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 tackle falling life expectancy in a number of local authorities in the north of England.

The Government are committed to ensuring people can enjoy at least five extra years of healthy, independent living by 2035. The NHS Long Term Plan contains a number of commitments, all major national programmes and every local area across England is required to set out specific measurable goals and mechanisms by which they will contribute to narrowing health inequalities over the next five and ten years.