A former Beaconsfield mayor who tragically lost his daughter to a brain tumour 15 years ago, spoke out about her tragic story at a Speaker’s House event in a bid to highlight the “chronic underfunding” of the disease.

Sandy Saunders’ oldest daughter, Diana Ford, died aged 42 weeks after she was diagnosed with an aggressive glioblastoma multiforme brain tumour, leaving her three young boys without their mum.

Now he and wife Rosemary are campaigning for change into brain tumour research, urging MPs to reverse the “decades” of underfunding, and to “significantly” improve treatments for the thousands of people in the UK living with the disease.

Mr Saunders, who is also the president of the board of trustees at national charity Brain Tumour Research, set up the Diana Ford Trust to fund vital research before it merged with Brain Tumour Research in 2009.

Famous faces who attended the Speaker’s House event included Buckingham MP and Speaker of the House John Bercow, who hosted, and TV's Debbie McGee, whose husband Paul Daniels died from a brain tumour a year ago.

Mr Saunders said: “Our lives were devastated in 2002 when we lost Diana…

“During that short time, I had tried everything I could to help, including ringing scientists, neurosurgeons, charities etc. about drugs, treatments, anything.

“But there was nothing anyone could do. The sad thing is even today there still aren’t the treatments available to cure people diagnosed with aggressive brain tumours.

“More research is needed so fewer lives will be devastated by this dreadful disease.

“I want to see a day when cancer is no longer life-threatening, when the notion that cancer could be a killer is thought absurd.

“We must act to improve outcomes for patients and increase funding into brain tumour research.”