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Public Health (England)

I am not going to give way to the hon. Lady for a little while, although I promise to do so if I have time. Given the great complexity of public health, it is a pity that the Government have sought to balkanise it and set responsibility for it at a relatively junior level. In December, the Minister rightly pointed out that the Black report of 1980 did not receive the attention it deserved, but she did not admit that in 1999 her Government ignored the Acheson report, which covered almost the same ground. That omission was not corrected today. This is the first time that we have debated public health in Government time for more than four years, although the Opposition have been extremely generous in using much of their own time to do so—we did so as recently as December—because we think that it is an important subject. The Government, however, have been busy. They appointed a public health Minister and have proceeded to churn out publications of breathtaking vapidity, culminating in last October’s ““Health Challenge England””. They launched their ““Small change, big difference”” public health campaign in April. Small change indeed! Will the Minister confirm that expenditure on that extravaganza totals £13,360? I am reminded of that campaign only because ““Small change, big difference”” has been recycled as a catchy soundbite on the front of the document that we are discussing. ““Health Challenge England”” is big on anecdote disguised as case study, but two and a half years after the ““Choosing Health”” White Paper, we are entitled to expect an update with a clearer sense of direction. Indeed, the document is evidently so inconsequential that the Minister did not even bother mention it in her 30-minute rant the last time that we debated public health on 5 December. Ministers cite reductions since 1997 in mortality from cancer and cardiovascular disease, but are we seriously expected to believe that they are responsible for those reductions? Deaths from those causes are happily in long-term decline, and current trends are simply extrapolations from the 1970s and 1980s.