Asked by: Ben Obese-Jecty (Conservative - Huntingdon)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, pursuant to the Answer of 23 October 2025 to Question 81534 on Hinchingbrooke Hospital: Medical Records, what steps he has taken to provide funding to ensure Hinchingbrooke Hospital can provide its core capabilities in their digital systems.
Answered by Zubir Ahmed - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
Hinchingbrooke Hospital is part of the North West Anglia Foundation Trust (NWAFT). All National Health Service trusts complete an annual self-assessment of their digital maturity against the seven dimensions of the What Good Looks Like framework. The results of this assessment have not yet been released. Further information is available on the What Good Looks Like framework at the following link:
NHS England is supporting NWAFT to produce a robust and affordable Outline Business Case to procure an Electronic Patient Record that meets the core capabilities set out by the NHS England Frontline Digitisation programme. This includes providing procurement support, subject matter expertise, and funding, including both capital and revenue. NHS England has provided £9.7 million to support NWAFT with these activities to date.
Asked by: Ben Obese-Jecty (Conservative - Huntingdon)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, pursuant to the Answer of 23 October 2025 to Question 81534 on Hinchingbrooke Hospital: Medical Records, when his Department assessed the level of digital maturity at Hinchingbrooke Hospital; and what level was identified.
Answered by Zubir Ahmed - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
Hinchingbrooke Hospital is part of the North West Anglia Foundation Trust (NWAFT). All National Health Service trusts complete an annual self-assessment of their digital maturity against the seven dimensions of the What Good Looks Like framework. The results of this assessment have not yet been released. Further information is available on the What Good Looks Like framework at the following link:
NHS England is supporting NWAFT to produce a robust and affordable Outline Business Case to procure an Electronic Patient Record that meets the core capabilities set out by the NHS England Frontline Digitisation programme. This includes providing procurement support, subject matter expertise, and funding, including both capital and revenue. NHS England has provided £9.7 million to support NWAFT with these activities to date.
Asked by: Ben Obese-Jecty (Conservative - Huntingdon)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what the scope is of Exercise PEGASUS.
Answered by Ashley Dalton - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
Exercise PEGASUS is a pandemic preparedness exercise, based on a novel enterovirus, led by the Department, with the UK Health Security Agency. It has been the largest simulation of a pandemic in the history of the United Kingdom and has involved all Government departments, the devolved administrations, local resilience forums, and other key stakeholders. Live participation in the exercise took place between September and November 2025, simulating the lifecycle of a pandemic, including emergence, containment, and mitigation, and sought to test decision-making processes at every level. A fourth phase, for recovery, is planned to be exercised via a ‘table-top’ in 2026.
Asked by: Ben Obese-Jecty (Conservative - Huntingdon)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, pursuant to the Answer of 23 October to Question 81534 on Hinchingbrooke Hospital: Medical Records, what the outcome was of the review of the strategic outline case for the new hospital as part of the New Hospitals Programme.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Strategic Outline Case for the New Hospital Programme scheme at Hinchingbrooke Hospital was approved by the Department’s Joint Investment Committee on 22 October 2025 and has since been approved by ministers.
Asked by: Ben Obese-Jecty (Conservative - Huntingdon)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what was the outcome of the national exercise for pandemic preparedness conducted in 2025.
Answered by Ashley Dalton - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The national pandemic preparedness exercise, Exercise PEGASUS, which focused on the emergence, containment, and mitigation phases of a pandemic, concluded live participation on 5 November 2025. Evaluation of these three phases is underway, and a fourth phase, focussed on recovery, is planned to be exercised in 2026. The Government has committed to communicating the findings and lessons of the exercise as recommended by the COVID-19 inquiry and a post-exercise report will be delivered in due course.
Asked by: Ben Obese-Jecty (Conservative - Huntingdon)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many people have been injured by fireworks in each of the past five years.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The following table shows the number of hospital admissions due to “discharge of firework” in each of the past five financial years:
External causes admissions data: | |
Financial year | Discharge of firework |
2020/21 | 116 |
2021/22 | 132 |
2022/23 | 109 |
2023/24 | 113 |
2024/25 | 123 |
Source: Hospital Admitted Patient Care Activity, available at the following link:
https://digital.nhs.uk/data-and-information/publications/statistical/hospital-admitted-patient-care-activity
These figures do not represent the total number of people injured by fireworks as data is not collected for those who do not attend accident and emergency or are not admitted.
Asked by: Ben Obese-Jecty (Conservative - Huntingdon)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to the Government's news story entitled, Update on Gaza medical evacuation scheme, published on 22 August 2025, what estimate he has made with Cabinet colleagues on the number of Gazan (a) children and (b) immediate family members that will be accepted for evacuation and treatment in the UK.
Answered by Zubir Ahmed - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
I refer the Hon. Member to the Written Statement HCWS899 made to the House on 1 September 2025 by my Rt. Hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care.
The safety, privacy, and wellbeing of these severely ill and vulnerable patients and their families remains our absolute priority. We will not be providing further operational details on the numbers who have arrived at this stage.
Asked by: Ben Obese-Jecty (Conservative - Huntingdon)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, pursuant to the Answer of 20 October 2025 to Question 77257 on North West Anglia NHS Foundation Trust: Medical Records, when he expects discussions between NHS England regional and national colleagues to take place on the (a) approvals and (b) funding for the outline business case.
Answered by Zubir Ahmed - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
North West Anglia NHS Foundation Trust is currently part way through the business case process for a new Electronic Patient Record, working to submit its outline business case (OBC) in 2026. NHS England is supporting them to produce a robust and affordable OBC which meets their core capabilities as set out by the NHS England Frontline Digitisations Programme. This includes providing procurement support, subject matter expertise, and funding, including capital and revenue.
Hinchingbrooke has also recently submitted its strategic outline case for its new hospital as part of the NHP, which was considered by the Joint Investment Committee on 22 October 2025, and a decision is pending.
Asked by: Ben Obese-Jecty (Conservative - Huntingdon)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, pursuant to the Answer of 20 October 2025 to Question 77257 on North West Anglia NHS Foundation Trust: Medical Records, by when the outline business case would need to be approved to meet the timeline for the new hospital opening at Hinchingbrooke.
Answered by Zubir Ahmed - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
North West Anglia NHS Foundation Trust is currently part way through the business case process for a new Electronic Patient Record, working to submit its outline business case (OBC) in 2026. NHS England is supporting them to produce a robust and affordable OBC which meets their core capabilities as set out by the NHS England Frontline Digitisations Programme. This includes providing procurement support, subject matter expertise, and funding, including capital and revenue.
Hinchingbrooke has also recently submitted its strategic outline case for its new hospital as part of the NHP, which was considered by the Joint Investment Committee on 22 October 2025, and a decision is pending.
Asked by: Ben Obese-Jecty (Conservative - Huntingdon)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many staff redundancies there will be following the abolition of NHS England.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
Following the Prime Minister’s announcement of the abolition of NHS England, we are clear on the need for a smaller centre, as well as scaling back integrated care board running costs and National Health Service provider corporate costs in order to reduce waste and bureaucracy.
Good progress is being made, with NHS England having sought expressions of interest for a voluntary redundancy scheme. We are still in the process of prioritising funding for exits, there is detailed design work to do on the structure of the new organisation, and there will be natural turnover that means not all reductions will be delivered by voluntary exit or redundancy. At this point we do not therefore have a firm estimate for numbers of staff redundancies.