Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how much funding his Department will provide to (a) the Macfarlane Trust, (b) the Caxton Foundation and (c) the Eileen Trust beyond 1 April 2017.

We will continue to fund the three discretionary payment support schemes beyond 1 April 2017. However, we are not yet able to confirm at this stage what the funding amount will be for the three charities. We are committed to continuing with discretionary funding.

The NHS Business Services Authority (NHS-BSA) is being appointed to provide support to all beneficiaries of the schemes later in 2017. We do not anticipate the NHS-BSA will receive an increase in running costs to administer the new scheme than is currently being provided to the existing schemes. It is important that any allocation to the new arrangement does not impact or compromise on support to beneficiaries. The overall allocation for the schemes, irrespective of provider, remains at £231 million for the period of the current Spending Review.