Asked by: Lord Weir of Ballyholme (Democratic Unionist Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to ensure that people with mild cognitive impairment or mild dementia are diagnosed early enough to benefit from novel treatments if approved by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence in the future.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) is the independent body responsible for developing authoritative, evidence-based recommendations for the National Health Service on whether new medicines represent a clinically and cost-effective use of resources. The NHS in England is legally required to fund medicines recommended in a NICE appraisal, usually within three months of final guidance.
A timely diagnosis is vital to ensuring that a person with dementia can access the advice, information, care, and support that can help them to live well and remain independent for as long as possible. We remain committed to recovering the dementia diagnosis rate to the national ambition of 66.7%. The latest dementia diagnosis rate reported by NHS England for the end of September 2025 was 66.3%.
To support commissioners and providers with appropriate data and to enable targeted support where needed, we have developed a memory service dashboard for management information purposes.
Our health system has struggled to support those with complex needs, including those with dementia. Under the 10-Year Health Plan, those living with dementia will benefit from improved care planning and better services.
We will deliver the first ever Modern Service Framework for Frailty and Dementia to deliver rapid and significant improvements in quality of care and productivity. This will be informed by phase one of the independent commission into adult social care, expected in 2026.
Asked by: Lord Kamall (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what opportunities they have identified in the NHS 10 Year Plan for the expansion of the NHS Genomic Medicine Service in relation to diabetes and cardiovascular disease.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The 10-Year Health Plan sets out how we will shift from sickness to prevention. As part of this, we will harness the combination of genomics, predictive analytics, and artificial intelligence to usher in a new era for secondary prevention. The National Health Service, in partnership with Our Future Health, will trial the use of Integrated Risk Scores, which combine genomic, lifestyle, and health data, within the newly announced neighbourhood health services. Initially focused on cardiovascular disease and diabetes, the programme will expand to includes breast, bowel, and prostate cancer, with other diseases such as glaucoma, osteoporosis, and dementia under consideration. This marks a major step toward routine genetic testing in preventive care, enabling earlier and more personalised interventions.
Asked by: Tom Morrison (Liberal Democrat - Cheadle)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps her Department is taking to improve GP (a) awareness and (b) understanding of (i) dementia and (ii) other neurodegenerative conditions.
Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
Employers in the health system are responsible for ensuring that their staff are trained to the required standards to deliver appropriate treatment for patients. The required training needs are set out in the Dementia training Standards Framework, which is available at the following link:
https://www.skillsforhealth.org.uk/info-hub/dementia-2015-updated-2018/
The Dementia Care Pathway: Full implementation guidance emphasises the need to ensure that general practitioners are supported in providing dementia diagnosis with education and training programmes.
There are also a variety of resources available on the NHS England E-learning for Health platform, including a programme on dementia care, designed to enhance the training and education of the health and social care workforce.
We will deliver the first ever Frailty and Dementia Modern Service Framework to deliver rapid and significant improvements in quality of care and productivity. This will be informed by phase one of the independent commission into adult social care, expected in 2026.
The framework will seek to reduce unwarranted variation and narrow inequality for those living with dementia and will set national standards for dementia care and redirect National Health Service priorities to provide the best possible care and support.
Asked by: Caroline Johnson (Conservative - Sleaford and North Hykeham)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will make it his policy to develop a modern services framework for (a) arthritis and (b) musculorskeletal disease.
Answered by Ashley Dalton - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
As announced in the 10-Year Health Plan, as well as an overall quality strategy, the National Quality Board will oversee the development of a new series of service frameworks to accelerate progress in conditions where there is potential for rapid and significant improvements in the quality of care and productivity.
Early priorities will include cardiovascular disease, mental health, and the first ever service framework for frailty and dementia. The Government will consider other long-term conditions with significant health and economic impacts for future waves of modern service frameworks.
Asked by: Dave Robertson (Labour - Lichfield)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how his Department plans to consult people with lived experience of dementia on the Modern Service Framework for Frailty and Dementia.
Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
We will deliver the first ever Modern Service Framework for Frailty and Dementia to deliver rapid and significant improvements in quality of care and productivity. This will be informed by phase one of the independent commission into adult social care, expected in 2026.
On 28 October, Alzheimer’s Society held a World Café event on behalf of the Department to help ensure that people living with dementia were able to feed in at an early stage to the development of the Modern Service Framework for Frailty and Dementia.
Policy leads from the Department attended the session, along with representatives from Alzheimer’s Society, to hear from those living with dementia, their family members, and their carers, both paid and unpaid. This event aimed to foster open dialogue and help inform the development of the modern service framework.
We intend to further engage with a range of partners over the coming months to enable us to build a framework which is both ambitious and practical, to ensure we can improve system performance for people with dementia both now and in the future.
Asked by: Tom Morrison (Liberal Democrat - Cheadle)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether his Department plans to provide funding for specialist dementia leads within GP surgeries.
Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence’s (NICE) guideline NG97 recommends that individuals should be referred to a specialist dementia diagnostic service, such as a memory clinic or community old age psychiatry service, if reversible causes of cognitive decline have been investigated and dementia is still suspected.
The Dementia Care Pathway: Full implementation guidance emphasises the need to ensure general practitioners (GPs) are supported in providing dementia diagnosis with education and training programmes, such as Dementia Revealed: What Primary Care Needs to Know, a resource for GPs and practice nurses who have no previous experience of diagnosing and treating dementia.
Our health system has struggled to support those with complex needs, including those with dementia. Under the 10-Year Health Plan, those living with dementia will benefit from improved care planning and better services.
We will deliver the first ever Frailty and Dementia Modern Service Framework to deliver rapid and significant improvements in the quality of care and productivity. This will be informed by phase one of the independent commission into adult social care, expected in 2026.
The Frailty and Dementia Modern Service Framework will seek to reduce unwarranted variation and narrow inequality for those living with dementia and will set national standards for dementia care and redirect National Health Service priorities to provide the best possible care and support.
Asked by: Dan Aldridge (Labour - Weston-super-Mare)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, when he plans to publish the Modern Service Framework for Frailty and Dementia.
Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Modern Service Framework for Frailty and Dementia is expected to be published in 2026 and will deliver rapid and significant improvements in the quality of care and productivity. This will be informed by phase one of the independent commission into adult social care, expected in 2026.
We intend to engage with a range of partners over the coming months to enable us to build a framework which is both ambitious and practical, to ensure we can improve system performance for people with dementia both now and in the future.
Asked by: Rachel Gilmour (Liberal Democrat - Tiverton and Minehead)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what assessment she has made of the potential merits of extending VAT exemption to include essential (a) day care and (b) respite services for people with (i) dementia and (ii) other permanent disabilities.
Answered by Dan Tomlinson - Exchequer Secretary (HM Treasury)
Supplies of welfare services, including the provision of care for people with permanent disabilities and dementia, are exempt from VAT if they are supplied by eligible bodies, such as public bodies or charities.
When developing policy, including on VAT on welfare services, the Treasury carefully considers the impact of its decisions on those sharing any of the nine protected characteristics, including disability, age, sex and race, in line with its statutory obligations under the Public Sector Equality Duty set out in the Equality Act 2010.
More generally, VAT is a broad-based tax on consumption, and the 20 per cent standard rate applies to most goods and services. VAT is the UK’s second largest tax, forecast to raise £180 billion in 2025/26. Exceptions to the standard rate have always been limited and balanced against affordability considerations.
Asked by: Al Pinkerton (Liberal Democrat - Surrey Heath)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment his Department has made of the potential merits of increasing funding for research into treatments for Huntington’s disease in Surrey Heath constituency.
Answered by Zubir Ahmed - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Department of Health and Social Care delivers research via the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR).
In January 2024, the NIHR invested £6 million over three years into two Dementia and Neurodegeneration Policy Research Units to conduct research that informs policymaking in the Department and its health system partners. The units’ work programmes span multiple neurodegenerative diseases, including Huntington’s disease.
As well as funding research itself, the NIHR invests significantly in research expertise and capacity, specialist facilities, support services and collaborations to support and deliver research in England, collectively forming the NIHR infrastructure.
For example, research supported by the NIHR’s UCLH Biomedical Research Centre and Research Delivery Network has shown that AMT-130 gene therapy led to a 75% slowing in disease progression after 36 months in people with Huntington’s disease who also demonstrated slower motor and cognitive function degeneration, offering long-awaited hope to individuals and families impacted by the disease..
The NIHR continues to welcome high-quality funding applications for research into any aspect of human health and care, including Huntington’s disease. These applications are subject to peer review and judged in open competition, with awards being made on the basis of the importance of the topic to patients and health and care services, value for money and scientific quality.
Asked by: Martin Wrigley (Liberal Democrat - Newton Abbot)
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 improve breast cancer screening rates in Devon.
Answered by Ashley Dalton - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Government is taking a range of actions to improve participation in breast screening in Devon, through the NHS Breast Screening Programme. These actions include: