Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps she is taking ahead of the winter to help relieve pressures on NHS services within the NHS Birmingham and Solihull Integrated Care Board area.

Preparations for winter are led locally by integrated care boards (ICBs) working with acute trusts, primary care, community services, mental health providers, local authorities and social care partners. On 17 July, NHS England wrote out to the system with the annual winter planning 2026/27 letter, which sets out expectations and assurance mechanisms for winter, including key actions for all local areas to take.

Local areas, including trust and ICB leadership, are developing robust plans to manage demand and capacity and respond to periods of increased pressure. They are also being asked to provide a named executive winter lead and will stress test plans at the September regional stress test exercise.

This builds on progress made last winter, when more patients were treated within four hours, fewer patients waited over 12 hours in accident and emergency departments and Category 2 ambulance response times improved, despite increased demand.