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Written Question
GP Surgeries
Tuesday 8th April 2025

Asked by: Neil O'Brien (Conservative - Harborough, Oadby and Wigston)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many (a) general practices and (b) GP premises there were in each integrated care board area in each month since June 2024.

Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

A table showing the number of general practices and premises in each current integrated care board (ICB) area in England, each month since June 2024, is attached.

Opening and closing dates for both practices and branches were identified using data from the NHS Organisation Data Service. Locations have been mapped to current ICB boundaries. The locations sheet in the attached document includes both main and branch practices.


Written Question
Doctors: Training
Thursday 27th March 2025

Asked by: Neil O'Brien (Conservative - Harborough, Oadby and Wigston)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many and what proportion of people starting an (a) F1 and (b) F2 placement were international medical graduates in each deanery in each year since 2015.

Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

The attached table contains information published by the General Medical Council (GMC) on the place of qualification of all foundation programme doctors by their region. The tables cover the period since 2012 and illustrate the increase in international recruitment following decisions taken by the last government in 2020.

This information is available at the following link as part of the GMC’s Data Explorer tool:

https://gde.gmc-uk.org/postgraduate-training/postgraduate-trainees/country-of-primary-medical-qualification


Written Question
Cervical Cancer: Screening
Wednesday 5th March 2025

Asked by: Neil O'Brien (Conservative - Harborough, Oadby and Wigston)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether patients who have changed gender from female to male are still automatically invited to cervical screening.

Answered by Ashley Dalton - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)

The NHS Cervical Screening Programme provides all women and people with a cervix between the ages of 25 and 64 years old with the opportunity to be screened routinely to detect certain types of human papillomavirus infection, which is the cause of 99.7% of cervical cancer.

Trans men who are still registered as female with their general practice (GP) will be routinely invited to cervical screenings. Trans men registered as male do not automatically receive invitations, but are still entitled to screenings if they still have a cervix.

Trans men who want to have cervical screenings should ask their GP to contact the NHS Cervical Screening Programme so that they are opted-in on the Cervical Screening Management System and invited for screenings correctly.


Written Question
Gender Dysphoria: Surgery
Monday 3rd March 2025

Asked by: Neil O'Brien (Conservative - Harborough, Oadby and Wigston)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many gender (a) reassignment and (b) affirmation operations were carried out by the NHS in each year since 2000 for which data is available.

Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

The Department does not hold this data centrally, as it is held at an individual National Health Service provider level.


Written Question
Gender Dysphoria: Surgery
Tuesday 25th February 2025

Asked by: Neil O'Brien (Conservative - Harborough, Oadby and Wigston)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many referrals for masculinising chest surgery there were from the NHS Gender Dysphoria National Referral Support Service in each year for which data is available since 1997.

Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

Referrals for masculinising chest surgery are made by the specialist clinical teams in the NHS Gender Dysphoria Clinics, not by the NHS Gender Dysphoria National Referral Support Service (GDNRSS). The non-clinical role of the GDNRSS is to process the referrals on behalf of the providers.

The GDNRSS was established in 2020. Between 1 April 2020 and 31 December 2024, the GDNRSS received 5,463 requests for masculinising chest surgery.


Written Question
NHS: Expenditure
Wednesday 15th January 2025

Asked by: Neil O'Brien (Conservative - Harborough, Oadby and Wigston)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to the Answer of 1 May 2024 to Question 19413 on NHS: Expenditure, how much (a) NHS England, (b) clinical commissioning groups and (c) integrated care boards spent in aggregate on (i) mental health services, (ii) acute health services, (iii) social care services, (iv) primary medical services, (v) specialised services, (vi) NHS continuing healthcare and (vii) all other recorded spending categories in each financial year since 2015-16; and how much those organisations plan to spend in aggregate in each of those areas in the 2024-25 financial year.

Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

The attached table sets out the spend categories for the specified services commissioned by NHS England, clinical commissioning groups (CCGs) and integrated care boards (ICBs) between 2015/16 and 2023/24.

Information for 2024/25 is unvalidated and not quality assured. In-year data is not routinely reported on the methodology used for this answer and would be subject to material change between plan and outturn as a result.

Purchase of Social care expenditure is an accounts category within the Operating Expense note of the NHS England Annual Report and Accounts 2023-24, with consolidated group expenditure for 2022/23 totalling £1,196,487,000 and that for 2023/24 totalling £1,024,918,000. Most of this expenditure, namely 76.2%, falls under the ‘Community’ category in the analysis provided. The report is available at the followed link:

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/6709344a92bb81fcdbe7b728/nhs-england-annual-report-and-accounts-2023-to-2024.pdf


Written Question
Death Certificates: Standards
Friday 3rd January 2025

Asked by: Neil O'Brien (Conservative - Harborough, Oadby and Wigston)

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 average time taken for deaths to be reviewed under the national medical examiner system since 9 September 2024; and if he will make an assessment of the potential impact of the time taken for deaths to be reviewed on the time taken to arrange funerals.

Answered by Andrew Gwynne

The Government is monitoring the impact of the death certification reforms, which came into legal effect on 9 September 2024. The median time taken to register a death since the introduction of the statutory medical examiner system in England and Wales is eight days. This figure is for all deaths, as it includes those certified by a doctor and those investigated by a coroner. The median time taken to register a death varies depending on the type of certification. Deaths certified by a doctor, that comprise approximately 80% of deaths registered each week, had a median time to registration of seven days. The Department has not conducted a separate review of the time taken to arrange funerals, which can depend on a number of external factors.

The core purposes of the death certification reforms are to introduce scrutiny of the cause of death to detect and deter malpractice, to improve reporting, and crucially to put the bereaved at the centre of the process by offering a conversation with the medical examiner about the cause of death. The expectation on doctors and medical examiners is clear, that they should complete certification as quickly and efficiently as possible, and the Department is working with all stakeholders to make sure this is the case.


Written Question
Social Services
Monday 30th December 2024

Asked by: Neil O'Brien (Conservative - Harborough, Oadby and Wigston)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, when he plans to publish the work his Department commissioned from the Adult Social Care Research Unit on updating the 2013 Adult Social Care Relative Needs Formula.

Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

The Department of Health and Social Care funds independent research through its research delivery arm, the National Institute of Health and Care Research (NIHR). This project is funded through the NIHR Adult Social Care Policy Research Unit.

The publication of research is led by the research team and in line with NIHR commitments to the transparent and independent publication of high-quality research will be made available on the Adult Social Care Policy Research Unit Website. The views expressed in outputs of the research are those of the authors and not necessarily those of the NIHR or the Department of Health and Social Care.

The Department of Health and Social Care is still considering this research as part of its ongoing policy work. We are working closely the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, and the role of a specific Adult Social Care funding formula is considered within the consultation ‘Local authority funding reform: objectives and principles’, published on 18 December 2024. We will update further in due course.


Written Question
Health: Children
Friday 20th December 2024

Asked by: Neil O'Brien (Conservative - Harborough, Oadby and Wigston)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what the average height was for state school pupils in (a) reception and (b) year six in each academic year since 2005-06; what the average height was for state school pupils in each ethnic group in those academic years in that period; and how many state school pupils were in each ethnic group in those academic years in that period.

Answered by Andrew Gwynne

The height of state school pupils in Reception and Year 6 is measured in the National Child Measurement Programme (NCMP). The following table shows the average height in centimetres of boys and girls aged five and 11 years old, in the academic years from 2008 to 2024:

Age

Academic year

Mean height for girls

Mean height for boys

5

2008 to 2009

109.2cm

110.0cm

5

2009 to 2010

109.2cm

110.1cm

5

2010 to 2011

109.2cm

110.1cm

5

2011 to 2012

109.3cm

110.2cm

5

2012 to 2013

109.2cm

110.1cm

5

2013 to 2014

109.3cm

110.2cm

5

2014 to 2015

109.3cm

110.2cm

5

2015 to 2016

109.3cm

110.2cm

5

2016 to 2017

109.3cm

110.3cm

5

2017 to 2018

109.3cm

110.3cm

5

2018 to 2019

109.3cm

110.3cm

5

2019 to 2020

109.4cm

110.4cm

5

2020 to 2021

109.8cm

110.9cm

5

2021 to 2022

109.7cm

110.7cm

5

2022 to 2023

109.3cm

110.4cm

5

2023 to 2024

109.3cm

110.3cm

11

2008 to 2009

145.7cm

145.0cm

11

2009 to 2010

145.8cm

145.0cm

11

2010 to 2011

145.9cm

145.1cm

11

2011 to 2012

145.9cm

145.1cm

11

2012 to 2013

146.0cm

145.1cm

11

2013 to 2014

146.1cm

145.3cm

11

2014 to 2015

146.2cm

145.3cm

11

2015 to 2016

146.3cm

145.5cm

11

2016 to 2017

146.3cm

145.5cm

11

2017 to 2018

146.4cm

145.6cm

11

2018 to 2019

146.5cm

145.6cm

11

2019 to 2020

146.6cm

145.7cm

11

2020 to 2021

148.0cm

146.5cm

11

2021 to 2022

148.0cm

146.4cm

11

2022 to 2023

147.8cm

146.3cm

11

2023 to 2024

147.5cm

146.4cm

Source: data is from the NCMP, with further information available at the following link:
https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/obesity-profile-november-2024-update

Height data has not been published for the years 2005 to 2008. Height data by ethnic group of pupil is not available, but is due to be published by the Department on 4 February 2025, and will be available at the following link:

https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/announcements/obesity-profile-february-2025-update

The Department for Education publishes information on the number of state school pupils by ethnicity. This information can be found in the Schools, pupils, and their characteristics publication on GOV.UK website, which is based on January school census data. Statistics from May 2010 onwards are available at the following link:

https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/statistics-school-and-pupil-numbers

Data is not published for Reception and Year 6 children specifically. Statistics from 2005 to 2009 are available at the following link:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/schools-pupil-and-their-characteristics-2002-to-2009-data


Written Question
HIV Infection
Thursday 14th November 2024

Asked by: Neil O'Brien (Conservative - Harborough, Oadby and Wigston)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many people there were in each region with a newly diagnosed HIV infection whose country of birth was (a) in the UK and (b) not in the UK in each year since 2014.

Answered by Andrew Gwynne

The number of new diagnoses for each year between 2014 and 2023, presented by region of residence and by whether country of birth was UK or not, is publicly available from the following GOV.UK link: https://view.officeapps.live.com/op/view