I’d like to thank every Member involved in bringing about this debate today. As highlighted by the motion, bowel cancer is one of Wales’s biggest killers. It's the fourth most common cancer in the UK, with one in 14 men and one in every 19 women developing the cancer in their lifetime. Almost 16,000 people die from bowel cancer in the UK every year, and many of those deaths could be prevented if only we could diagnose the disease earlier. We have a bowel cancer screening programme for men and women aged between 60 and 74, but we should be screening everyone over the age of 50. Many people refuse to take the test because of embarrassment or because of the complexity of the home test. 

Thankfully there is a much more simple and accurate screening test, the faecal immunochemical test, or FIT test. I have spoken many times in this Chamber about FIT, about the need to introduce it earlier, about the need to lower the age for testing and, more importantly, the need to introduce a more scientifically robust sensitivity threshold. The FIT test has already been introduced in Scotland and will shortly become the standard test in England. In Wales we have to wait another year. The test is much simpler as it requires just a single sample and is much more accurate—or it would be if the Welsh Government hadn’t opted to lower the sensitivity threshold. Wales is having a testing threshold that is half that proposed in Scotland and lower than that proposed for England. We are told that this is because we don’t have the capacity in endoscopy services to perform follow-up tests. How many cancers will be missed as a result? How many people will die because we took the easy route?

I hope, when responding to this debate, the Cabinet Secretary will outline his plan for increasing colonoscopy capacity in Wales, outline the actions his Government will take to accelerate increasing the sensitivity of the FIT test, and outline a timetable for lowering the screening age to 50. Screening saves lives and it's estimated that around 6,000 people in their 50s are being diagnosed with bowel cancer each year. As other members have highlighted, when bowel cancer is diagnosed early, 90 per cent of patients survive, as opposed to only one in 10 when diagnosed at a later stage. It makes sense to lower the age of screening to 50, given that nearly 95 per cent of cases are in the over-50s.

Unfortunately, here in this Chamber, we are keenly aware that bowel cancer can strike at any age—it has no respect for age—with one of our own battling the disease, and having lost a staff member, Sam Gould. Therefore, we have to increase awareness of the symptoms because, as we know, if caught early, this terrible disease can be beaten.

We also know that there are genetic conditions such as Lynch syndrome that can increase the risk factor of developing bowel cancer. All bowel cancer patients should be screened for Lynch syndrome and screening should then be offered to family members.

I urge the Welsh Government to do all they can to improve screening, to stop people dying needlessly because the disease was discovered too late. I urge Members to support this motion. Thank you.