Last week I was pleased to meet with school nurses and health visitors who work across North Lancashire. They work incredibly hard and care deeply about the welfare and development of our children.

It was concerning to hear of their experiences supporting babies and children with health and social challenges. If we are to do the best by our young people, we need to start with better support for health visitors and school nurses!

We discussed concerns about the Government not funding some of the recent Agenda for Change pay deal for people not directly working for the NHS. This is even though these staff have faced the same challenges and pressures as those who are directly employed NHS staff. Many have also got years of working directly for the NHS under their belt, but have been contracted out in recent years.

To me this fragmentation of our health services is not only impacting the continuity of care for patients, it’s affected continuity of employment and fair pay for workers. The only people who seem to benefit from this kind of creeping privatisation of our health services are the company shareholders.

I very much share the concerns of my constituents and others who are helping to deliver vital healthcare services and I believe it is totally unacceptable for them to miss out, either in full or in part, on the recently agreed NHS pay deal. I have raised the alarm on this with the Secretary of State for the Department of Health and Social Care, and I will keep working towards ensuring that those who work in our public services get fair pay.

If you would like to contact me about this or anything else then please email me at cat.smith.mp@parliament.uk .