Asked by: Lord Porter of Spalding (Conservative - 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 medical complications and associated risks arising from at-home tablet-induced abortions are accurately monitored, recorded, and reported.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
It is a legal requirement in England and Wales that all terminations must be notified to the Chief Medical Officer within 14 days of the procedure. The Department provides the HSA4 form for this purpose. Information is collected on the abortion and the woman that had the abortion, including the method of the abortion, whether any abortion pills were taken at home, the gestation, or number of weeks, and details of any known complications.
The Department publishes data from these notifications in annual abortion statistics reports, which include data on complications up until the time of discharge from the abortion service.
In November 2023, the Department published a one-time analysis comparing data from the Department’s Abortion Notification System and the Hospital Episode Statistics, which are produced and controlled by NHS England.
Abortion continues to be a very safe procedure for which major complications are rare at all gestations. The complication rates for the Abortion Notification System and the Hospital Episodes Statistics data remains similar to both before and after the introduction of the home use of early medical abortion pills.
Asked by: Lord Porter of Spalding (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether the forthcoming NHS workforce strategy will include specific projections of workforce needs with respect to (1) health visiting, (2) school nursing, (3) sexual health services, and (4) drug and alcohol treatment.
Answered by Lord Markham - Shadow Minister (Science, Innovation and Technology)
The Government has commissioned NHS England to deliver a high-level National Health Service Long Term Workforce Plan (LTWP).
This plan is currently being developed and we have committed to publishing it this year.
Asked by: Lord Porter of Spalding (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government how much public health funding per head was allocated to each local authority in England in (1) 2020–21 and (2) 2021–22.
Answered by Lord Markham - Shadow Minister (Science, Innovation and Technology)
The information requested is set out in the attached spreadsheet.
Asked by: Lord Porter of Spalding (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what plans they have, if any, to strengthen regulatory powers in respect of the sale of vaping products to children.
Answered by Lord Markham - Shadow Minister (Science, Innovation and Technology)
The Government is clear that vaping should only be used to help people quit smoking and vapes should not be used by people under the age of 18 or non-smokers.
We have regulations in place to discourage underage vaping. The law protects children through restricting sales of vapes to people over the age of 18 only, limiting nicotine content, refill bottle and tank sizes, labelling requirements and through advertising restrictions. The Department continues to work with enforcement agencies to ensure these regulations are enforced in England. There are no current plans to strengthen the regulatory powers in respect of the sale of these products to children, but we will keep this under review.
Asked by: Lord Porter of Spalding (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether, as was announced in the 2021 Spending Review, the public health grants for 2023–24 and 2024–25 will increase in line with inflation.
Answered by Lord Markham - Shadow Minister (Science, Innovation and Technology)
We will announce the 2023/24 Public Health Grant allocations to local authorities shortly.
Asked by: Lord Porter of Spalding (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what discussions they have had with local authorities regarding the £250 million of funding allocated to speed up hospital discharge.
Answered by Lord Markham - Shadow Minister (Science, Innovation and Technology)
The Minister of State for Social Care (MS(C)) (Helen Whately MP), and Department officials engage regularly with local authorities (LAs) and their representative organisations. This has included calls hosted by MS(C) and Lee Rowley MP, the Parliamentary Under Secretary of State in the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities. The Chief Executives and Directors of Adult Social Services of all LAs were invited to these calls to discuss the latest situation on hospital discharge into adult social care; and to share insights on the challenges facing different local authorities and how these challenges are being addressed. This has included discussions of the funding where relevant.
Asked by: Lord Porter of Spalding (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what discussions they have had on the level of funding required from the public health grant in order to ensure that local authorities are able to fulfil their statutory public health responsibilities.
Answered by Lord Markham - Shadow Minister (Science, Innovation and Technology)
The Department meets frequently with local government representatives on a range of public health issues. Most recently, the Minister for Primary Care and Public Health met with the Local Government Association on 17 January and the Association of Directors of Public Health on 24 January to discuss matters relating to public health, including future public health grant allocations.
At the 2021 Spending Review, we considered the need for local authority public health funding and confirmed that the public health grant to local authorities would increase over the settlement period. In 2022/23, the grant increased by 2.81% to £3.417 billion. This is in addition to targeted investment through local government in start for life support and drug and alcohol treatment services.
We will announce 2023/24 public health grant allocations to local authorities shortly, and in doing so will consider the impact of changes to pay and inflation trends and forecasts since the Spending Review.
Asked by: Lord Porter of Spalding (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 adequacy of the level of funding of the public health grant to local authorities.
Answered by Lord Markham - Shadow Minister (Science, Innovation and Technology)
At the Spending Review 2021, we considered the need for local authority public health funding and confirmed that the public health grant to local authorities would increase over the settlement period. In 2022/23, the Grant increased by 2.81% to £3.417 billion. This is in addition to targeted investment through local Government in start for life support and drug and alcohol treatment services.
We will announce 2023/24 Public Health Grant allocations to local authorities shortly, and in doing so will consider the impact of changes to pay and inflation trends and forecasts since the Spending Review.
Asked by: Lord Porter of Spalding (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government when they will inform local authorities of their provisional public health grant budgets for 2023–24.
Answered by Lord Markham - Shadow Minister (Science, Innovation and Technology)
We will announce the 2023/24 Public Health Grant allocations to local authorities shortly.
Asked by: Lord Porter of Spalding (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 analysis by the Local Government Association that £13 billion needs to be delivered into social care so that councils can deliver on all their statutory duties so that (1) people of all ages can live an equal life, and (2) the need for hospital treatment is reduced.
Answered by Lord Markham - Shadow Minister (Science, Innovation and Technology)
Whilst we have not made a specific analysis of the figure referenced by the Local Government Association, we have assessed the level of funding made available to local authorities for this purpose through the Autumn Statement delivered on 17 November 2022. The Government is providing up to £7.5 billion of additional funding over two years to support adult social care and discharge, which represents a higher than real terms increase and will enable local authorities to deliver tangible improvements in adult social care services. These improvements aim to address discharge delays, social care waiting times, low fee rates, and workforce pressures.