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 number of families who will benefit from the financial support package to cover travel costs to and from cancer appointments in (a) Bedfordshire and (b) England.

The Department knows that the cost of travel is an important issue for many young cancer patients and their families across the United Kingdom.

Through the National Cancer Plan, the Government is committing up to £10 million a year to a new fund open to all children and young people in England with cancer and their families regardless of income, to support them with the cost of travelling to and from treatment. This commitment sits alongside wider action to transform cancer care for children and young people.

The Department has not made a formal estimate of the number of families who will benefit from the financial support package to cover travel costs to and from treatment in Bedfordshire specifically. However, the Department’s work to-date estimates that approximately 3,100 young cancer patients will benefit across England.