Asked by: Jim McMahon (Labour (Co-op) - Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many adults are assessed as having an unmet social care need in England.
Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
Local authorities are responsible for assessing individuals’ care and support needs and, where eligible, for meeting those needs, as set out in the Care Act 2014. The Care Quality Commission (CQC) is assessing how local authorities in England are meeting the full range of their duties under Part 1 of the Care Act 2014, including how local authorities assess people’s needs. Formal assessments commenced in December 2023 and as of November 2025, the CQC has published over 80 local authority assessments. Reports are available on the CQC’s website at the following link:
https://www.cqc.org.uk/care-services/local-authority-assessment-reports
The Government is supporting the sector to help people live independent and dignified lives. The Spending Review allows for an increase of over £4 billion of funding available for adult social care in 2028/29 compared to 2025/26, to support the sector in making improvements. We are also providing £172 million across this and the last financial year, for approximately 15,000 home adaptations, and are introducing new national standards and trusted guidance for care technologies.
Asked by: Jim McMahon (Labour (Co-op) - Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what estimate he has made of the number of community pharmacies in England relative to indices of multiple deprivation.
Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
NHS Business Services Authority publishes quarterly consolidated NHS pharmaceutical lists with all community pharmacies in England. As of the end of September, there were twice as many pharmacies located in the lowest two deprivation deciles than there were in the top two.
The data is available at the following link:
https://opendata.nhsbsa.net/dataset/consolidated-pharmaceutical-list
Asked by: Jim McMahon (Labour (Co-op) - Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what was the cost to the public purse of installing new telephone systems in GP practices in England last year; and how many (a) systems (b) handsets were installed.
Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Department does not hold data on the cost of installing new telephone systems in general practices, nor on how many systems and handsets were installed.
As part of our ambition to end the 8:00am scramble, we want patients to contact their practice by phone, online, or by walking in, and for people to have an equitable experience across these access modes. Since 1 October 2025, practices are required to keep their online consultation tool open for the duration of core hours for non-urgent appointment requests, medication queries, and admin requests.
Asked by: Jim McMahon (Labour (Co-op) - Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment has been made of the number of reported patient safety incidents as a result of prescription medicines being lost in delivery in each of the last five years.
Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
Patient safety data is routinely collected by NHS England, including a breakdown of the proportion of incidents linked to community pharmacy. However, the Department does not hold data on the number of reported patient safety incidents that are a result of prescription medicines being lost in delivery.
Community pharmacies, including online pharmacies, are required to dispense all prescriptions with reasonable promptness as part of their National Health Service terms of service, recognising that it is not feasible for a pharmacy to maintain stock of every medicine. This requirement includes prescription medicines that are delivered to patients’ homes. They are also required to report any patient safety incidents to NHS England.
Asked by: Jim McMahon (Labour (Co-op) - Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what estimate has been made of the average number of lost work days for (a) public sector employees (b) private sector employees (c) self employed patients waiting for pre-booked NHS operations and procedures.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
No recent estimate has been made on the average number of lost work days for public sector employees, private sector employees, or self-employed patients waiting for pre-booked National Health Service operations and procedures.
We recognise the importance of supporting patients to return to work where they can. That is why the Further Faster 20 (FF20) initiative was announced in September 2024, to deploy expert advice to NHS trusts in areas with the highest levels of economic inactivity to get patients treated faster. This programme is part of the plans to reduce the number of people that are unable to work due to long-term sickness, which is at its highest level since the 1990s. FF20 co-exists alongside other interventions, including reducing demand, which are positively impacting the waiting list, and it is challenging to disentangle the impact of one from the other.
The Government is committed to addressing health-related economic inactivity, which is crucial for enhancing public health, strengthening communities, and boosting the economy. By reducing economic inactivity, we can also alleviate demand on the NHS, thereby improving its performance. Analysis conducted by NHS England and the Office of National Statistics demonstrates there could be multi-billion-pound benefits in achieving the Government’s Plan for Change’s ambition to meet the referral-to-treatment standard for elective procedures.
Asked by: Jim McMahon (Labour (Co-op) - Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what the total number of calls (a) answered (b) abandoned was for each public helpline numbers provided by his Department and its executive agencies for each year from 2015 to date.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The information requested is not held in the format requested. The NHS England 111 calls offered and abandoned are all published. The NHS 111 Minimum Data Set was the official source of Integrated Urgent Care data from 2011 until the end of March 2021, and is available at the following link:
The annual national data is provided for each financial year. The Integrated Urgent Care Aggregate Data Collection was published as experimental statistics from June 2019, using April 2019 data, until May 2021, using March 2021 data. This data collection is available at the following link:
Asked by: Jim McMahon (Labour (Co-op) - Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how much her Department spent with private sector providers of (a) diagnostic and imaging services (b) elective surgery (c) mental health services (d) community and primary care services for each year from 2015 to date.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The information is not held in the format requested, breaking down private sector spend by these exact categories. However, the annual reports and accounts for the Department provide figures for total National Health Service spending with non-NHS, including private, voluntary, local authority, and other, providers. The following table shows the total spend with non-NHS providers and the spend on private providers within that figure, for each year from 2015/16 to 2023/34:
Year | Total spend with non-NHS providers (£bn) | Of which, spend with private providers (£bn) |
2015/16 | 12.2 | 8.7 |
2016/17 | 12.7 | 9 |
2017/18 | 13 | 9 |
2018/19 | 13.7 | 9.2 |
2019/20 | 14.4 | 9.7 |
2020/21 | 18.4 | 12.1 |
2021/22 | 17 | 10.9 |
2022/23 | 16.6 | 11 |
2023/24 | 18.1 | 12.4 |
Source: the Department of Health and Social Care annual reports and accounts of activity and services for 2015/16, 2016/17, 2017/18, and 2018/19 to 2023/24, with further information available at the following link:
https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/dhsc-annual-reports-and-accounts
Asked by: Jim McMahon (Labour (Co-op) - Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many hospital wards are not in active use in England; and what the patient capacity is of those wards.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
Data for the occupancy and utilisation rates of clinical rooms in the NHS Estate for the latest period, which was 2023/24, published in December 2024, is available at the following link:
Asked by: Jim McMahon (Labour (Co-op) - Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what estimate his Department has made of the cost of unused medication held by patients in England.
Answered by Zubir Ahmed - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
No assessment has been made of the cost of unused medication held by patients in England. The Government seeks to have a coordinated approach to prevent wastage as much as possible to improve inefficiencies and reduce costs for the taxpayer.
Primary care networks are required to ensure that Structured Medication Reviews (SMRs) for high-risk cohorts are implemented. SMRs are an evidence based comprehensive review of a person’s medication, their views, concerns, and safety. The use of SMRs can reduce harmful polypharmacy and medicine wastage.
Asked by: Jim McMahon (Labour (Co-op) - Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many (a) adults (b) children are not registered with a dentist in (1) Greater Manchester (2) Oldham.
Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
Patients in England are not registered with a National Health Service dental practice, although many NHS dental practices do tend to see patients regularly. There is no geographical restriction on which practice a patient may attend. Some dental practices may operate local waiting list arrangements. Therefore, data is not available on the number of adults and children not registered with a dentist in Greater Manchester and Oldham.
The responsibility for commissioning primary care services, including NHS dentistry, to meet the needs of the local population has been delegated to the integrated care boards (ICBs) across England. For the Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton constituency, this is the Greater Manchester ICB.