BS 30440 and a validation framework for the use of AI within healthcare. I previously worked with the AI and digital regulations service for NHS England, working with NICE, the MHRA, the CQC and the Health Research Authority. In the interests of time, I will say that in that duty I identified a number of accountability and regulatory gaps that certainly need further addressing. I ask that the Minister responsible for health tech meets me so that we can discuss these further. They partner quite well with new clause 108, which I had not spotted, so I apologise for not signing the amendment of my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool West Derby (Ian Byrne).