EU membership good for UK as it gives medical students access to more diseases, says Labour peer

Lord Winston says movement of people across EU helps British medicine 'massively'

Lord Robert Winston thinks leaving the EU will be bad for doctors (Rex Features)

The UK benefits from EU membership as British medical students have greater access to people with different diseases, a Labour peer has said.

Lord Robert Winston, a doctor and scientist who is perhaps best known for presenting on the BBC, said the movement of people across the EU had helped British medicine “massively” and is a reason to stay in the EU.

“It gives our students extra teaching material,” he said while on a EU referendum debate panel at Regent's University London.

“They are seeing diseases they would not see in the indigenous population and treating them successfully,” he added.

Lord Winston said the threat of pandemic diseases spread by air travel was real and praised EU scientists for working together “extremely well”.

Lord Winston, who became a member of the House of Lords in 1995, also said it was a “massive mistake” to elect Jeremy Corbyn as the Labour party’s leader.

“I don’t think he has the right skills to lead a political party," he said.

“Take the health service for example. It is really quite shocking how that debate has been very narrow. I think Jeremy, bless him, is not helping.”