Asked by: Mark Tami (Labour - Alyn and Deeside)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment his Department has made of the potential quality of life benefits of potentially one-time treatments for patients with life-long and chronic diseases.
Answered by Will Quince
The Government would like all National Health Service patients in England to benefit from innovative and effective new treatments in a way that represents value to taxpayers. All new medicines, including cell and gene therapies, are appraised by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) which makes recommendations for the NHS on whether they should be funded by the NHS, considering clinical and cost effectiveness. NICE aims to publish guidance on new medicines around the time of licensing wherever possible and the NHS is legally required to make funding available for NICE recommended treatments.
The NHS has struck commercial deals with the manufacturers of several cell and gene therapies enabling NICE to recommend them for NHS patients, including through the Government’s £340 million Cancer Drugs Fund. NHS patients in England were among the first in the world to benefit from access to CAR-T cancer therapy and, NHS England has also negotiated deals to secure lifesaving gene therapies Zolgensma® and Libmeldy® for patients with spinal muscular atrophy and metachromatic leukodystophy, respectively.
Asked by: Mark Tami (Labour - Alyn and Deeside)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what the average payment was to people that claimed (a) Maternity Allowance and (b) Statutory Maternity Pay in the last 12 months for which data is available.
Answered by Mims Davies - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Maternity Allowance data is published on a quarterly basis and includes data on average payment. The latest release is for June to August 2022. Maternity Allowance statistics for May 2022 was not published as planned due to a data production error. Thereby, data from the last 4 available quarters is reported in Table 1. This is taken from Table 4 of the Maternity Allowance quarterly statistics published here.
Table 1: Average weekly Maternity Allowance payments over 4 quarters
| Average weekly Maternity Allowance payments |
June 2021 to August 2021 | £143.07 |
September 2021 to November 2021 | £143.69 |
December 2021 to February 2022 | £141.85 |
June 2022 to August 2022 | £147.57 |
Statutory Maternity Pay is delivered through HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC), rather than the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP). There is no published data on the average payment for Statutory Maternity Pay.
Asked by: Mark Tami (Labour - Alyn and Deeside)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many claimants of Maternity Allowance who earn below the lower earnings limit were (a) self-employed and (b) recently left employment in the last 12 months for which data is available.
Answered by Mims Davies - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Lower Earnings Limit per week in the period of 6 July 2022 to 5 April 2023 was £123. Guidance on National Insurance contributions are published here.
You can get Maternity Allowance for 39 weeks if in the 66 weeks before your baby is due, you have been employed or registered as self-employed for at least 26 weeks. Maternity Allowance eligibility is published here.
Maternity Allowance data is published on a quarterly basis and includes data on employment status. The latest release is for June to August 2022. Maternity Allowance statistics for May 2022 was not published as planned due to a data production error. Thereby, data from the last 4 available quarters is reported in Table 1. This is taken from Table 7a of the Maternity Allowance quarterly statistics published here.
Data specific to claimants earning below the Lower Earnings Limit is not available. The data in Table 1 refers to claimants on both the Maternity Allowance Standard Rate or Variable Rate.
Table 1: Number of self-employed, unemployed, and other Maternity Allowance claimants over 4 quarters
| Self-employed claimants | Unemployed and other claimants |
June 2021 to August 2021 | 6,900 | Negligible |
September 2021 to November 2021 | 5,880 | Negligible |
December 2021 to February 2022 | 4,860 | Negligible |
June 2022 to August 2022 | 5,740 | Negligible |
Asked by: Mark Tami (Labour - Alyn and Deeside)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what the average time was that people claimed (a) Maternity Allowance and (b) Statutory Maternity Pay in the last 12 months for which data is available.
Answered by Mims Davies - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Maternity Allowance data is published on a quarterly basis and includes data on average duration. The latest release is for June to August 2022. Maternity Allowance statistics for May 2022 was not published as planned due to a data production error. Thereby, data from the last 4 available quarters is reported in Table 1. This is taken from note 6 of the Maternity Allowance quarterly statistics published here.
Asked by: Mark Tami (Labour - Alyn and Deeside)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what progress he has made on the service specifications for teenage and young adult cancer services in England; and when those specifications will be published.
Answered by Helen Whately - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
New Teenage and Young Adult cancer service specifications are expected to be published within the coming months.
Asked by: Mark Tami (Labour - Alyn and Deeside)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, when she plans to commence the Glue Traps (Offences) Act 2022; and whether she plans to use the statutory powers in that Act to introduce a glue trap licensing scheme for England.
Answered by Trudy Harrison
The Glue Traps (Offences) Act does not stipulate a commencement date but as stated during the passage of the Bill, the intention is to bring the Act into effect after a two year transition period.
I intend to use the statutory powers of the Act to introduce a licencing regime in order to permit the use of glue traps in England in the most exceptional circumstances by professional pest controllers for the purposes of preserving public health and safety, when there is no satisfactory alternative.
Asked by: Mark Tami (Labour - Alyn and Deeside)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, whether he has made an assessment of the financial impact of the delay in issuing the Energy Bills Support Scheme payments for (a) park home residents and (b) other households without a direct energy supply contract on those households.
Answered by Graham Stuart
The Department has made no such assessment. The Government is working to deliver this support through the EBSS Alternative Funding as soon as possible.
Asked by: Mark Tami (Labour - Alyn and Deeside)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to help stem cell transplant and CAR-T therapy recipients with the cost of travel to hospital appointments.
Answered by Neil O'Brien
The NHS Healthcare Travel Costs Scheme assists those on a low income with travel costs to hospital.
Asked by: Mark Tami (Labour - Alyn and Deeside)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what the average rate payable under the Smart Export Guarantee for renewable energy generated by households was in the latest period for which data is available; and if he will make an assessment of adequacy of the responsiveness of rates available under the Smart Export Guarantee to market conditions.
Answered by Graham Stuart
Ofgem’s second annual report for 2021/22 found that 12 suppliers offered 36 different tariffs, including offerings of over 5p per kilowatt hour (which is in some cases higher than the FIT export tariff) and above the 3p per kilowatt hour average electricity wholesale price for 2020. The Government continues to monitor whether the market is delivering an effective range of options for small exporters.
Asked by: Mark Tami (Labour - Alyn and Deeside)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many (a) nurses and (b) doctors were employed in the NHS in England in (i) the fourth quarter of 2019, and (ii) the second quarter of 2022, excluding those on the temporary register set up to assist with the covid-19 outbreak.
Answered by Robert Jenrick
This information is not held in the format requested.
Statistics on the National Health Service workforce are published by NHS Digital and measure staff in permanent positions. The data for these statistics is collected from the Electronic Staff Record, the human resources and payroll system for the NHS. Staff who joined the workforce on a COVID-19 temporary register would be recorded in the same way as staff on a permanent register.