Asked by: Lord Scriven (Liberal Democrat - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what plans they have, if any, to assist local authorities address social care overspends, considering Association of Directors of Adult Social Services' ADASS Spring Survey 2025 finding that “the financial situation is as bad as it has been in recent history”.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
To enable local authorities to deliver key services such as adult social care, the Government has made available up to £3.7 billion of additional funding for social care authorities in 2025/26, which includes an £880 million increase in the Social Care Grant.
In addition, the 2025 Spending Review allows for an increase of over £4 billion of funding for adult social care in 2028/29 compared to 2025/26, to support the sector in making improvements. Funding will be made available each year of the Spending Review through additional grant funding and growth in other sources of income available to support adult social care.
Between 2025/26 and 2028/29, local authority core spending power will increase by an average of 2.6% in real terms.
Asked by: Lord Scriven (Liberal Democrat - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government how many posts paying £100,000 or more a year have been advertised or recruited in (1) NHS England, and (2) integrated care boards, since 11 March.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
Since 11 March, NHS England has advertised 25 posts and has recruited 16 where the actual pay will be over £100,000. Actual pay is the amount of an individual’s salary that NHS England pays.
We do not hold this information centrally in relation to integrated care boards.
Asked by: Lord Scriven (Liberal Democrat - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Baroness Merron on 18 July (HL9450), why no assessment has been made of the impact on patient safety of the wait times for each accident and emergency department in the Calderdale and Huddersfield NHS Foundation Trust.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
All patients who attend accident and emergency departments, including in the Calderdale and Huddersfield NHS Foundation Trust, are prioritised based on clinical need, which ensures that people are seen by the right service in a timely way.
The Calderdale and Huddersfield NHS Foundation Trust has implemented a number of initiatives to improve patient flow and patient waiting times, including introducing a Same Day Emergency Care service which has recently been reviewed by NHS England’s Getting It Right First-Time team.
In June 2025, the Calderdale and Huddersfield NHS Foundation Trust’s accident and emergency four-hour performance was 83.5%.
Asked by: Lord Scriven (Liberal Democrat - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government, following the merger of NHS England and the Department of Health and Social Care, what steps they will take to ensure that health tech companies who have received first phase funding from the Small Business Research Initiative can receive second phase funding this financial year.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Department and NHS England are committed to health and care research, as it is vital to fulfilling the objectives of the Growth and Health Missions. The Department and NHS England will continue to support research and development throughout the transition process and beyond. NHS England’s Innovation, Research and Life Sciences Strategy team has confirmed funding in 2025/26 for innovations already supported through Small Business Research Initiative (SBRI) Healthcare competitions in their current phases. NHS England has invested £13.6 million through the SBRI Healthcare programme to support the development of over 50 innovations this year. NHS England is unable to fund future phases within this financial year.
Asked by: Lord Scriven (Liberal Democrat - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government over what timescale NHS England will move integrated care systems to fair share funding allocation.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
Decisions on integrated care board funding allocations and the pace of convergence to fair shares for the next three years have not yet been taken. We expect to set out allocations alongside multi-year planning guidance in the autumn.
Asked by: Lord Scriven (Liberal Democrat - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what the fair share funding allocation will be for each integrated care board in the next three financial years.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
Decisions on integrated care board funding allocations and the pace of convergence to fair shares for the next three years have not yet been taken. We expect to set out allocations alongside multi-year planning guidance in the autumn.
Asked by: Lord Scriven (Liberal Democrat - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government when they will publish an implementation plan for the NHS 10 Year Health Plan.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
Implementation of the 10-Year Health Plan is already underway; waiting lists have already fallen by over 232,000 since July 2024 and is the lowest in two years. Between October 2024 and April 2025, we recruited more than 1,900 extra general practitioners and in June 2025, we published the Urgent and Emergency Care Plan.
Delivery expectations are embedded throughout the plan, which will shift care from hospital to community, analogue to digital, and sickness to prevention. Over the remainder of 2025/26, we will put in place key next steps to deliver the plan, build the foundations for the shifts from hospital to community, analogue to digital and sickness to prevention, and roll out current best practice across the whole country.
Following the Plan’s publication, we have already launched the National Neighbourhood Health Implementation Programme (NNHIP). The NNHIP will support systems across the country to test new ways of working, share learning, and scale what works, making Neighbourhood Health the norm, not the exception. Integrated care boards have also been invited to submit their proposals for sites to form the first Neighbourhood Health Teams.
Asked by: Lord Scriven (Liberal Democrat - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what urgent assessment they have made of patient safety at Huddersfield Royal Infirmary's Accident and Emergency considering reported data showing that only approximately 10 per cent of the sickest patients are being seen within the four-hour waiting time standard.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
No such assessment has been made. The latest available data for June shows that 83.5% of patients in the Calderdale and Huddersfield NHS Foundation Trust were discharged, admitted, or transferred within four hours of arrival.
The Government is clear that patients should expect and receive the highest standard of service and care from the National Health Service, and that people should be treated with compassion, dignity, and respect. Patients attending emergency departments will always be prioritised based on clinical need.
We are committed to reducing long waits in accident and emergency. Our urgent and emergency care plan for 2025/26, sets out action across the system to deliver improvements for patients this year, backed by nearly £450 million of capital investment.
Asked by: Lord Scriven (Liberal Democrat - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what targets have been set for the first year of the NHS 10 Year Health Plan.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The 10-Year Health Plan is a plan to make the National Health Service fit for the future.
It sets out a wide range of commitments to be delivered over both the short and long term, the implementation of which is already underway, supported by the financial framework set out in the recent Spending Review. The plan will deliver the three shifts from hospital to community, from analogue to digital, and from sickness to prevention. The first year will include immediate actions to, for example, develop neighbourhood health services and the app, a workforce plan, and a suite of actions on prevention as well as actions which lay the foundation for future commitments.
Asked by: Lord Scriven (Liberal Democrat - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Baroness Merron on 7 July (HL8984), why Hertfordshire and West Essex integrated care board's planned elective hub at St Albans City Hospital will now only provide extra funding and capacity for two acute trusts, instead of three as originally intended.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Hertfordshire and West Essex Integrated Care System was allocated funding from the national Elective Recovery Fund in 2025/26. Hertfordshire and West Essex’s Surgical Centre Programme Board undertook a full options appraisal to consider how to get the best use out of the new surgical centre facilities within their financial envelope for 2025/26.
The programme board agreed that when it first opens in November, the surgical centre will be used primarily by the West Hertfordshire Teaching Hospitals Trust for treating patients. The Princess Alexandra Hospital Trust is also planning to use the facility to operate over the winter months.
The availability of the surgical centre for patients across Hertfordshire will continue to be reviewed alongside future funding announcements. Subject to future funding, the system will look to accelerate full opening in 2026/27.