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Written Question
Autism and Learning Disability: Community Care
Thursday 21st March 2024

Asked by: Barbara Keeley (Labour - Worsley and Eccles South)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, pursuant to the Answer of 26 February 2024 to Question 15040 on Autism and Learning Disability: Community Care, whether the funding flows task and finish group have developed plans to (a) fund support effectively across the health and social care system and (b) improve oversight of expenditure on the Building the Right Support Action Plan.

Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)

The aim of the Funding Flows task and finish group was to look at how to improve national oversight of the National Health Service and local authority spend on services and support for people with a learning disability and autistic people who are, or are at risk of being, admitted to mental health inpatient services.

The Funding Flows task and finish group has been looking at relevant data currently collected for the NHS and local government, to explore whether it could be brought together to help meet this objective. The final report from the Funding Flows task and finish group will be shared with the Building the Right Support Delivery Board in due course.


Written Question
Autism and Learning Disability: Community Care
Monday 26th February 2024

Asked by: Barbara Keeley (Labour - Worsley and Eccles South)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to the findings in the Red Quadrant report entitled, Building the Right Support: An analysis of funding flows, published by her Department, in July 2022, whether she is taking steps to improve financial oversight of expenditure for the Building the Right Support programme.

Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)

In our response to the Health and Social Care Committee’s report, The Treatment of Autistic People and People with Learning Disabilities published 27 July 2022, we noted the wide range of capital and revenue funding sources, as well as the range of support that a person who is, or is at risk of being, admitted to a mental health hospital may draw on. This makes assessing the costs and expenditure associated with the Building the Right Support (BtRS) programme practically challenging. The response, which referenced RedQuadrant’s report, set out that we are clear that there must be credible alternatives to inpatient care, so that people can live independent, fulfilled lives in their community, without financial incentives or disincentives which prevent this from happening.

We recognise the case for improving how data is collected, in order to better understand the specific costs related to BtRS. That is why the BtRS Delivery Board set up a Funding Flows task and finish group to look at improving national oversight of the National Health Service and local authority spend on services, and support for this group of people.


Written Question
Autism and Learning Disability: Community Care
Monday 26th February 2024

Asked by: Barbara Keeley (Labour - Worsley and Eccles South)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many times the Funding Flows Task and Finish Group has met since 20 January 2023.

Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)

The Funding Flows task and finish group has met five times since its inception in September 2022. Two of those meetings took place after 20 January 2023.


Written Question
Autism and Learning Disability: Patients
Monday 26th February 2024

Asked by: Barbara Keeley (Labour - Worsley and Eccles South)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many (a) autistic people and (b) people with learning disabilities were placed in an inpatient unit rated as inadequate by the Care Quality Commission in the last 12 months.

Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)

The Assuring Transformation data shows that there are 130 people with learning disabilities or autism reported in a mental health inpatient setting which the Care Quality Commission (CQC) rates as inadequate. This is based on inpatients at the end of November 2023, and CQC inspection ratings on 17 January 2024. These units may not have been rated as inadequate at the point of the person’s admission.


Written Question
Mental Health: Emergency Services
Monday 26th June 2023

Asked by: Barbara Keeley (Labour - Worsley and Eccles South)

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 (a) the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport and (b) the event organisers to help enable the Gratitude Games to go ahead this year.

Answered by Will Quince

No specific discussions have been held with the Department for Culture, Media and Sport or the event organisers. Officials from the Department of Health and Social Care held discussions with UK Emergency Services Games Ltd (UKESG) throughout 2021. At the time, UKESG were referred to the Department for Culture, Media and Sport own Live Events Reinsurance Scheme launched in September 2021.

The NHS workforce continues to demonstrate unwavering compassion and dedication and it is something we should all be immensely proud of. This was recognised in 2021 when Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II awarded the George Cross to the NHS across all four nations.


Written Question
Dental Services
Monday 5th June 2023

Asked by: Barbara Keeley (Labour - Worsley and Eccles South)

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 support dentists to take on new NHS patients.

Answered by Neil O'Brien

In July 2022, we announced a package of dental system improvements to increase access for National Health Service dental patients and make NHS dentistry more attractive to practices.

NHS England has negotiated amendments to the NHS dental contract with the British Dental Association and other stakeholders. These improvements, which came into effect in November 2022, include enabling commissioning of up to 110% of contracted Units of Dental Activity to increase NHS care; fairer remuneration for practices providing complex treatment within current Band 2 treatments; and removing barriers around use of staff skills mix in NHS dentistry teams.

We will announce our plan for further reform of the NHS dental system later this year. It will outline a number of additional actions across a number of areas to support and recover NHS dentistry.


Written Question
Dental Services: Finance
Monday 5th June 2023

Asked by: Barbara Keeley (Labour - Worsley and Eccles South)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment his Department has made of the potential impact of an underspend in the primary dentistry budget on the availability of dentistry services.

Answered by Neil O'Brien

We have assessed the utilisation of underspends in National Health Service dentistry budgets on NHS dentistry services. NHS England has provided guidance for integrated care boards (ICBs) that requires dental funding to be ringfenced, with any unused resources re-directed to improve NHS dental access in the first instance. A schedule setting out the dental ringfence has been issued to ICBs. NHS England’s 2023/24 revenue finance and contracting guidance, which provides more detail, is available at the following link:

https://www.england.nhs.uk/publication/2023-24-revenue-finance-and-contracting-guidance/


Written Question
Autism and Learning Disability: Integrated Care Boards
Wednesday 17th May 2023

Asked by: Barbara Keeley (Labour - Worsley and Eccles South)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many Integrated Care Boards have an operational keyworker service for children with learning disabilities and autistic children.

Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)

The NHS Long Term Plan committed to ensuring children and young people with a learning disability and autistic children with the most complex needs will have a designated keyworker by 2023/24. The keyworker programme was developed and tested in 13 pilot sites, and at the end of March 2023 the service was operational in 36 integrated care boards.


Written Question
Autism and Learning Disability: Health Services
Thursday 2nd March 2023

Asked by: Barbara Keeley (Labour - Worsley and Eccles South)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether (a) his Department, (b) NHS England, (c) private providers of inpatient services and (d) integrated care systems are taking steps to implement the recommendations of the report by NHS England entitled Safe and wellbeing reviews: thematic review and lessons learned, published on 21 February 2023.

Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)

‘The safe and wellbeing reviews: thematic review and lessons learned’ report does not make recommendations but sets out important findings and learning points relevant to everyone involved in commissioning or delivering mental health community and inpatient provision. Integrated care systems have been putting in place actions to address the themes highlighted.

NHS England has taken learnings from the Safe and Wellbeing Review programme to inform work to support timely discharge from mental health inpatient care and to improve the quality of care for people with a learning disability and autistic people. This includes the new Quality Transformation Programme and the refreshed Dynamic support register and Care (Education) and Treatment Review policy and guidance.

The Building the Right Support Action Plan, published 14 July 2022, outlines actions we are taking to keep people with a learning disability and autistic people safe and was developed considering findings from safe and wellbeing reviews. The Action Plan includes work to check that people with a learning disability and autistic people in mental health inpatient care have received a safe and wellbeing review.

We will continue to work with NHS England to ensure we properly embed the report’s findings as part of our ongoing programmes of work.


Written Question
Social Services: Vacancies
Tuesday 28th February 2023

Asked by: Barbara Keeley (Labour - Worsley and Eccles South)

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 tackle vacancies in the social care workforce.

Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)

We are running a national recruitment campaign until 31 March to encourage more people to consider a rewarding role in care. In addition, the £500 million adult social care discharge fund announced last September can be used for the recruitment and retention of the social care workforce.

In February 2022, we made care workers eligible for the Health and Care Visa and added them to the Shortage Occupation list. This was in addition to senior care workers who were made eligible in January 2021. There has been a strong uptake of international recruitment in the sector since, with the latest Home Office data showing there were 56,900 visa grants for care workers and senior care workers in 2022.

The Government is making available £15 million for the 2023/24 financial year to help local areas establish support arrangements for international recruitment in adult social care.