Indeed. We recognise that more people are being treated and more people are being diagnosed with cancer, and that’s the reality. It’s something about the population we have, and it’s also about the greater recognition of the fact that people are being diagnosed later in life than they otherwise would have been. We recognise that we’re not the only post-industrial country with an ageing population to have a problem with lung cancer. However, survival from lung cancer is poor relative to many other cancers in most countries, but our ambition, as set out in the cancer deliver plan, is to close the gap with the best in Europe. We recognise that we are not there now.

The 2013 cancer plan is currently being refreshed by the Wales cancer network, and I will endorse and publish a new plan by the end of this month. The Government amendment and the contribution from Rhun ap Iorwerth recognise that we’re going to provide £15 million of capital funding for 2016-17 for diagnostics, and this will support work to improve cancer diagnosis in addition to the £10 million we’ve already invested in replacing linear accelerators and our commitment to a new £200 million Velindre Cancer Centre mentioned by Julie Morgan in her contribution. Of course, the £15 million capital funding was agreed as part of the budget agreement with Plaid Cymru, recognising our shared priorities to improve diagnostic services.

The national cancer implementation group has already been taking forward a lung cancer initiative over the past year, and I was pleased to hear this mentioned in the opening contribution from Caroline Jones. This includes a symptom awareness campaign that ran over the summer, and a programme to help improve lung cancer surgery outcomes, a really important part of improving survival rates. We also want to help people to be ready for surgery, so prehabilitation before surgery, and to provide enhanced recovery.

Through NHS Wales’s participation in the British lung cancer audit, we have already seen improvements in the quality of services, including increases in our lung resection rates. There’s still more to do, but some of our services do perform incredibly well against several elements of those national standards. For example, treatment by a specialist nurse in Wales is 88 per cent, compared to a British average of 78 per cent, and the management of the condition in an individual being discussed at a lung cancer multidisciplinary team is 99.6 per cent in Wales compared to a British average of 94 per cent. So, all is not lost. There are some areas where we perform very well compared to UK counterparts.

The specialised services committee in Wales is also reviewing thoracic surgery services here in south Wales with a view to improving the model available. Cardiff and Vale health board was also partnered with Novartis to redesign and shorten the lung cancer pathway, and improving the pathway was a really important part of improving outcomes for patients across the board. The GP contract includes a national priority area for cancer prevention and detection, but also includes an analysis of all cases of lung cancer in 2015 to inform practice development and cluster action plans. I hope that deals with one of the points made in the opening speech.

We have of course partnered with Macmillan to support improvement in identifying suspected cancer in primary care, as well as post-diagnosis support and treatment. This Government will continue to implement regulations on environmental hazards such as asbestos and air pollution, but as has been recognised in a number of contributions today, smoking remains the highest risk factor for lung cancer. With smoking rates of up to 29 per cent in our most deprived communities, we can see the importance of continuing to have a focus on tobacco control and smoking cessation to address the biggest preventable cause of lung cancer and the inequalities in cancer incidence and outcomes.

The October United Kingdom Lung Cancer Coalition report stated that

‘significant steps have been taken in Wales to improve outcomes for those diagnosed with lung cancer’.

I’m happy to say I met representatives of the coalition in February and my officials met them again in June. Work is already progressing against many of their recommendations. This is an area where we recognise more improvement is necessary, but we continue to invest over £6.4 million annually in specialist palliative care services, and we are committed to ensuring people approaching the end of their life here in Wales have access to high-quality and specialist palliative care. That’s why we’re focusing on supporting hospice-at-home services, developing a consistent approach to advanced care plans, and rolling out the care decisions document for the last days of life. Also, we’re ensuring comprehensive paediatric palliative care arrangements are in place.

I’m happy to say that, this week, I’ve had conversations with stakeholders about how we do we improve both paediatric and adult end-of-life care services. One million pounds of funding is already available to both cancer and end-of-life implementation groups. The end-of-life implementation board is funding support for hospice-at-home services to enable people to die comfortably in their preferred place of death. We recognise that far too many people still die in a hospital bed, where it’s not the choice of where they want to end their days and equally not the most appropriate place for that to happen. One hundred and fifty-nine thousand pounds has also been allocated to support staff with advanced communication skills involved in end-of-life care.

The end-of-life care plan is also being updated and I expect to publish the new plan in January. Working with other parties in the Assembly, in particular with Plaid Cymru following our budget negotiations, we’ve included an additional £1 million for end-of-life care within the draft budget. This is for all end-of-life care services, rather than a specific section or a specific set of conditions, which I do not think would be either manageable or, frankly, ethically desirable.

These priorities do include the further expansion of hospice-at-home services and extending the reach of serious illness conversations, but I do think that we should recognise that, here in Wales, we’re in a better position than our UK counterparts on end-of-life care. However, there is more, of course, that we could and should do. The Government amendment confirms recent improvements in one-year lung cancer survival and the approach set out in the cancer and end-of-life delivery plans. We also highlight the important partner arrangements we have with the third sector, in particular the Wales Cancer Alliance and hospice sector, and the additional £240 million for the health service in the draft budget.

We should recognise and celebrate the progress that has been made, but we will continue to work with and welcome the constructive challenge of the third sector and will continue to work with our clinicians right across the NHS. So, this Government recommits itself to the further improvement that all of us would wish to see.