Asked by: Shaun Davies (Labour - Telford)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps his Department is taking to improve the quality and availability of prostate cancer support and treatment.
Answered by Ashley Dalton - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
To improve the quality and availability of prostate cancer support, NHS England has committed to ensuring that every person diagnosed with cancer has access to personalised care. This includes needs assessments, a care plan, and health and wellbeing information and support. Through the provision of information, personalised care empowers people to manage their care and the impact of their cancer. This approach ensures that each person’s care is planned holistically, covering mental and physical health, as well as any practical or financial concerns.
NHS England has funded an audit of prostate cancer to improve treatment quality and availability. Using routine data collected on patients diagnosed in a National Health Service setting, the audit brings together information to look at what is being done well, where it’s being done well, and what needs to be done better. On 9 October 2025, the latest national prostate cancer audits were published alongside patient summaries. The Government and the NHS are now considering the reports and acting on the findings where appropriate.
The National Cancer Plan will aim to improve how the physical and psychosocial needs of people with cancer can be met, including for prostate cancer, with a focus on personalised care to improve quality of life. It will address how the experience of care can be improved for those diagnosed, treated, and living with and beyond prostate cancer.
Asked by: Will Forster (Liberal Democrat - Woking)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps the Government is taking to promote active and healthy lifestyles among pensioners, including through access to affordable physical activity and active travel.
Answered by Ashley Dalton - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Government recognises that reducing physical inactivity and promoting active, healthy lifestyles in people of all ages, including among pensioners, is important in helping people live longer, healthier lives, and is a key part of the Department’s shift from treatment to prevention.
The NHS Better Health Campaign promotes ways for people of all ages to move more, and signposts to digital support like the NHS Active 10 walking and NHS Couch to 5k app.
The Department supports the National Health Service, together with local authorities, to provide a range of community and social prescribing approaches to support older people, such as walking groups and aquatic/swimming classes.
The Government is promoting active and healthy lifestyles among pensioners through investment in walking and cycling infrastructure and community-based programmes that make active travel safer and more accessible for older adults, and has recently closed its consultation on the third Cycling and Walking Investment Strategy, due to be published next year.
Asked by: Callum Anderson (Labour - Buckingham and Bletchley)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what guidance his Department issues to GP practices in the Buckingham and Bletchley constituency on early detection of prostate cancer.
Answered by Ashley Dalton - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
We are committed to ensuring that general practitioners (GPs) have the right training and systems to identify cancer symptoms. Use of specific clinical decision support tools are agreed at a local level. This will benefit cancer patients across England, including in Buckingham and Bletchley. GPs are responsible for ensuring their own clinical knowledge remains up-to-date and for identifying learning needs as part of their continuing professional development.
The Department is taking cancer detection seriously, including in GPs. The Government has recently launched Jess’s Rule, a patient safety initiative that introduces clinical guidance to support clinicians in taking a “fresh eyes” approach in GPs. It asks GPs to think again if, after three appointments, they have been unable to diagnose a patient, or their symptoms have escalated. This will benefit all cancer patients, including prostate cancer patients.
Asked by: Jim Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party - Strangford)
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 impact of the UK National Screening Committee’s draft recommendation on prostate cancer screening on future demand for PSMA PET-CT imaging, including modelling of the different demand scenarios included in the current public consultation.
Answered by Ashley Dalton - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The independent UK National Screening Committee (UK NSC), which is made up of leading medical and screening experts, advises ministers in all four nations of the United Kingdom on the evidence on screening. They have carried out an evidence review to look at screening for prostate cancer. Where the committee is confident that screening provides more good than harm, they recommend a screening programme. Treatment can lead to immediate life changing side effects which need to be balanced against potential benefits some years in the future.
On 28 November 2025, the UK NSC opened a 12-week public consultation on an evidence review to look at screening for prostate cancer and a draft recommendation to:
Alongside the consultation, work is being carried out to assess the costs and resources required to deliver the possible screening pathway, this could include an assessment of future demand for PSMA PET-CT imaging.
We anticipate that the UK NSC will make a final recommendation on screening for prostate cancer in early 2026. My Rt Hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, will consider this and make a decision on whether to accept and next steps at this point.
Asked by: Callum Anderson (Labour - Buckingham and Bletchley)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what support his Department provides to public health teams operating in the Buckingham and Bletchley constituency to increase men’s engagement with preventative health services.
Answered by Ashley Dalton - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
On 19 November, to coincide with International Men’s Health Day, we published the first ever Men’s Health Strategy for England which aims to improve the health of all men and boys in England, including those in Buckingham and Bletchley constituency. The strategy includes tangible actions to improve access to healthcare, provide the right support to enable men to make healthier choices, develop healthy living and working conditions, foster strong social, community and family networks and address societal norms. It also considers how to prevent and tackle the biggest health problems affecting men of all ages, which include mental health and suicide prevention, respiratory illness, prostate cancer, and heart disease.
We recognise that many of the issues affecting men cannot be solved by the Government alone. The strategy sets out how other sectors, such as the National Health Service, local government, employers, charities, research funders and communities, can contribute to shared outcomes and highlights that improving men’s health will depend on how national priorities are translated into local delivery.
The Department support Upper Tier Local Authorities, including Buckinghamshire and Milton Keynes, with the Public Health Grant. This is ringfenced funding given to local government to improve the health of their local populations and to reduce inequalities. We recently announced details of a three-year funding settlement for local government, including the Public Health Grant.
Asked by: Andrew Mitchell (Conservative - Sutton Coldfield)
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 help tackle inequalities in (a) waiting times and (b) access to treatment for diabetes in the West Midlands.
Answered by Ashley Dalton - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
Action is being taken across the West Midland integrated care boards (ICBs) to address inequalities in waiting times and access to treatment for diabetes
This action includes strengthening monitoring of data and to identify delays and variation, improving general practice (GP) engagement through Protected Learning Time sessions, streamlining referral pathways and supporting GPs to proactively identify and engage patients using improved data and low-literacy-friendly approaches
ICBs are also take actions to identify groups at greatest risk of poor outcomes who face barriers in accessing services. The aim of these actions is to deliver fairer waiting times, more consistent access to treatment, and equitable, high‑quality diabetes care for all communities.
Asked by: Andy MacNae (Labour - Rossendale and Darwen)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, pursuant to the Answer of 24 November 2025 to Question 91494, if the UK Health Security Agency will publish its assessment of the need for mandatory notification for Group B Streptococcus.
Answered by Ashley Dalton - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) plays a key role in addressing group B streptococcus (GBS) infection both through routine service activities and innovative research.
The UKHSA does not believe that there is a rationale at present for GBS being added to the Health Protection Notification Regulations. There are no immediate and specific public health actions required to be taken in response to a case being diagnosed. Whilst periods of enhanced surveillance suggest routine surveillance may be underestimating numbers of infections, this has not been audited to identify the source and reason for discrepancies between different sources of reports during these periods. Given the largely automated nature of laboratory surveillance, making GBS notifiable would not necessarily address any deficits in reporting.
The list of notifiable disease is kept under review by the Department with the UKHSA involvement. Further information is available at the following link:
Asked by: Jenny Riddell-Carpenter (Labour - Suffolk Coastal)
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 local authorities are able to act swiftly where there is evidence of illegal tobacco or vaping products being sold on high streets.
Answered by Ashley Dalton - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Tobacco and Vapes Bill will strengthen enforcement and crack down on rogue retailers selling illegal tobacco and vaping products. The bill enables ministers in England, Wales, and Northern Ireland to introduce a licensing scheme for the retail sale of tobacco, vapes, and nicotine products, and enables the introduction of a new registration system for tobacco, vape, and nicotine products that are sold on the United Kingdom’s market. This will help ensure products are compliant with product safety and standards requirements and enable Trading Standards to remove non-compliant products from the market quickly and efficiently.
Alongside the bill, the Government has announced £10 million of new funding in 2025/26 to Trading Standards, to support the enforcement of illicit and underage tobacco and vape sales in England, and the implementation of the measures in the bill. This funding is being used to boost the Trading Standards workforce by recruiting 94 new apprentices. This will provide greater workforce capacity, enabling swifter enforcement action against illicit activity.
Asked by: Paul Holmes (Conservative - Hamble Valley)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, whether she plans to make further changes to business rate relief in 2026-27, further to the measures introduced at Budget 2025.
Answered by Dan Tomlinson - Exchequer Secretary (HM Treasury)
The amount of business rates paid on each property is based on the rateable value of the property, assessed by the Valuation Office Agency (VOA), and the multiplier values, which are set by the Government. Rateable values are re-assessed every three years. Revaluations ensure that the rateable values of properties (i.e. the tax base) remain in line with market changes, and that the tax rates adjust to reflect changes in the tax base.
At the Budget, the VOA announced updated property values from the 2026 revaluation. This revaluation is the first since Covid, which has led to significant increases in rateable values for some properties.
To support with bill increases, at the Budget, the Government introduced a support package worth £4.3 billion over the next three years, including to protect ratepayers seeing their bills increase because of the revaluation. As a result, over half of ratepayers will see no bill increases, including 23% seeing their bills go down next year. Government support also means that most properties seeing increases will see them capped at 15% or less next year, or £800 for the smallest.
Asked by: Tim Farron (Liberal Democrat - Westmorland and Lonsdale)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what contingency plans are in place for periods of water shortage and supply outages.
Answered by Emma Hardy - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
In England and Wales, The Security and Emergency Measures Direction 2022 (SEMD) is the main legislative framework specific to water companies for emergency planning. It requires water companies to ensure continuation of their water distribution functions during an emergency. Separate arrangements apply in Scotland and Northern Ireland.
Companies are required under the SEMD framework to plan for a wide range of disruptive scenarios, including continuous monitoring of risks such as severe winter weather. In addition to SEMD requirements, companies are also incentivised under Ofwat’s performance targets regime to minimise supply interruptions and resulting customer impacts. The Drinking Water Inspectorate regulates water company performance on SEMD performance.
Water companies are also Category Two Responders under the Civil Contingencies Act (2004) and have duties to plan for emergencies and cooperate with other organisations in their Local Resilience Forums in understanding risk, planning and exercising.
Defra maintains regular strategic engagement with water companies on resilience planning. This includes in advance of forecast periods of severe weather. Water companies also engage with their Local Resilience Forums during responses to water outages.
Defra undertakes strategic risk assessment, planning and engagement with the water sector and other government departments to regarding water outage risk.