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Cancer Treatment

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who have participated in the debate. My noble friend Lady Golding brought to it all the expertise of a highly experienced radiographer. At the heart of her contribution, she called on the need for increased training and protection for workers in this area of nuclear medicine. I am reassured that my noble friend the Minister said in his reply that the Government are treating these matters very seriously. The noble Baroness, Lady Tonge, brought her expertise as a GP and referred to her husband’s role in the development of PET and CT combined scanners, for which we are all grateful. But she also referred to the identification of secondary tumours, which was a subject that I failed to refer to. A particular point was made to me by John Moore Gillan, who is the lead consultant in the department of respiratory medicine at St Bartholemew’s Hospital. On the other training issues that the noble Baroness raised, I myself will do more research into those specific issues, which are of particular interest to students of this whole debate. Her concerns related to what happens in the conditions of the development of public/private partnerships and the implications for training. The noble Earl, Lord Howe, referred in his contribution to the views being expressed by leaders in the area of cancer care nationally to this whole debate. He referred to the sparing of pain for patients, but I would argue that there is equally a sparing of pain to another group of people in society—that is, to the taxpayer. There are major public expenditure implications in CT scans which are beneficial to the taxpayer, as the avoidance of surgery has major implications for health service budgets. I would suggest to the National Audit Office that, following the success in the treatment of its report on cancer issues and the subsequent PAC report to which the noble Earl referred, it too might want to look specifically at that area, to see whether it can be shown—as I am suggesting—that major savings would arise for the public purse if we went down the PET CT scanning route. In other words, there are issues of economy, efficiency and effectiveness in this whole area that are of great interest to the taxpayer. My noble friend the Minister referred to the Government’s substantial record in providing equipment for the treatment of cancer, and we are all as a nation indebted to the Government for that. As my noble friend said, there are thousands of pieces of equipment—without going into detail—that have only recently been brought on stream, many of which I was able to observe closely during the time that I spent with my son. My noble friend emphasised the role that independent contractors will make in meeting the demand for that kind of equipment. That emphasis will generate a lot of discussion in hospitals throughout the country, in the trade unions involved and particularly among health service professionals, who have been gravely frightened by their experience over CT scanning and the contractualisation of use of facilities. I close by thanking my noble friend for this promise that we are about to receive the framework document, which we are all looking forward to reading. I thank him for the time that his department officials have spent in recent days in ensuring that my debate, of which they were given good notice, was fully answered. I thank my noble friend and I beg leave to withdraw the Motion for Papers. Motion for Papers, by leave, withdrawn.