Asked by: Stuart Anderson (Conservative - Wolverhampton South West)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment he has made of the potential merits of introducing changes to the means test for adult social care to allow for the (a) effects of inflation and (b) current interest rates.
Answered by Helen Whately - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The means test threshold is reviewed on an annual basis. The next review is due in January 2022.
Asked by: Stuart Anderson (Conservative - Wolverhampton South West)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps his Department is taking to improve the (a) accuracy and (b) speed of results to people through the test and trace system.
Answered by Helen Whately - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
Turnaround times for most testing routes continue to fall, with 97.6% of in-person test results returned the next day after the test was taken. Of those people who took their tests in-person, at either a local or regional test centre, 97.6% received their results the following day, while the median turnaround time for home test kits was just 35 hours.
Asked by: Stuart Anderson (Conservative - Wolverhampton South West)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what his timeframe is for bringing forward legislative proposals to reform the funding of adult social care.
Answered by Helen Whately - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
We are committed to bringing forward a proposal for social care this year to ensure that everyone is treated with dignity and respect and to find long term solutions for one of the biggest challenges we face as a society.
Asked by: Stuart Anderson (Conservative - Wolverhampton South West)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what plans are in place to increase the number of biomedical testing laboratories in the West Midlands to expand the national and regional capacity for identifying and responding to (a) existing and (b) future health threats.
Answered by Helen Whately - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Department has announced a new laboratory based in Leamington Spa opening in 2021, cementing the United Kingdom as a world leader in diagnostics. When at full capacity, the laboratory will be able to process up to 300,000 polymerase chain reaction tests per day.
Asked by: Stuart Anderson (Conservative - Wolverhampton South West)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what effect the proposed transition to Integrated Care Systems in England will have on the national provision of weight management services.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Local authorities and clinical commissioning groups are responsible for commissioning weight management services. Integrated Care Systems (ICS) are an opportunity for collaborative working between National Health Service organisations, local authorities and other system partners. ICS guidance set out that NHS organisations, in partnership with local councils and others, should take collective responsibility for managing resources, delivering NHS care, and improving the health of the population they serve. NHS England is working closely with ICS to support their ambitions around obesity.
Asked by: Stuart Anderson (Conservative - Wolverhampton South West)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what support is in place for young people who require physiotherapy sessions additional to those commissioned by Clinical Commissioning Groups.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Physiotherapy services are primarily commissioned by clinical commissioning groups (CCGs). Physiotherapy services are commissioned across primary, secondary and tertiary care, taking place in the community, general practitioner practices, patients’ homes, acute hospitals, schools, nurseries in addition to other high street settings.
Outside of the CCG arrangements, NHS England is responsible for specialised commissioning – which can include specialist rehabilitation for young people with complex rehabilitation needs. Local authorities can fund physiotherapy services, both in education and also via personal care budgets. Schools can directly employ physiotherapy services, and this is indeed the case in some Special Educational Needs schools. Physiotherapists could be employed directly out of personal healthcare budgets. Local authorities can also offer physiotherapy as part of wider health and wellbeing schemes, targeted at both their young and adult populations.
Physiotherapy provision can also be accessed via private practitioners, or via the third sector, including charity and voluntary organisations.
Asked by: Stuart Anderson (Conservative - Wolverhampton South West)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps his Department is taking to reduce the number of (a) BAME and (b) other stillbirths in the West Midlands region.
Answered by Nadine Dorries
All maternity services have been asked to ensure that continuity of carer (CoC) is rolled out to women from black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) communities and for women from the most deprived communities. The overall target for March 2021 is 35% of all women should be on a continuity pathway with at least as many women from the BAME communities and the most deprived communities receiving CoC as white women.
Every maternity service in the National Health Service is actively implementing elements of the Saving Babies’ Lives Care Bundle which comprises four key elements of care to support providers, commissioners and healthcare professionals to take action to reduce stillbirths.
Asked by: Stuart Anderson (Conservative - Wolverhampton South West)
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 15 September 2020 to Question 83952, for what reason funding is not being made available to help small businesses and voluntary groups support of the Government's obesity reduction strategy; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Local authorities and clinical commissioning groups are responsible for commissioning weight management services.
Asked by: Stuart Anderson (Conservative - Wolverhampton South West)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what financial support from the public purse is available for UK medical research charities.
Answered by Edward Argar - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
The United Kingdom is home to globally-recognised medical research charities, which are an integral part of our world-leading life sciences sector. The Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy and Department of Health and Social Care officials are working closely with medical research charities to understand the impact of the pandemic, identifying how we can work together, and ensure patients benefit from charity-funded research.
The Sustaining University Research Expertise (SURE) Fund aims to help to sustain the research capacity?of the university research base as a whole. The Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy are asking universities in receipt of SURE funding to demonstrate how these funds are being utilised to sustain research in areas typically funded by charities and business. Charities also have access to the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme, will pay no business rates for their shops for the 2020 to 2021 tax year and can get a Business Interruption Loan.
Asked by: Stuart Anderson (Conservative - Wolverhampton South West)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what funding he plans to allocate to improve access to affordable physiotherapy.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
NHS England and NHS Improvement have been clear in their guidance that non-COVID-19 health services such as physiotherapy should be maintained as far as possible. The ‘Help Us to Help You’ campaign is underway to encourage the public to access the NHS services they need. Anyone who is concerned or needs treatment should come forward.
To further support the National Health Service, the Government is providing an additional £3 billion of funding, which includes funding for continued access to independent sector providers to carry out routine NHS treatments and procedures for non-COVID-19 health services, including physiotherapy. Furthermore, the five-year GP Contract announced funding for 20,000 new primary care healthcare professionals, such as physiotherapists. By 2024, all adults in England will to be able to see a musculoskeletal first contact physiotherapist at their local general practitioner (GP) practice without being referred by a GP.