Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to ensure that (a) NHS Test and Trace and (b) local public health teams have the (i) capacity and (b) resources to manage effectively an increase in cases of covid-19.

NHS Test and Trace has built in flexibility within its contracts to adjust capacity which includes surge testing through mobile testing units; door-to-door testing, increasing supplies of test kits; increased laboratory processing capacity; enhanced contact tracing; walk in vaccine clinics; and increased communications to drive vaccine uptake.

We have provided local authority public health teams with additional funding through the Contain Outbreak Management Fund to support their local efforts in managing COVID-19 transmission and outbreaks to deliver interventions such as targeted testing for hard-to-reach groups; additional contact tracing; enhanced communication and marketing; and additional support for compliance and enforcement. We expect local authority Chief Executives to work in coordination with the Director of Public Health to determine the necessary activities.