Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether he has made an assessment of the comparative cost to the NHS of (a) hospice inpatient beds and (b) acute hospital beds for palliative care patients.

While the majority of palliative care and end of life care is provided by National Health Service staff and services, we recognise the vital part that voluntary sector organisations, including charitable hospices, also play in providing support to people at the end of life and those important to them. As charitable hospices are independent, autonomous organisations, they are free to set their own wages and some associated costs, and the Department does not hold or collect this information.