Asked by: Alistair Strathern (Labour - Hitchin)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference the Answer of 12 May 2025 to Question 50325, what his planned timeline is for publishing the update to the Patient Safety Commissioner’s report.
Answered by Ashley Dalton - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Government is carefully considering the valuable work done by the Patient Safety Commissioner and the resulting Hughes Report, which set out options for redress for those harmed by valproate and pelvic mesh. This is a complex area of work, involving several government departments and it is important that we get this right. We will be providing an update to the Patient Safety Commissioner’s Report at the earliest opportunity however we are not currently able to give a timeline for a response.
Asked by: Alistair Strathern (Labour - Hitchin)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many cases of postnatal depression involved (a) engagement with and (b) mental health assessment of the woman’s partner by the relevant service in the most recent 12-month period for which data is available.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The information requested is not held centrally at this level of detail. The Government is committed to improving the support available to mothers, fathers, and partners who experience mental health difficulties, including postnatal depression, during the perinatal period.
Fathers and partners of women accessing specialist perinatal mental health services and maternal mental health services should be offered an evidence-based assessment for their mental health and signposted to sources of support as required. This can include NHS Talking Therapies services, which are available for anyone who needs support with their mental health. People can refer themselves online via the National Health Service website or by contacting their general practice.
In addition, in January 2025, the Department announced £126 million for the continuation of the Family Hubs and Start for Life programme in 2025/26 in 75 local authorities with high levels of deprivation. This includes £36.5 million for bespoke perinatal mental health and parent-infant relationship support, including for fathers.
Asked by: Alistair Strathern (Labour - Hitchin)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if his Department will publish data on the number of (a) fathers who have accessed perinatal mental health services and (b) maternity outreach clinics that offer (i) evidence-based mental health assessments and (ii) signposting.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The information requested is not held centrally at this level of detail. The Government is committed to improving the support available to mothers, fathers, and partners who experience mental health difficulties, including postnatal depression, during the perinatal period.
Fathers and partners of women accessing specialist perinatal mental health services and maternal mental health services should be offered an evidence-based assessment for their mental health and signposted to sources of support as required. This can include NHS Talking Therapies services, which are available for anyone who needs support with their mental health. People can refer themselves online via the National Health Service website or by contacting their general practice.
In addition, in January 2025, the Department announced £126 million for the continuation of the Family Hubs and Start for Life programme in 2025/26 in 75 local authorities with high levels of deprivation. This includes £36.5 million for bespoke perinatal mental health and parent-infant relationship support, including for fathers.
Asked by: Alistair Strathern (Labour - Hitchin)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what discussions he has had with the Secretary of State for Education on support available for medical students.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Department of Health and Social Care works closely with the Department for Education on an on-going basis, covering a wide range of matters to ensure the education system is supporting medical students.
For the 2025/26 academic year, the Government will increase the NHS Bursary tuition fee contributions, maintenance grants, and all allowances by 3.1%. For the 2025/26 academic year, the Government has also announced that maximum loans for living costs from Student Finance England, including reduced rate non-means tested loans for students in NHS Bursary years, will increase by 3.1%.
Asked by: Alistair Strathern (Labour - Hitchin)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether he plans to increase availability of Givinostat for children.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Department understands the impact that Duchenne muscular dystrophy has on those living with it and their families, and the urgent need for new treatment options. The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) makes recommendations for the National Health Service on whether new licensed medicines should be routinely funded by the NHS independently based on an assessment of their costs and benefits. The NHS in England is legally required to fund medicines recommended by the NICE, normally within three months of the publication of final guidance. The NICE is currently evaluating givinostat for the treatment of Duchenne muscular dystrophy and its independent Appraisal Committee will meet to consider the evidence in July 2025.
Asked by: Alistair Strathern (Labour - Hitchin)
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 support NHS trusts to (a) recognise and (b) involve fathers as parents in (i) maternity and (ii) early childhood services.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The National Health Service’s three-year delivery plan for maternity and neonatal services recognises that listening and responding to all women, their partners and families, is an essential part of enabling and delivering safe and high-quality care. There are multiple initiatives in place that recognise and involve the role of fathers and other parents. These initiatives include:
- ensuring that fathers’ perspectives shape improvements to services and care, through Maternity and Neonatal Voice Partnerships;
- encouraging fathers’ involvement in the care for their babies in neonatal units, through Family Integrated Care, helping to strengthen the parent-infant bond and infant health outcomes;
- providing evidence-based assessments and support for partners, including fathers, through Specialist Perinatal Mental Health Services. This has helped 5% to 10% of fathers experiencing mental health conditions during the perinatal period;
- health visiting services that are parent focussed and which include both mothers and fathers, and which are including in perinatal mental health support; and
- the Department announcing £126 million for the continuation of the Family Hubs and Start for Life programme for 2025/26 in 75 local authorities with high levels of deprivation in January 2025. This includes £36.5 million for bespoke perinatal mental health and parent-infant relationship support, including for fathers.
Asked by: Alistair Strathern (Labour - Hitchin)
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 ensure that NHS services (a) engage with new fathers and (b) record their details alongside the mothers in their baby's health records.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
I refer the Hon. Member to the answer I gave to the Hon. Member for Livingston on 31 March 2025 to Question 38280.
Asked by: Alistair Strathern (Labour - Hitchin)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will make an assessment of the potential benefits of making prostate cancer screening mandatory.
Answered by Andrew Gwynne
Screening for prostate cancer is currently not recommended by the UK National Screening Committees (UK NSC). This is because of the inaccuracy of the current best test, called the Prostate Specific Antigen (PSA). A PSA-based screening programme could harm some men as many would be diagnosed with a cancer that would not have caused them problems during their life. This would lead to additional tests and treatments which can also have harmful side effects, such as sexual dysfunction and incontinence.
The UK NSC regularly reviews its recommendations, and the evidence review for prostate cancer screening is underway and plans to report within the UK NSC’s three-year work plan.
The evidence review includes modelling the clinical effectiveness and cost of several approaches to prostate cancer screening, including different potential ways of screening the whole population from 40 years of age onwards, and targeted screening aimed at groups of people identified as being at higher than average risk, such as black men or men with a family history of cancer.
Asked by: Alistair Strathern (Labour - Hitchin)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent discussions he has had on the provision of Enhurtu to Her2 low metastatic breast cancer patients.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Department’s ministers and officials have had a number of recent meetings at which the issue of the availability of Enhertu for the treatment of HER2 low metastatic breast cancer has been discussed, including with Breast Cancer Now and other campaigners.
The Government wants patients to be able to benefit from access to innovative and effective new treatments such as Enhertu at a price that fairly reflects the benefits that they bring to patients, and does not displace funding for other valuable treatments and services. The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence and NHS England have been clear with the companies that the price represents the main barrier to access to Enhertu for patients with HER2 low breast cancer, and we encourage the companies to come forward with an improved commercial offer.
Asked by: Alistair Strathern (Labour - Hitchin)
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 reduce waiting times for non-cancerous gynaecological services.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
Tackling waiting lists is a key part of our Health Mission and a top priority for the Government, as we get the National Health Service back on its feet. Equality of both access to care and outcomes will be at the heart of building an NHS that is fit for the future. This includes ensuring that women’s health is not neglected.
We have committed to achieving the NHS Constitutional standard that 92% of patients should wait no longer than 18 weeks from Referral to Treatment by the end of this Parliament, which includes those waiting for gynaecology treatment. To achieve this, we will deliver an extra 40,000 operations, scans, and appointments per week, and will increase the number of computed tomography, magnetic resonance imaging, and other tests, that are needed to reduce elective and cancer waits. This urgent work will help the nearly 600,000 women on gynaecology waiting lists get the care they need.