Asked by: Lord Smith of Finsbury (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Baroness Merron on 11 March (HL15210), what insurance arrangements they envisage for NHS-accredited hospitals providing services commissioned by public health authorities which were previously part of the NHS but are now part of local government.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
Where National Health Service accredited hospitals provide services commissioned by public health authorities which were previously part of the NHS but are now part of local government, any liability arising from clinical negligence is covered by the Clinical Negligence Scheme for Trusts (CNST). CNST is a state indemnity scheme administered by NHS Resolution.
Asked by: Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what discussions they have held with the Human Tissue Authority regarding the final report of the Evaluation of the Organ Donation (Deemed Consent) Act 2019, published by McLaughlin et al on 1 January 2024.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Department has not held discussions with the Human Tissue Authority (HTA) regarding the final report of the Evaluation of the Organ Donation (Deemed Consent) Act 2019.
The Organ Donation Joint Working Group, jointly chaired by the Department and NHS Blood and Transplant (NHSBT), made recommendations which ministers have noted, and which action owners are working together to implement. As part of this work, the Department, NHSBT, and HTA have met to discuss the report’s findings and actions. The HTA is currently at an early stage of reviewing its current statutory codes of practice and will revise them where necessary to ensure they remain clear, up to date, and effective.
NHSBT is actively progressing work to ensure that their family approach processes use clear, affirmative language that supports a family’s understanding of their loved one’s recorded donation decision. As part of this, NHSBT are reviewing their operational guidance and training materials for specialist nurses in organ donation to strengthen support offered to families by focussing on building trust and rapport with the family to explore the patient’s beliefs and values as a central reference point for the donation decision, rather than focusing on any last known expressed wishes.
Asked by: Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether they will require NHS England to use its powers under section 14Z61 of the National Health Service Act 2006 to ensure that integrated care boards allow the prescription of liothyronine where clinically appropriate.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
Decisions about prescribing liothyronine are made by the responsible clinician. NHS England guidance, which aligns with National Institute for Health and Care Excellence guidance on the assessment and management of thyroid disease, is clear that liothyronine should not be routinely prescribed in primary care. Where clinically appropriate, liothyronine should only be initiated by a National Health Service consultant endocrinologist, and only where no clinically appropriate alternative treatment is available.
Integrated care boards are responsible for local commissioning arrangements and for supporting the application of national guidance, but it is for clinicians, working with their patients, to decide on the most appropriate treatment in line with that guidance.
Asked by: Baroness Barker (Liberal Democrat - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they will take to ensure that people in prisons have effective access to HIV prevention tools, including condoms, pre-exposure prophylaxis, post-exposure prophylaxis, and harm-reduction measures.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The new HIV Action Plan sets out how the Government will enable every level of the healthcare system to work together to engage everyone in prevention, testing, and treatment, tackling stigma, and reaching our ambition to end new HIV transmissions by 2030. This includes a dedicated action to deliver tailored and targeted HIV prevention, treatment, and care services to meet the needs of local populations and address inequalities, including the challenges of HIV prevention and care in prisoners.
Sexual health services in prisons are commissioned by NHS England under the Section 7a Public Health Functions Agreement with the Department. They are required to deliver care and ensure access in accordance with the British Association for Sexual Health and HIV’s prison standards, helping to ensure that all individuals in custody receive equitable healthcare comparable to that available in the community.
Access to HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis in England is via commissioned level three sexual health services. These are commissioned by local authorities for people in the community. NHS England Health and justice commissioners arrange for these providers to enable access for detained people via referral for assessment. The service is accessed by the detained person via in-reach provision, where the sexual health team come on-site, or out-reach provision, where the individual goes out to clinic. The level three sexual health team use the same commissioning policy to provide the service on the same basis to detained people and people in the community.
HIV post exposure prophylaxis is accessed by prisoners in the same way as people in the community. They attend accident and emergency or access a Sexual Assault Referral Centre based on locally commissioned arrangements.
To inform future action, the UK Health Security Agency is working with regional partners to carry out an audit to understand the provision of HIV diagnosis, prevention, and care in English prisons.
Asked by: Lord Boateng (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the adequacy of the powers and performance of the Care Quality Commission in inspecting supported accommodation for people with autism, in the light of the death of Chanté Lloyd-Buckingham.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
We have not made a formal assessment of the adequacy of the powers and performance of the Care Quality Commission (CQC) in inspecting supported accommodation for people with autism.
Under the Health and Social Care Act 2008, a provider must register with the CQC if they provide a regulated activity. More specifically, supported living providers need to register with the CQC if they carry out the regulated activity of ‘personal care’. The CQC’s guidance Housing with Care provides further information on regulated activities and how they apply in the context of supported living services. A copy of the CQC’s guidance is attached.
The Government is tackling poor quality supported housing to ensure that residents get the care and support they need and is committed to the reforms set out in the Supported Housing (Regulatory Oversight) Act 2023 (the Act). The Act was enacted to address gaps in regulation and set standards for the support provided to prevent exploitation in the sector, ensuring that all providers deliver safe housing and necessary support services.
The Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government consulted on proposals for implementing the measures set out in the Act between February and May 2025. These include the introduction of new National Supported Housing Standards for all supported housing settings, enforced through a licensing regime, and a proposal to link the payment of higher rates of Housing Benefit to licensing in England. We are working to issue the Government response to the consultation as soon as possible.
Asked by: Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of Action 6(iii) in the report, A Bolder, Braver Approach for Organ Donation in the UK, published by the Organ Donation Joint Working Group on 21 January, to change the Human Tissue Authority Code of Practice and NHS Blood and Transplant processes so that families are approached for information to support donation proceeding using affirmative language.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Department has not held discussions with the Human Tissue Authority (HTA) regarding the final report of the Evaluation of the Organ Donation (Deemed Consent) Act 2019.
The Organ Donation Joint Working Group, jointly chaired by the Department and NHS Blood and Transplant (NHSBT), made recommendations which ministers have noted, and which action owners are working together to implement. As part of this work, the Department, NHSBT, and HTA have met to discuss the report’s findings and actions. The HTA is currently at an early stage of reviewing its current statutory codes of practice and will revise them where necessary to ensure they remain clear, up to date, and effective.
NHSBT is actively progressing work to ensure that their family approach processes use clear, affirmative language that supports a family’s understanding of their loved one’s recorded donation decision. As part of this, NHSBT are reviewing their operational guidance and training materials for specialist nurses in organ donation to strengthen support offered to families by focussing on building trust and rapport with the family to explore the patient’s beliefs and values as a central reference point for the donation decision, rather than focusing on any last known expressed wishes.
Asked by: Lord Kamall (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Baroness Merron on 23 February (HL14441), what assessment they have made of the impact of the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence guidelines on generalised anxiety and panic disorder on access to treatment for marginalised groups.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Department has made no assessment of the impact of the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) guidelines on generalised anxiety and panic disorder or on access to treatment for marginalised groups.
NICE keeps its published guidelines under active surveillance and decisions on whether they should be updated in light of new evidence are taken by the NICE prioritisation board in line with its published prioritisation framework. NICE’s prioritisation board will be considering whether the guideline on generalised anxiety and panic disorder should be updated following a letter from the UK Council for Psychotherapy.
Asked by: Rachael Maskell (Labour (Co-op) - York Central)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will make an estimate of the costs involved in maintaining the building and grounds of Bootham Park Hospital.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
Bootham Park Hospital site is a Grade I listed heritage asset and therefore requires significant ongoing management. The costs associated with maintaining the buildings and grounds have been £5.5 million since 2018, which covers maintenance, security, and insurance across the site, as well as the upkeep of areas that remain operational, including the chapel used by the York and Scarborough Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, and the work required to maintain safe public access through parts of the site. NHS Property Services continues to progress plans to sell the site, which would bring these ongoing holding costs to an end.
Asked by: James McMurdock (Independent - South Basildon and East Thurrock)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, pursuant to Answer of 2 March 2026 to Question 110313 on NHS: Standards, what assessment he has made of the potential implications for his policies of the variation between NHS trusts in protocols for monitoring patients after initial triage.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
Patients are triaged upon initial entry to accident and emergency departments, after which their condition and any deterioration is monitored through observation at clinically appropriate intervals. How this happens and how often is down to local clinical decision making and governance.
There is a national target that patients receive an initial assessment within 15 minutes of arrival in accident and emergency. This assessment considers patient acuity, ensuring those most unwell and at greatest risk are identified and prioritised, so that clinical oversight can be adjusted accordingly and to ensure the sickest patients are seen first.
On 9 February 2026 NHS England published guidance on the Model Emergency Department, which is intended to set out a consistent national framework by defining the core principles and pathways of high‑performing emergency departments. The guidance recognises that there is variation in how emergency departments operate across National Health Service trusts, reflecting differences in local populations, clinical judgement, and governance arrangements.
The Model Emergency Department does not remove local decision‑making, but provides a shared national model, including extended emergency medicine ambulatory care, to support greater consistency, faster decision‑making across urgent and emergency care pathways, and stronger whole‑system responsibility for performance. This approach is intended to improve patient experience and patient flow, with lower waiting times and reduced overcrowding.
Asked by: James McMurdock (Independent - South Basildon and East Thurrock)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, pursuant to Answer of 2 March 2026 to Question 110313 on NHS: Standards, whether any national guidance exists on the reassessment of patients whose clinical condition deteriorates while waiting in Accident and Emergency departments.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
Patients are triaged upon initial entry to accident and emergency departments, after which their condition and any deterioration is monitored through observation at clinically appropriate intervals. How this happens and how often is down to local clinical decision making and governance.
There is a national target that patients receive an initial assessment within 15 minutes of arrival in accident and emergency. This assessment considers patient acuity, ensuring those most unwell and at greatest risk are identified and prioritised, so that clinical oversight can be adjusted accordingly and to ensure the sickest patients are seen first.
On 9 February 2026 NHS England published guidance on the Model Emergency Department, which is intended to set out a consistent national framework by defining the core principles and pathways of high‑performing emergency departments. The guidance recognises that there is variation in how emergency departments operate across National Health Service trusts, reflecting differences in local populations, clinical judgement, and governance arrangements.
The Model Emergency Department does not remove local decision‑making, but provides a shared national model, including extended emergency medicine ambulatory care, to support greater consistency, faster decision‑making across urgent and emergency care pathways, and stronger whole‑system responsibility for performance. This approach is intended to improve patient experience and patient flow, with lower waiting times and reduced overcrowding.