Asked by: Baroness Goudie (Labour - 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 children's hospices receive equitable and sustainable long-term funding, in light of their role in delivering the 10-Year Health Plan.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
We are supporting the hospice sector with a £100 million capital funding boost for eligible adult and children’s hospices in England to ensure they have the best physical environment for care.
We are also providing £26 million of revenue funding to support children and young people’s hospices for 2025/26. This is a continuation of the funding which until recently was known as the children and young people’s hospice grant. We cannot yet confirm what the funding for 2026/27 will be, or how it will be administered.
The Department and NHS England are looking at how to improve the access, quality, and sustainability of all-age palliative care and end of life care in line with the 10-Year Health Plan.
The Government and the National Health Service will closely monitor the shift towards the strategic commissioning of palliative care and end of life care services to ensure that the future state of services reduces variation in access and quality, although some variation may be appropriate to reflect both innovation and the needs of local populations.
Officials will present further proposals to ministers over the coming months, outlining how to operationalise the required changes to palliative care and end of life care to enable the shift from hospital to community, including as part of neighbourhood health teams.
Asked by: Baroness Goudie (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether they will review the way in which children's palliative care is currently planned and funded.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
We are supporting the hospice sector with a £100 million capital funding boost for eligible adult and children’s hospices in England to ensure they have the best physical environment for care.
We are also providing £26 million of revenue funding to support children and young people’s hospices for 2025/26. This is a continuation of the funding which until recently was known as the children and young people’s hospice grant. We cannot yet confirm what the funding for 2026/27 will be, or how it will be administered.
The Department and NHS England are looking at how to improve the access, quality, and sustainability of all-age palliative care and end of life care in line with the 10-Year Health Plan.
The Government and the National Health Service will closely monitor the shift towards the strategic commissioning of palliative care and end of life care services to ensure that the future state of services reduces variation in access and quality, although some variation may be appropriate to reflect both innovation and the needs of local populations.
Officials will present further proposals to ministers over the coming months, outlining how to operationalise the required changes to palliative care and end of life care to enable the shift from hospital to community, including as part of neighbourhood health teams.
Asked by: Baroness Goudie (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether they will commit to ensuring that ringfenced NHS funding for children's hospices will be available for multiple years beyond 2025–26, and when they intend to make such a commitment.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
We are supporting the hospice sector with a £100 million capital funding boost for eligible adult and children’s hospices in England to ensure they have the best physical environment for care.
We are also providing £26 million of revenue funding to support children and young people’s hospices for 2025/26. This is a continuation of the funding which until recently was known as the children and young people’s hospice grant. We cannot yet confirm what the funding for 2026/27 will be, or how it will be administered.
The Department and NHS England are looking at how to improve the access, quality, and sustainability of all-age palliative care and end of life care in line with the 10-Year Health Plan.
The Government and the National Health Service will closely monitor the shift towards the strategic commissioning of palliative care and end of life care services to ensure that the future state of services reduces variation in access and quality, although some variation may be appropriate to reflect both innovation and the needs of local populations.
Officials will present further proposals to ministers over the coming months, outlining how to operationalise the required changes to palliative care and end of life care to enable the shift from hospital to community, including as part of neighbourhood health teams.
Asked by: Baroness Goudie (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether they intend to close the Fleming Fund and, if so, whether they have an alternative model for maintaining Britain's antimicrobial resistance commitments.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
As set out at the Spring Statement, the Government is reducing its Official Development Assistance (ODA) from 0.5% to 0.3% of gross national income by 2027 to respond to pressing security and defence challenges that the United Kingdom is facing. As a result, the Fleming Fund will close at the end of its current grant agreements by March 2026. The Government is committed to exiting the Fleming Fund responsibly. Each country context is different, and we are currently in discussions with governments and partners to ensure all possibilities of sustainability are explored. We are working through detailed decisions on how the ODA budget will be used in future years, including future allocations for antimicrobial resistance (AMR) activities. This will be informed by internal and external consultation and impact assessments, ahead of publishing indicative multi-year allocations in the autumn.
Tackling AMR remains a priority for the Government and is vital for protecting our National Health Service, including via delivery of the UK National Action Plan on AMR, as laid out in the recent publication of the 10-Year Health Plan. Through global partnerships and diplomacy, the UK is working with our partners to drive robust implementation of the commitments from the Political Declaration, including on the importance of strengthening multisectoral surveillance.
Asked by: Baroness Goudie (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the link between poor media literacy and the impact of health misinformation on public health decision-making.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Department has not made a specific assessment of the impact of health misinformation on public health decision making, but recognises the importance of accurate health information being available to the public and of preventing misinformation.
The Department regularly rebuts factual inaccuracies when they appear in traditional media and undertakes extensive planning, engagement, and strategic work to ensure accurate public health information is available on social media channels, to mitigate misinformation. In addition, the Department strives to ensure that all of the information it publishes is accurate, clear, and accessible to a variety of audiences, including using easy read versions.
Asked by: Baroness Goudie (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government who is responsible for ensuring that pharmacies in women's prisons are stocked correctly and take into account prisoners' illnesses; and how many qualified clinicians are on duty each day.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
NHS England contracts prison healthcare and pharmacy services directly via its Health and Justice regional commissioning teams, which also assure the contracts.
Contracted providers are expected to enable access to a prescription dispensing pharmacy service, which can be on-site or via an externally contracted pharmacy, that meets the same standards as those provided by community pharmacies.
The provider is responsible for ensuring the service meets the standards set out in the National Health Service’s health and justice national prison primary care service specification. These include the expectation that dispensed medicines are provided for supply to the patient within specific timeframes, with the pharmacy deciding which medicines to keep in stock based on the usual items prescribed.
The contracted provider will decide how many qualified clinicians need to be on duty each day based on the health needs and size of the prison population, and the admission, release, and transfer rates at the prison. The provider provides the regional commissioning team with information about the workforce and service delivery arrangements as part of the contract monitoring information and service assurance.
Asked by: Baroness Goudie (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the interim report Infant formula and follow-on formula market study by the Competition and Markets Authority published on 8 November.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
Infant feeding is critical to a baby’s healthy growth and development. The Government is committed to giving every child the best start in life, and that includes helping families to access support to feed their baby.
We welcome the Competition and Market Authority’s (CMA) infant formula and follow-on formula market study interim report, and will carefully consider its findings and options. We will continue to engage with the CMA ahead of the publication of its final report in February 2025.
Asked by: Baroness Goudie (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of delays experienced by children’s hospices in receiving the £25 million annual NHS England funding, which is now distributed by Integrated Care Boards, and what steps they are taking to ensure timely access to this funding in future years.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
While 2023/24 marked the final year of the Children’s Hospice Grant in its previous format, in 2024/25, NHS England continued to provide an additional £25 million of funding for children and young people’s hospices, maintaining the level of grant funding from 2023/24. For the first time, this funding was transacted by integrated care boards (ICBs), on behalf of NHS England, rather than being centrally administered as before.
The Department and NHS England are aware that the shift to the dissemination of funding via ICBs in 2024/25 has not been as smooth a transition as we would have hoped. However, we are working closely with NHS England to resolve any remaining issues to the 2024/25 funding, and we are also jointly considering the future of this important funding stream beyond 2024/25.
The Minister of State for Care recently met NHS England, Together for Short Lives, and one of the co-chairs of the Children Who Need Palliative Care All-Party Parliamentary Group, Lord Balfe, to discuss children’s palliative and end of life care, and this funding stream was discussed at length at that meeting.
Asked by: Baroness Goudie (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the extent to which children’s hospices rely on the annual £25 million funding from NHS England; and what plans they have to secure this funding beyond 2024–25 to prevent a shortfall in services.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
While 2023/24 marked the final year of the Children’s Hospice Grant in its previous format, in 2024/25, NHS England continued to provide an additional £25 million of funding for children and young people’s hospices, maintaining the level of grant funding from 2023/24. For the first time, this funding was transacted by integrated care boards (ICBs), on behalf of NHS England, rather than being centrally administered as before.
The Department and NHS England are aware that the shift to the dissemination of funding via ICBs in 2024/25 has not been as smooth a transition as we would have hoped. However, we are working closely with NHS England to resolve any remaining issues to the 2024/25 funding, and we are also jointly considering the future of this important funding stream beyond 2024/25.
The Minister of State for Care recently met NHS England, Together for Short Lives, and one of the co-chairs of the Children Who Need Palliative Care All-Party Parliamentary Group, Lord Balfe, to discuss children’s palliative and end of life care, and this funding stream was discussed at length at that meeting.
Asked by: Baroness Goudie (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what plans they have to ensure that children's hospices can continue to provide lifeline care if the £25 million annual funding from NHS England is not extended beyond 2024–25.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
While 2023/24 marked the final year of the Children’s Hospice Grant in its previous format, in 2024/25, NHS England continued to provide an additional £25 million of funding for children and young people’s hospices, maintaining the level of grant funding from 2023/24. For the first time, this funding was transacted by integrated care boards (ICBs), on behalf of NHS England, rather than being centrally administered as before.
The Department and NHS England are aware that the shift to the dissemination of funding via ICBs in 2024/25 has not been as smooth a transition as we would have hoped. However, we are working closely with NHS England to resolve any remaining issues to the 2024/25 funding, and we are also jointly considering the future of this important funding stream beyond 2024/25.
The Minister of State for Care recently met NHS England, Together for Short Lives, and one of the co-chairs of the Children Who Need Palliative Care All-Party Parliamentary Group, Lord Balfe, to discuss children’s palliative and end of life care, and this funding stream was discussed at length at that meeting.