Asked by: Paul Sweeney (Labour (Co-op) - Glasgow North East)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to the 2018 finding of the National Autistic Society that half of autistic people report not leaving the house because they are worried about society's reaction to them, what steps the Government is taking to increase awareness of autism.
Answered by Caroline Dinenage
The Government is committed to raising awareness and understanding of autism in line with the autism strategy and Autism Act (2009). On 21 March 2019, I responded to the backbench business debate on autism services on behalf of the Government. This debate has helped to raise awareness and understanding of autism ahead of Autism Awareness Week 2019.
On 13 February 2019, the Department launched an eight-week consultation on learning disability and autism training for health and care staff. We are consulting on proposals for introducing mandatory learning disability and autism training to ensure that staff across health and social care have the right skills and we have overall the right culture, to provide better support. The consultation is available at the following link:
Government Departments are taking forward actions and strategies to raise awareness and understanding of autism, and to adjust services to make them more accessible to autistic people. For example, these include:
- In July 2018, the Department for Transport published its, ‘Inclusive Transport Strategy: Achieving Equal Access for Disabled People.’ The Department for Transport is committed to ensuring that disabled people and those with hidden impairments such as autistic people have the same access to transport and opportunities to travel as everyone else; and
- Through the Disability Confident scheme, the Department for Work and Pensions is engaging with employers, offering guidance and helping to promote the skills, talents and abilities of autistic people and associated hidden impairment conditions. Over 11,000 employers have signed up. A Disability Confident Toolkit has also been developed to provide comprehensive information on autism and hidden impairments, as well as guidance on employment and local authority services. In addition, Access to Work has a hidden impairment support team that aims to give advice and guidance to help employers support employees with conditions such as autism, learning disability and/or mental health conditions and it offers eligible people an assessment to find out their needs at work and help to develop a support plan
Asked by: Paul Sweeney (Labour (Co-op) - Glasgow North East)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps the Government is taking to reduce the time that people have to wait for a diagnosis of autism.
Answered by Caroline Dinenage
We are committed to ensuring adults and children receive a timely autism diagnosis in line with National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) guidance.
The NHS Long Term Plan was published on 7 January 2019. The Plan commits to improving autism diagnostic pathways in England and ensuring autistic people have access to high-quality care and support in the community. Over the next three years, autism diagnosis will be included alongside work with children and young people’s mental health services to test and implement the most effective ways to reduce waiting times for specialist services. This will be a step towards achieving timely diagnostic assessments in line with best practice guidelines.
The Department is determined to drive up performance on autism diagnosis nationally. To support this NHS Digital began formally collecting autism diagnosis waiting time data from mental health provider trusts for the first time through the Mental Health Services Data Set in April 2018. Data is submitted on behalf of autism diagnostic services, in line with issued guidance. The current plan is to publish a report after a year’s data has been collected and analysed, in September/October 2019. As this is the first time this data is being submitted, some work to improve its quality may be necessary.
The data being collected covers both adults and children and includes:
- The length of time people with suspected autism wait following referral for a diagnosis before an assessment is started (to compare with the 13 week NICE Recommendation);
- The number of people within the reporting period receiving an autism diagnosis and the time it took to get the diagnosis;
- Profiled information (gender, age, other recorded diagnosis etc);
- The number of autistic people seen by mental health services within the reporting period; and
- Referrals to NHS services due to autism diagnosis or because autism diagnosis not confirmed, or where no further assessment or treatment was appropriate.
In addition, the Department is developing guidance on autism and an accompanying toolkit to support local health and care commissioners with commissioning diagnostic and post-diagnosis services. The guidance will bring together existing guidelines, standards and best practice examples on how to commission effective, high quality services for autistic people. This will include setting out care pathways to support timely diagnosis of autism and effective post-diagnosis support services. We expect the guidance and toolkit to be available by this summer.
Asked by: Paul Sweeney (Labour (Co-op) - Glasgow North East)
Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, what representations he will make to the Chinese Government on the protection of minorities in light of the recent allegations of forced organ harvesting in China.
Answered by Mark Field
We are aware of reports that allege that organ harvesting may be taking place in China, including suggestions that minority and religious groups are being specifically targeted. This includes the 2016 update to the Kilgour, Matas and Gutmann report and other information provided so far to the ongoing tribunal organised by the International Coalition to End Transplant Abuse in China. We continue to scrutinise the situation carefully and review new information as it becomes available. At present, however, our assessment is that there is not a strong enough evidential base to substantiate the claim that systematic state-sponsored or sanctioned organ harvesting is taking place in China. We therefore have no current plans to raise these allegations with the Chinese Government.
Asked by: Paul Sweeney (Labour (Co-op) - Glasgow North East)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether he plans to (a) retain and (b) extend to EEA citizens the Tier 2 visa salary exemption for nurses after the UK leaves the EU.
Answered by Caroline Nokes
We have been clear that we want all EU nationals, including those working in the NHS and the care sector, to stay in the UK after we leave the EU.
In their report, EEA migration in the UK, the independent Migration Advisory Committee (MAC) recommended maintaining the existing system of salary thresholds.
The Government has been clear that we will undertake an extensive programme of engagement with a wide range of stakeholders across the UK, including with the private, public and voluntary sector and local government, as well as industry representatives and individual businesses before taking a final decision on the level of salary thresholds.
Asked by: Paul Sweeney (Labour (Co-op) - Glasgow North East)
Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, what recent discussions he has had with (a) Cabinet colleagues, (b) his Cuban counterpart and (c) his counterpart in the US Administration on banking measures to support British businesses in Cuba.
Answered by Alan Duncan
The UK is aware that banking challenges remain an issue for British companies interested in doing business in Cuba; the low risk appetite of banks continue to be influenced by risks associated with potential enforcement of the US embargo and Cuban compliance standards. The Chancellor and the Secretary of State for International Trade discussed the banking challenges faced by British companies with senior Cuban officials, during the President's visit to the UK in November 2018. The UK raises its opposition to the embargo and potential further tightening of it with US counterparts regularly, including via two recent EU demarches in Washington.
Asked by: Paul Sweeney (Labour (Co-op) - Glasgow North East)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether he plans to ensure that overseas care workers are exempt from the Tier 2 visa £30,000 salary cap and able to work in the UK; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Caroline Nokes
We have been clear that we want all EU nationals, including those working in the NHS and the care sector, to stay in the UK after we leave the EU.
In their report, EEA migration in the UK, the independent Migration Advisory Committee (MAC) recommended maintaining the existing system of salary thresholds.
The Government has been clear that we will undertake an extensive programme of engagement with a wide range of stakeholders across the UK, including with the private, public and voluntary sector and local government, as well as industry representatives and individual businesses before taking a final decision on the level of salary thresholds.
Asked by: Paul Sweeney (Labour (Co-op) - Glasgow North East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, for what reasons the universal credit hotline advises claimants who work part-time that taking their entitlement to paid leave will affect their right to universal credit.
Answered by Lord Sharma
Universal Credit is calculated using earnings, either full or part time. It does not matter how many hours a claimant works, it is the actual earnings they receive and are reported in an assessment period that count. This would include earnings from paid leave such as holidays.
Asked by: Paul Sweeney (Labour (Co-op) - Glasgow North East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what recent assessment she has made of the effect of natural migration to universal credit on severely disabled people.
Answered by Justin Tomlinson
Our Regulations will ensure that eligible claimants in receipt of Severe Disability Premium are only moved to Universal Credit as part of a managed migration process, and through that process will see their payments protected. We are spending over £3 billion on Transitional Protections for 1.1 million households, to ensure that no one loses out at the point of transition. We have also made provision for those eligible claimants who have already naturally migrated to Universal Credit to be considered for Severe Disability Premium transitional payments. These will be made as on-going monthly payments and an additional lump-sum to cover the period since they moved to Universal Credit.
Over £2.4 billion in benefits are currently unclaimed and Universal Credit ensures that vulnerable claimants receive the money they are entitled to. More severely disabled people will receive higher payments under Universal Credit, with around 1 million disabled households gaining on average around £100 more per month.
Asked by: Paul Sweeney (Labour (Co-op) - Glasgow North East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what recent assessment she has made of the effect of benefit (a) sanctions and (b) conditionality on disabled people.
Answered by Justin Tomlinson
The department has not made an assessment of the effect of imposing sanctions and conditionality on disabled claimants.
Asked by: Paul Sweeney (Labour (Co-op) - Glasgow North East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what recent assessment her Department has made of the effect of the introduction of universal credit on disabled people.
Answered by Justin Tomlinson
Most disabled people are better off under Universal Credit than the legacy system.
More severely disabled people will receive higher payments under Universal Credit, with around 1 million disabled households gaining on average around £100 more per month.
Disabled claimants have the biggest work allowance of any group, and benefit from the unified taper and removal of rules such as ‘permitted work’ that put a cap on how much money disabled people can earn. Universal Credit also, for the first time, helps people with a disability or health condition who are already in work to remain there and progress.