Asked by: Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the (1) funding, and (2) staff resources, available to local authorities to undertake the necessary checks on food labelling; and whether they will ensure that those resources are ring-fenced for that purpose.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
Local authorities (LAs) in the United Kingdom are competent authorities. It is for the cabinet of each authority to determine how their budget is spent based on statutory obligations, local priorities, and service demands.
The Food Standards Agency (FSA) monitors the resources available to carry out food safety checks. Their report Our Food 2023 – An annual review of food standards in the UK notes that the number of Trading Standards Officers (TSOs) available in LAs to carry out food labelling checks has fallen considerably over the past decade. There were 182 fewer TSOs working in LAs across England, Wales, and Northern Ireland in 2023 compared to a decade ago, in 2012/13. Although the number of officers in LAs rose slightly during 2023, there was still a higher proportion of unfilled posts compared to pre-pandemic numbers. A copy of the report is attached.
The FSA has worked closely with the Chartered Trading Standards Institute and the Association of Chief Trading Standards Officers to endorse a level 6 Trading Standards Practitioner apprenticeship. This has led to over 100 new people training in the first year. The FSA will continue to work across the Government and with the food sector to monitor the situation and to take appropriate action to ensure that food is safe.
Asked by: Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of health inequalities between (1) rural and coastal, and (2) urban, areas; and what steps they intend to take to address any imbalances.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
We support the National Health Service’s CORE20PLUS5 approach, which targets action to reduce health inequalities in the most deprived 20% of the population, and which improves outcomes for the groups that experience the worst access, experience, and outcomes within the NHS.
The Chief Medical Officer’s 2023 annual report made clear that future health and care needs will vary significantly in different areas, with the populations of rural, semi-rural, and coastal areas ageing much faster than those in metropolitan areas. This means there will be considerable variation in health and care needs even within an integrated care system. We recognise that providing services in rural areas comes with significant additional costs, for example, in travel and staff time. That is why the funding formula used by NHS England to allocate funds to integrated care boards (ICBs) includes an element to better reflect needs in some rural, coastal, and remote areas.
NHS England is responsible for determining allocations for ICBs. In allocating budgets, they have two aims, those being equal opportunity of access for equal need, and reducing health inequalities that are amenable to NHS healthcare. There are a range of adjustments made in the core ICB allocations formula that account for the fact that the costs of providing health care may vary between rural and urban areas.
Tackling health inequalities is central to our Health Mission, which is why the Government has committed to halving the healthy life expectancy gap between the richest and poorest regions, by addressing the social determinants of health. Work is currently underway across the Department, and with NHS England and the regional directors of public health, to develop approaches to address regional health inequalities.
As part of the consultation phase of the 10-Year Health Plan, we invited people from across every NHS region in England, including people from coastal communities, to provide input on how care should be designed and delivered, providing us with rich insights into these areas.
Asked by: Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the risks of water fluoridation in causing cancer.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
My Rt Hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care has a duty to monitor the effects of water fluoridation schemes on health, and to publish reports at intervals no greater than four years. Health monitoring reports published in 2014, 2018, and 2022, taken alongside the existing wider research, show that there is no convincing evidence for adverse outcomes, including for bladder cancer or osteosarcoma, due to fluoridation schemes. These findings are consistent that water fluoridation, at levels recommended in the United Kingdom, is a safe and effective public health measure to reduce dental cavities. The next health monitoring report will be published in 2026.
Asked by: Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether they have undertaken an impact assessment of adding fluoride to the water supply which takes account of (1) the financial cost, and (2) the possible health risks.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
An impact assessment was completed as part of the proposals to expand the existing water fluoridation scheme in the North East of England, to a further 1.6 million people. This sets out a net present social value of the proposal of £201 million over 40 years, and accounts for estimated benefits through dental health care cost savings, productivity gains, and quality of life benefits to individuals. My Rt Hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care has a duty to monitor the effects of water fluoridation schemes on health, and to publish reports at intervals no greater than four years. The findings of monitoring reports published in 2014, 2018, and 2022 are consistent that water fluoridation, at levels recommended in the United Kingdom, is a safe and effective public health measure to reduce dental caries.
Asked by: Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the cost to water companies of adding fluoride to the water supply.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
My Rt Hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care is responsible for reimbursing water undertakers for the reasonable costs associated with water fluoridation schemes. In the financial year 2023/24, these costs were £4,109,521 in revenue and £348,351 in capital for the estimated six million people in England covered by such schemes.
Asked by: Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government how the National Cancer Plan will reduce waiting times for cancer treatment and reduce the length of time from referral to diagnosis.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
As we set out in our new plan for reforming elective care, we are committed to improving performance on cancer waiting times to meet national targets. Further details are available in the National Health Service’s annual operational planning guidance.
Meeting these targets for cancer will ensure no patient waits longer than they should for diagnosis or treatment, and we have started by delivering an extra 40,000 operations, scans, and appointments each week, to support faster diagnosis and access to treatment.
NHS Planning Guidance set stretching targets for cancer. By March 2026, approximately 100,000 more people every year will be told whether they have cancer or not within 28 days, and 17,000 more people will begin treatment within two months of a referral.
To achieve this, we have launched a National Cancer Plan call for evidence, seeking contributions from individuals and organisations to help shape this plan, including ideas on how to meet national targets. The call for evidence is available on the GOV.UK website, in an online only format.
Asked by: Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether their 10-year plan for the NHS will address the distribution of resources between (1) primary and secondary care and (2) urban and rural areas.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
General practices (GPs) and primary care have been receiving a smaller proportion of National Health Service resources, and we’re committed to reversing that and shifting the focus of care out of hospitals and into the community. Additionally, we acknowledge the pressing challenge of ensuring that rural areas have the resources to continue serving their patients.
We have already invested £82 million to recruit 1,000 newly qualified GPs to combat this, and our 10-Year Health Plan will outline steps to shift care from hospitals back to the community and to a Neighbourhood Health Service, which will bring together vital health and care services, ensuring healthcare is closer to home. We will also train more doctors to increase capacity and take the pressure of people currently working in the system.
Asked by: Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the impact that food consumption campaigns, such as “Drinka Pinta Milka Day”, have had on introducing children to healthy eating habits.
Answered by Lord Markham - Shadow Minister (Science, Innovation and Technology)
We cannot comment on campaigns undertaken by other commercial companies or organisations. The Government’s nutrition campaigns, such as Better Health Families previously named Change4Life, have focused on sugar, specifically encouraging parents to decrease the amount of sugar their children consume.
These campaigns have seen high claimed behavioural change as a result, as well as a measurable reduction in sugar consumption. For example: in 2019, 59% of all mothers of five to 11 year olds, or 89% of advert recognisers, said they took direct sugar-related action as a results of the campaign; in 2017, 64% of mothers reported making changes around sugar, saturated fats or salt as a result of our Be Food Smart campaign; a 2016 study of the Sugar Smart campaign showed that supermarket stores which featured Change4Life advertising saw a 3% to 4% difference in sales of sugary cereals, sugary drinks and diet drinks compared to the control stores, a trend which continued for 16 weeks after the campaign ended; and the 2014 Smart Swaps campaign led to a decrease of more than 8% in the purchase of sugary fizzy drinks during the campaign period, when compared with the previous year.
For the assessment of our campaigns, we use an evaluation framework to holistically evaluate, measure success, and optimise. This framework examines the conditions in which campaigns operate, the cost of the campaigns, the activity undertaken and the resultant reach, the reaction to the campaign, the behaviour change achieved, whether claimed and actual, and the impact of the campaign on individuals.
Asked by: Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to encourage more GPs to practice in rural areas.
Answered by Lord Markham - Shadow Minister (Science, Innovation and Technology)
The Government recognises that there are issues with recruitment and retention in certain areas of the country, including some rural locations. We launched the Targeted Enhanced Recruitment Scheme in 2016, which has attracted hundreds of doctors to train in hard to recruit locations, including many rural areas, by providing a one-off financial incentive of £20,000. As of 2023/24, there are 782 places available on the scheme.
Asked by: Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what plans they have to restore the balance in funding between primary and secondary care to ensure primary care has the resources to train, recruit and retain GPs.
Answered by Lord Markham - Shadow Minister (Science, Innovation and Technology)
Funding for General Practice and Primary Care Networks has increased to £11.5 billion in 2023/24.
The Government remains committed to growing the general practitioner (GP) workforce and number of doctors in general practice and is determined to deliver this as soon as possible. We are working with NHS England to increase the GP workforce in England. This includes measures to boost recruitment, address the reasons why doctors leave the profession, and encourage them to return to practice.
NHS England has made available several retention schemes available to boost the general practice workforce. This includes the GP Retention Scheme, the GP Retention Fund, the National GP Induction and Refresher, the Locum Support Scheme, and the Supporting Mentors Scheme.
To boost recruitment, we have increased the number of GP training places. Last year, we saw 4,032 doctors accepting a place on GP training, up from 2,671 in 2014. The number of training places will rise to 6,000 by 2031/32, with the first 500 new places available from September 2025.