Asked by: Theresa Villiers (Conservative - Chipping Barnet)
Question to the Department for Business and Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, if she will make it her policy to assess the performance of local authority trading standards bodies.
Answered by Kevin Hollinrake - Minister of State (Department for Business and Trade)
Trading Standards provide a range of services that fall under the remit of a number of Departments. However, Trading Standards services are delivered by Local Authorities, who are responsible for their operation and effectiveness. As Local Government is independent of Central Government, the Department for Business does not therefore have a remit to assess the performance of Trading Standards and would not therefore produce or publish league tables of such bodies.
Asked by: Theresa Villiers (Conservative - Chipping Barnet)
Question to the Department for Business and Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, if she will make an assessment of the effectiveness of Barnet trading standards.
Answered by Kevin Hollinrake - Minister of State (Department for Business and Trade)
Trading Standards provide a range of services that fall under the remit of a number of Departments. However, Trading Standards services are delivered by Local Authorities, who are responsible for their operation and effectiveness. As Local Government is independent of Central Government, the Department for Business does not therefore have a remit to assess the performance of Trading Standards and would not therefore produce or publish league tables of such bodies.
Asked by: Theresa Villiers (Conservative - Chipping Barnet)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether her Department is taking steps to expand testing for Alzheimer's to enable people to benefit at an early stage from new treatments (a) lecanemab and (b) other new treatments.
Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
NHS England is committed to improving diagnosis rates, and recovering to the national ambition for two thirds of people with dementia to have a formal diagnosis. This commitment is included in the operational planning guidance for 2023/24, giving clear direction for integrated care boards to prioritise dementia. The national ambition includes provision for a sub-type diagnosis.
NHS England has established a dedicated national programme team which co-ordinates the preparations for the potential roll out of new treatments, for use in the earlier stages of Alzheimer’s disease. These plans assume that, if these new treatments are approved by the regulators, significant additional diagnostic capacity including amyloid positron emission tomography and computed tomography (PET-CT) lumbar puncture and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), will be needed both to identify patients who are most able to benefit, and to provide important safety monitoring for potential adverse effects during treatment.
The team at NHS England is taking concrete steps to ramp up preparations across the country and assess the additional scanning, treating, and monitoring capacity that will be needed. This encompasses securing additional diagnostic capacity including MRI, lumbar puncture, and PET-CT.
Asked by: Theresa Villiers (Conservative - Chipping Barnet)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, if he will make it his policy to establish a medal for police officers injured on duty.
Answered by Chris Philp - Minister of State (Home Office)
We owe a tremendous gratitude to dedicated police officers for their continued hard work and sacrifice. There is no doubt that police officers who have their service cut short through injury have made, and in many cases will continue to make, an invaluable contribution to the emergency services.
It is right that there are provisions to support police officers who are injured in the line of duty, through the provision of paid leave, the injury benefit scheme and medical retirement where appropriate. Alongside the existing Police Long Service and Good Conduct Medal, and the King’s Police Medal, work is continuing on an appropriate way to mark the contribution of emergency workers and other public servants who are killed while serving the public. The Government has no plans currently to introduce a medal specifically for police officers who are injured on duty.
Asked by: Theresa Villiers (Conservative - Chipping Barnet)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what discussions she has had with NHS England about improving training for NHS workers on caring for people with dementia.
Answered by Helen Whately - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
We want all relevant staff to have received appropriate training to provide high quality care to people with dementia, whether in hospital or in the community.
Individual employers are responsible for ensuring their staff are trained and competent to carry out their role, and for investing in the future of their staff through providing continuing professional development (CPD) funding.
To supplement local employer investment for CPD, the NHS Long Term Workforce Plan, published on 30 June 2023, sets out NHS England’s commitment to continue national CPD funding for nurses and allied health professionals.
There are a variety of resources available on the NHS England E-learning for Health platform, including a programme on dementia care, designed to enhance the training and education of the health and social care workforce.
Asked by: Theresa Villiers (Conservative - Chipping Barnet)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what discussions he has had with his counterparts in the devolved Administrations on ensuring a consistent approach across the UK to the Government's proposed ban on disposable vapes.
Answered by Robbie Moore - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Following the consultation on creating a smokefree generation and tackling youth vaping, the recently published government response confirmed that the UK Government intends to bring forward legislation as soon as possible to ban the supply and ban of disposable vapes in England. Scotland and Wales also confirmed they intend to bring forward similar legislation and Northern Ireland is considering next steps following the consultation. We are in regular discussions with the devolved administrations on these proposals.
Asked by: Theresa Villiers (Conservative - Chipping Barnet)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether there were storm overflow discharges into Pymmes Brook in 2023.
Answered by Robbie Moore - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Defra and the Environment Agency have instructed water companies to introduce Event Duration Monitors (EDMs), which provide them with much more information about where and when storm overflow discharges have occurred. Water companies submit annual returns of their EDM data, which are publicly available. The annual returns for 2023 are not yet available. At the end of 2023, the Government target of having all storm overflows in England monitored was met, so the EDM data for all sites should soon be available. Three of the EDMs on the Pymmes Brook are new and therefore not online yet.
Asked by: Theresa Villiers (Conservative - Chipping Barnet)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether any storm overflow discharges took place in Chipping Barnet constituency in 2023.
Answered by Robbie Moore - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Defra and the Environment Agency have instructed water companies to introduce Event Duration Monitors (EDMs), which provide them with much more information about where and when storm overflow discharges have occurred. Water companies submit annual returns of their EDM data, which are publicly available. The annual returns for 2023 are not yet available. At the end of 2023, the Government target of having all storm overflows in England monitored was met, so the EDM data for all sites should soon be available.
Asked by: Theresa Villiers (Conservative - Chipping Barnet)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps she is taking to measure progress made by initiatives to tackle health inequalities in maternity care in the black and Asian community.
Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)
NHS England’s three-year delivery plan for maternity and neonatal services outlines an ambition to reduce inequalities for all in access, experience, and outcomes, and provide targeted support where health inequalities exist. As part of this plan, NHS England will utilise several metrics to track the impact on maternity and neonatal outcomes based on ethnicity, to measure progress towards improving equity for mothers and babies. These metrics are of sufficient sensitivity and statistical power to track changes in clinical outcomes for the groups most at risk of adverse outcomes.
Ethnic coding data completeness has improved year on year since 2019, helping to better understand health outcomes for different ethnic groups. NHS Resolution’s Maternity Incentive Scheme safety action two also sets a data quality standard to improve ethnic coding data completeness.
Asked by: Theresa Villiers (Conservative - Chipping Barnet)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if she will take steps to ensure that all general practice clinicians have access to training on the (a) risk factors and (b) symptoms of liver (i) disease and (ii) cancer.
Answered by Andrea Leadsom - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
General practitioners (GP) are responsible for ensuring their own clinical knowledge, including on liver disease and cancer, remains up-to-date and for identifying learning needs as part of their continuing professional development. This activity should include taking account of new research and developments in guidance, such as that produced by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence, to ensure that they can continue to provide high quality care to all patients.
All doctors registered in the United Kingdom are expected to meet the professional standards set out in the General Medical Council’s (GMC’s) Good Medical Practice. In 2012 the GMC introduced revalidation which supports doctors in regularly reflecting on how they can develop or improve their practice, which gives patients confidence that doctors are up to date with their practice, and promotes improved quality of care by driving improvements in clinical governance. The training curricula for postgraduate trainee doctors is set by the Royal College of General Practitioners and must meet the standards set by the GMC.