Debate contribution: North/South Ministerial Council: Health and Food Safety

Debate contribution by Mr Mike Nesbitt on 1 July 2024.

MLA

Mr Mike Nesbitt

Party at the time

Ulster Unionist Party

Date

1 July 2024

Type

Debate contribution (made as a minister)

Business

Ministerial Statements

Heading

North/South Ministerial Council: Health and Food Safety

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 4498857

Read the official Assembly record

Text

I thank the Member for her question. I have to be honest and say that women's health, as a specific agenda item, was not discussed in great detail. Cancer was discussed in considerable detail, in particular the need for this Administration to bring forward a cancer research strategy. I would like to think that that will, of course, include a section that is relevant to women's health. As it happens, I will have a Zoom call with my Welsh counterpart later this afternoon, and, certainly, women's health will be part of that agenda. The Member knows that I am keen for this body and its Executive to look at the idea of gender budgeting, the impact of how we spend our money and what that means for men and women, because there are areas in which the outcomes are, frankly, grossly imbalanced, and that needs to be addressed. The way to start that is to collect the data, which we are not necessarily doing.

If I heard the Member correctly, she asked for a commitment to bring forward a cancer research strategy within this mandate. I hope to please the Member by going a little further: I would like to do that within this calendar year — that is my objective — and, certainly, within the mandate.

I thank the Member for her question. I wish to explore that with senior officials. I noted the discussion that we had on what the health sector can do on biodiversity and climate change. I then stayed on as Minister O'Dowd's accompanying Minister for the sectoral meeting on infrastructure. I am not criticising the officials who were there for the health meeting, but there was a detailed presentation at the infrastructure meeting about what can be done on biodiversity. I brought that back with me from Armagh, and I want to inject it into the Department of Health to ask, "How can we learn from it? How can we mirror it? How can we expand on our current plans?".

I thank the Member for his question. I can absolutely give that commitment. It was the first time that I had met Stephen Donnelly, and, for my part, I thought that we got on extremely well. I look forward to working with him. I will have no difficulty doing so and will enjoy working with him. He is obviously well across his brief and has some great ideas. I talked about my proposed initiative for the autumn to tackle health inequalities, and he told me about something that he tried in his jurisdiction that did not work as well as was intended, because its delivery was not as he had envisaged it would be. It was affirming for me to realise that what he had intended to do is pretty much exactly what I intend to do. To return to the specifics of the Member's question, yes, cooperation on cancer care and research has to be done on an all-island basis. As, I think, I have said before in the House, it is not a question of whether we should cooperate but a question of what our capacity is to cooperate. That is the only inhibitor.

I thank the Member. As with a lot of issues, it is about data collection, about understanding the data and about recognising that there are common threads, but behind data is the human cost. Every data set is about the human cost of somebody who has taken their own life. Every suicide has to be regarded as preventable. I want to build on an initiative that I started in my constituency a number of years ago. I was contacted by a mother whose 23-year-old son had taken his life. She wanted to hold a vigil in Conway Square in Newtownards to remember him. A lot of people turned up, but we realised that they had come not in solidarity but because they had also lost loved ones to suicide. Those of us who organised the vigil felt that we could not just leave it there, so we started the Ards Suicide Awareness Group. We go into schools. We give money towards resilience and mental capacity training, and there are reflective benches in all the large housing configurations in Newtownards. We sponsor safeTALK training, which is an awareness campaign that empowers people not to be counsellors but to listen to people and to signpost them to services. I want to develop such initiatives with the Government of Ireland as we go forward.

I thank the Member for his question. I think that it already is. My assessment is that the North West Cancer Centre is at the leading edge. As for what further can be done, there are two issues. First, we have to scope it out. Officials will do that as part of the work programme that I discussed, which they are working on to present at the next meeting in the autumn. Secondly, we have to ask about the budgetary ability, particularly for our Department of Health, to invest further in the North West Cancer Centre, because, as Members are aware, the budget settlement to date has proved to be disappointing for my Department.

The Member raises a very important point. I confirm that we did indeed discuss that issue specifically. I hope that the Member will permit me not to go into the detail of that discussion, because, I think, Minister Donnelly wished to take some points away to consider them with his officials and bring those back in the autumn. I think that we agree that it is a big, horrible ask to require parents to travel by plane or ferry to Alder Hey Children's Hospital in Liverpool in such horrible and tragic circumstances. In my view, if it were possible to have a pathology centre, in Belfast preferably but, if not, in Dublin, that would relieve a lot of that stress and strain. It is in that area that we are moving, if I may put it like that. I am not, however, comfortable rehearsing my conversation with Minister Donnelly without first speaking to him again.

I thank the Member. No, there was no substantive discussion, and the reason for that is simple: there is nothing in my budget to permit such a replacement. It was a successful scheme. Well over 4,000 people applied to it, and just over 4,000 went through it. The satisfaction level was high. As I have said before, I have no political or ideological objection to reintroducing the scheme, but it is a question of capacity in our budget to do it. At the moment, it is not on the agenda.

Many hospitals, including Daisy Hill Hospital, the South West Acute Hospital in Enniskillen and Altnagelvin Hospital in Derry/Londonderry, are in that position.

I thank the Member. In her last few words, she mentioned something important: the word "network". I am coming towards the end of my deliberations and consultations with senior colleagues on a reconfiguration plan for our hospital network, and I hope to have something detailed to say about that in the immediate future, ahead of going into pre-consultation. That plan needs to consider where all-Ireland work is appropriate, and I will look to explore and maximise that. Once again, it is about capacity, and, if we can maximise capacity in cooperation, so much the better; I am absolutely for it.

1,234 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Assessment

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Assessed 21 October 2026 at 10:49 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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