Heading into 2025 with hope

I’m not a great singer, but that doesn’t stop me loving a carol at this time of year. And singing alongside Dame Joanna Lumley (who of course has a lovely voice) and over 800 of our brilliant supporters at our annual Carol Concert earlier this month was a bit of a moment for me. The event not only marks the last big milestone in the Macmillan calendar, but also the end of a significant year for our charity.

During the evening, we heard from Sophia Jones, who was diagnosed with cancer in early 2019; she held the audience captive by talking about the challenges she has faced and the hope she has found in her experience of cancer. Her words reminded us again of what a difficult year it has been for people with cancer.

Over the last year, conversations around cancer have stayed firmly in the spotlight. We saw two members of the Royal Family share their diagnoses with the world, which is unprecedented. The openness of His Majesty King Charles and Her Royal Highness The Princess of Wales has not only helped to raise awareness of cancer, but it has also encouraged more people to seek out vital support. At Macmillan we saw almost 50,000 hits to the information and support pages of our website in one day*. I’ve been able to share this with His Majesty, who is our Patron, as well as our plans for the year ahead.

And this all happened in a year when support for people with living cancer has never been so critical. We know that there are 3 million people living with cancer in the UK, and that this number is rising. We’ll talk more about this in January. At the same time, for many people, their experience of cancer is getting worse rather than better. Lord Darzi’s review of the healthcare system highlighted how it is in “serious trouble”, despite hard-working professionals who, as we all know, are giving everything they’ve got. The truth is that some people are being hit even harder by cancer because of who they are or where they live.

People are being left behind, but it doesn’t have to be this way.

At Macmillan, we are known and loved for doing whatever it takes to support people living with cancer. As I write this, I’m proud to say that we’re on track to have supported even more people in 2024 than in 2023**. We’ve demanded the very best care for people with cancer across all four nations of the UK - and we’ve worked hand-in-hand with people with cancer and community leaders, supporters and volunteers, healthcare professionals, decision makers and partners to do this.

We’ve worked in partnership with marginalised communities to support people with cancer up and down the country, from Black women in Watford to fishermen in North Shields, Tyne and Wear. We've worked alongside the Coalfields Regeneration Trust in Bridgend, Merthyr Tydfil and Rhondda Cynon Taf in Wales, to help people with cancer and their families deal with their emotional and practical needs by signposting them to local cancer support services.

We’ve rolled out our ground-breaking ‘Improving the Cancer Journey’ personalised care model across Scotland, with the service launching in the last part of the country in 2025. This is the culmination of ten years of work, and offers everyone with cancer in Scotland the personalised, tailored support they need through a network of local partners. We’ve increased the number of innovations that we’re investing in, from Neutrocheck - a finger-prick blood test which helps doctors to identify patients at risk of neutropenic sepsis - to Lucida Medical, to help shape the future of care through patient-led innovation.

We’ve been testing and learning; our award-winning end-of-life care social investment fund is focused on improving outcomes for people at end of life and catalysing change in healthcare systems across the UK, and we're now looking at the approach to see how we can use it to support people with cancer and other long-term conditions, addressing health inequalities and improving access to care. We’ve been joining forces with our corporate partners to go further and faster, like sexual wellness brand Lovehoney, who we teamed up with to highlight the impact that taboos around sex are having on people with cancer.

I am proud of how many organisations, community groups we have worked with, and we owe our thanks to so many. On top of this, we’ve painted the UK ‘Macmillan green’ in our thousands, through volunteers and supporters taking on coffee mornings, Mighty Hikes, LGBTQ+ Pride marches and marathons. And these are a tiny handful of my highlights from the year - and as always, I am focussed on how much more there is still to do.

After a year of transformation, we’re ending 2024 in a strong financial position; confident that we will be able to weather a turbulent time for charities, and aware of the responsibility this gives us to support other organisations. It has been heartbreaking to see other vital charities struggle and some even have to close their doors. I am painfully aware that there will be more of this over the coming months and years, and we have a role to play in strengthening the sector by being a generous collaborator and partner to organisations both big and small. We have started learning how to do this better through our approach to developing our new organisational strategy. We have come to understand how we can work differently - both as an organisation and in partnership - to have even greater impact. And also, crucially, how we can do this in a responsible and sustainable way.

We’re set to hit the ground running as we head into 2025. We’ll do more in the places where people with cancer need us most; we’ll build on the information and support we offer so that it’s more relevant and helpful, and we’ll find new ways of delivering it so we reach more people. We’ll also grow our community of nurses, doctors and other healthcare professionals who we work alongside, to ensure that people get the very best of cancer care.

At the same time, we’ll help to make cancer care fair - for everyone - by helping more people to get the best care that the UK has to offer. And we’ll work with the people who have the worst experience of cancer care to find the solutions that suit them. We’ll bring together local partners - across public services, business and the charity sector - to help tackle the deep-rooted problems that exist in cancer care; not just for the people in front of us now, but for everyone who will be diagnosed in the future too.

A lot has changed since 1911, when Douglas Macmillan founded our organisation, but one thing that will never change is our passion for and commitment to fighting for the best possible support for everyone living with cancer, no matter who they are or where they live.

Better is possible - and it’s time for us to work together to transform cancer care for good. We have big plans for 2025 and we look forward to sharing more with you in the new year.

*Macmillan Cancer Support internal data. Refers to Monday 5th February 2024. On this day there were 48,304 unique page views of the information and support pages on the Macmillan website, the highest daily figure since at least March 2020 and 42% higher than the equivalent day in 2023.