Annual Review 2008/09 - Cancer Research UK

Influencing public policyWe work with politicians around the UKto keep cancer at the top of the politicalagenda. We take every opportunity to meetwith Ministers, politicians of all parties andcivil servants. We tell them what we thinkabout important issues relating to cancerand how legislation could be changed forthe better. It’s an essential part of our workto help us beat cancer.Our ‘Out of Sight, Out of Mind’ campaign urges politicians toprotect children and young people from tobacco marketing,aiming to stop them from becoming smokers in the firstplace. We have lobbied in Westminster and Scotland,supporting proposals to put tobacco out of sight in shopsand supermarkets. We have also been calling for tobaccovending machines to be removed and cigarettes to becovered by plain packaging.Many thousands of you joined our campaign, signing petitionsand emailing your views to Peers, MPs and MSPs. As a result,the Westminster and Scottish parliaments are debating newlaws to remove tobacco products from the point of sale andrestrict vending machines.Our ‘Screening Matters’ campaign, to get more people toattend cancer screening programmes, continues to have animpact. We produced a set of detailed policy reports forNHS organisations. These looked at ways to increase theuptake of screening and make sure there are enough trainedstaff in the screening services. These reports were based oninformation collected by our supporters from local MPs andNHS bodies. We are now working to build stronger links withthe NHS at a local level to help them implement nationalguidance on cancer.Access to new cancer drugs continues to make headlinesand cause controversy. We were an integral part of the changewhich means treatments for rarer cancers are now more likelyto be approved. We also asked cancer patients to commenton a series of important decisions by the National Institute forHealth and Clinical Excellence (NICE) on whether to allow theuse of four new kidney cancer drugs in the NHS. We sharedthese views with NICE’s specialists, as well as telling them whatour researchers and clinicians thought of their decisions.We continue to work with the national parliaments andassemblies to help them develop, introduce and monitortheir national cancer plans. These strategies will help shapecancer services and aim to improve cancer prevention,diagnosis, treatment and research. We make sure the voicesof patients and researchers are heard on crucial cancer issues.For more on our influencing workwww.cancerresearchuk.org/publicpolicy14 / Annual Review / Influencing public policy