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 impact of alternative pathway on reducing ambulance handover delays at hospital emergency departments in the East of England.

Reducing unacceptably long ambulance handover delays is a priority for the Government, and the National Health Service has recently introduced a maximum 45-minute standard, supporting ambulances to be released more quickly and get back on the road to treat patients.

We are further tackling this issue through greater use of alternative pathways of care, so patients receive the right care at the right time and in the right place. The Urgent and Emergency Care Delivery Plan 2025/26 commits to scaling a new “Home First” approach which will enable ambulance services to prioritise the most critical cases while providing alternative pathways for those with less urgent needs.

To achieve this, we will enhance paramedic-led care in the community to ensure more patients receive effective treatment at the scene or in their own homes, reducing avoidable hospital conveyance. This will be delivered through ambulance crews operating a call before convey principle and enabling “see and treat”, supported by additional clinicians in emergency operating centres and single points of access. The East of England Ambulance Service in January 2026 reported that it responded to over half of incidents, or 52.6%, with either a see and treat response, at 34.3%, or hear and treat, at 18.3%.

The NHS Planning Guidance 2025/26 commits to improving accident and emergency waiting times and ambulance response times. NHS England will work with systems to reduce avoidable ambulance dispatches and conveyances by ensuring all Category 3 and 4 calls are clinically navigated, validated, and where appropriate, triaged in ambulance control centres, or in single points of access in line with existing guidance.