Asked by: Andrew Mitchell (Conservative - Sutton Coldfield)
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 help improve the capacity of sexual health services in Sutton Coldfield constituency.
Answered by Ashley Dalton - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
Local authorities in England, including Birmingham, which is the upper tier local authority for Sutton Coldfield, are responsible for commissioning comprehensive, open access to most sexual health services (SHSs) funded through the Public Health Grant. In 2025/26, we are increasing funding through the Public Health Grant to £3.858 billion, providing local authorities with an average 5.4% cash increase and a 3% real terms increase, the biggest real-terms increase after nearly a decade of reduced spending. Individual local authorities are well placed to make funding and commissioning decisions about the SHSs that best meet the needs of their local populations.
The UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) supports local areas to improve SHS delivery through data monitoring and reporting.
The Government is committed to ending new HIV transmissions in England by 2030 and is developing a new HIV Action Plan in collaboration with the UKHSA, NHS England, and a broad range of system partners, which we aim to publish this year. The plan will have the key objective of stabilising and supporting system enablers to further support joined up working across the system.
Asked by: Andrew Mitchell (Conservative - Sutton Coldfield)
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 accident and emergency waiting times in hospitals in the West Midlands.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Government recognises that urgent and emergency care performance has fallen short in recent years and is committed to restoring accident and emergency waiting times to the National Health Service constitutional standard across England, including in the West Midlands.
Our Urgent and emergency care plan 2025/26 sets out a fundamental shift in the approach to urgent and emergency care. It will drive collaboration across the system to deliver improvements for patients this year and is backed by nearly £450 million of capital investment.
Furthermore, our 10-Year Health Plan sets out how we will reduce waiting times in accident and emergency by shifting care into the community through new Neighbourhood Health Services, forming a key part of our mission to reform the NHS.
Asked by: Andrew Mitchell (Conservative - Sutton Coldfield)
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 reduce waiting times for endometriosis treatment in the West Midlands.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
As of the end of May 2025, the latest available data, the Gynaecology Service waiting list, which includes those waiting for endometriosis treatment, for the West Midlands stood at 64,594, with 52.1% of patient pathways within 18 weeks.
As set out in the Plan for Change, we have committed to return to the National Health Service constitutional standard that 92% of patients, including those waiting for endometriosis treatment, wait no longer than 18 weeks from referral to treatment by March 2029, including in the West Midlands. We have supported this with additional investment in the Autumn Budget, which has allowed us to exceed our pledge to deliver an extra two million operations, scans, and appointments, having now delivered 4.6 million additional appointments up to the end of April 2025.
There are a range of efforts underway, nationally and in the West Midlands, to reduce the time patients are waiting for gynaecological care. The Elective Reform Plan, published in January 2025, sets out the productivity and reform efforts we will undertake to return to the 18-week standard, and to ensure patients have the best possible experience while they wait. This includes increasing the relative funding available to support gynaecology procedures, including for certain endometriosis pathways with the largest waiting lists, and reviewing support options from the independent sector.
In November 2024, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence updated its guidelines on the diagnosis and management of endometriosis, which will help women receive more timely care. This includes updated recommendations that for women with symptoms of endometriosis, initial pharmacological treatment should take place in primary care, and that this can take place in parallel with additional investigations and referral to secondary care if needed.
Asked by: Andrew Mitchell (Conservative - Sutton Coldfield)
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 improve access to (a) autism and (b) attention deficit hyperactivity disorder assessments in Sutton Coldfield constituency.
Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Government has recognised that, nationally, the demand for assessments for autism and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) has grown significantly in recent years, and that people are experiencing severe delays in accessing such assessments. The Government’s 10-Year Health Plan will make the National Health Service fit for the future, recognising the need for early intervention and support, without the need for diagnosis.
Integrated care boards (ICBs) are responsible for making appropriate provision to meet the health and care needs of their local population, including access to ADHD and autism assessments, in line with National Institute for Health and Care Excellence guidelines.
NHS England has established an ADHD taskforce to better understand the challenges affecting those with ADHD, including in accessing services and support. An interim report was published on 20 June 2025, with the final report expected later in the year, and we will carefully consider its recommendations.
The NHS Birmingham and Solihull ICB is working with regional and local partners, including Parent Carer Forums, to coproduce and redesign pathways of care to focus on addressing the health and social needs that arise in neurodiverse children, young people, and adults. The Birmingham Community Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust has also launched a 12-month pilot programme working with schools and community care providers to better support children, families, and professionals while they wait for autism assessments.
Asked by: Andrew Mitchell (Conservative - Sutton Coldfield)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many people were waiting for treatment from community mental health services in the West Midlands in the latest period for which data is available.
Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
Since July 2023, NHS England has included waiting time metrics for referrals to community-based mental health services in its monthly mental health statistics publication, to help services target the longest waits. Data in the Mental Health Services Dataset is known to be incomplete and these figures may be an undercount. Information on patients waiting to access NHS Talking Therapies services is not included. The latest information on wait times for NHS Talking Therapies is available at the following link:
Asked by: Andrew Mitchell (Conservative - Sutton Coldfield)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent steps he has taken to help reduce waiting times for cancer screening and testing in Sutton Coldfield constituency.
Answered by Ashley Dalton - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Government understands that more needs to be done to reduce waiting times for cancer patients. To achieve this, we have delivered an extra 40,000 operations, scans, and appointments each week during our first year in Government, as the first step to ensuring early diagnosis and faster treatment.
We will support the National Health Service to transform diagnostic services by spending £1.65 billion on additional capacity, including new surgical hubs and diagnostic scanners, to support the delivery of over 30,000 more procedures and 1.25 million diagnostic tests as they come online.
In bowel cancer screening services across Birmingham and Solihull, the integrated care board (ICB) has successfully implemented the age-extension so all people aged 50 years old or over are now eligible for a screening test and the service is meeting targets.
Delays in breast cancer screening in this region have caught up from the backlogs seen during the pandemic and are now in line with national requirements. The symptomatic service for breast screening is also meeting the faster diagnosis standard.
NHS Birmingham and Solihull ICB is also running a cancer bus tour, stopping off at locations across Birmingham and Solihull, including two stops in the Sutton Coldfield constituency at Princess Alice Retail Park, across 18 dates throughout April, June and September 2025. Local citizens can talk to health professionals about the importance of cancer screening, learn how to check themselves for different cancers and find support to help them live the healthiest possible life.
Asked by: Andrew Mitchell (Conservative - Sutton Coldfield)
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 help reduce waiting times for ambulances in the West Midlands.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Government recognises the pressures on the National Health Service and the impact this is having on ambulance response times, including in the West Midlands.
We are determined to turn things around, our 10-Year Health Plan will be published in summer 2025, setting out major NHS reforms to move healthcare from hospital to the community, analogue to digital and sickness to prevention.
The NHS Urgent and emergency care plan 2025/26, published on 6 June 2025, requires health systems to focus on those areas likely to have the biggest impact on urgent and emergency care services this year. The plan includes actions that will reduce category 2 ambulance response times to 30 minutes and reduce ambulance handovers to 45 minutes, helping to get 550,000 more ambulances back on the road.
Asked by: Andrew Mitchell (Conservative - Sutton Coldfield)
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 reduce the backlog for cancer treatment in the West Midlands.
Answered by Ashley Dalton - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
We will improve National Health Service cancer waiting time performance so that cancer patients are diagnosed and treated faster, including patients in the West Midlands.
We set out expectations for renewed focus on cancer targets in the Elective Reform plan, published on 6 January 2025. Our reforms to cancer care will see thousands of patients starting treatment within two months, and across the NHS we have already hit our target of delivering two million extra operations, scans, and appointments seven months early.
Asked by: Andrew Mitchell (Conservative - Sutton Coldfield)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether he has had discussions with the Birmingham and Solihull integrated care board on access to ear wax removal services in the context of their decision to commission self-referral community audiology services.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Department has not engaged with the Birmingham and Solihull Integrated Care Board (ICB) directly on this point, but it is supportive of the ICB’s work to improve access to community-based services. All ICBs have a statutory responsibility to commission cost-effective healthcare to meet the needs of their local population. This includes the arrangement of audiology services.
In line with NHS England’s work to improve access to primary care following the COVID-19 pandemic, all ICBs were asked to expand self-referral pathways for certain carefully considered community-based services by September 2023.
However, the Birmingham and Solihull ICB recommend visiting a pharmacist for blocked ears caused by ear wax rather than using the self-referral hearing check service. Ear wax removal services are not a core service included in the national GP Contract, and general practitioners often recommend home treatment remedies to alleviate ear wax build-up as manual ear syringing is no longer advised by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence due to the risks associated with it, such as trauma to their ear drum or infection.
Asked by: Andrew Mitchell (Conservative - Sutton Coldfield)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent steps his Department has taken to help reduce the average waiting times for accessing NHS mental health services in the West Midlands.
Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
As part of our mission to build a National Health Service that is fit for the future and that is there when people need it, the Government will recruit an additional 8,500 mental health workers to reduce delays and provide faster treatment which will also help ease pressure on busy mental health services.
Despite the challenging fiscal environment, the Government has chosen to prioritise the funding to deliver expansions of NHS Talking Therapies and Individual Placement & Support schemes, demonstrating our commitment to addressing the root cause of mental health issues and providing support for people with severe mental illness to contribute to the economy by remaining in or returning to work.