Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to the planned closure of the University of Essex's Southend Campus, what plans he has to increase the provision of health and social care-related courses.

While the Government is committed to ensuring sustainable training pathways for health and care professions, higher education institutions are independent providers and are responsible for making their own decisions about course delivery and viability based on learner demand and provider capacity.

The closure of the University of Essex Southend campus is a consolidation of oral health, adult, and mental health nursing courses to their main campus at Colchester. This is not expected to negatively impact overall training numbers or local recruitment to these professions.