Asked by: Charlotte Cane (Liberal Democrat - Ely and East Cambridgeshire)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, further to the recent announcement of £400m UK Government funding for grassroots sports facilities, how much will go to (a) tennis and (b) padel facilities.
Answered by Stephanie Peacock - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport)
The Government is determined to ensure that everyone has access to quality sport and physical activity opportunities. That is why we have committed another £400 million to transform facilities across the whole of the UK following the Spending Review. We are now working closely with sporting bodies and local leaders to establish what communities need and will then set out further plans. I have met with the Lawn Tennis Association, the National Governing Body for tennis and padel, along with representatives from other sports, to discuss this.
The Government provides the majority of support for grassroots sport in England through Sport England, which annually invests over £250 million in Exchequer and Lottery funding. This includes long term investment in the Lawn Tennis Association, which receives up to £10.2 million for five years from 2022 to 2027 to invest in community tennis and padel initiatives in England that will benefit as many people as possible.
Asked by: Charlotte Cane (Liberal Democrat - Ely and East Cambridgeshire)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, what assessment she has made of the potential merits of providing funding for (a) tennis and (b) padel facilities.
Answered by Stephanie Peacock - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport)
The Government is determined to ensure that everyone has access to quality sport and physical activity opportunities. That is why we have committed another £400 million to transform facilities across the whole of the UK following the Spending Review. We are now working closely with sporting bodies and local leaders to establish what communities need and will then set out further plans. I have met with the Lawn Tennis Association, the National Governing Body for tennis and padel, along with representatives from other sports, to discuss this.
The Government provides the majority of support for grassroots sport in England through Sport England, which annually invests over £250 million in Exchequer and Lottery funding. This includes long term investment in the Lawn Tennis Association, which receives up to £10.2 million for five years from 2022 to 2027 to invest in community tennis and padel initiatives in England that will benefit as many people as possible.
Asked by: Charlotte Cane (Liberal Democrat - Ely and East Cambridgeshire)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, whether she plans to take steps to increase the provision of (a) indoor and (b) covered tennis facilities in Ely and East Cambridgeshire constituency.
Answered by Stephanie Peacock - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport)
The Government is determined to ensure that everyone has access to quality sport and physical activity opportunities. That is why we have committed another £400 million to transform facilities across the whole of the UK following the Spending Review. We are now working closely with sporting bodies and local leaders to establish what communities need and will then set out further plans. I have met with the Lawn Tennis Association, the National Governing Body for tennis and padel, along with representatives from other sports, to discuss this.
The Government provides the majority of support for grassroots sport in England through Sport England, which annually invests over £250 million in Exchequer and Lottery funding. This includes long term investment in the Lawn Tennis Association, which receives up to £10.2 million for five years from 2022 to 2027 to invest in community tennis and padel initiatives in England that will benefit as many people as possible.
Asked by: Charlotte Cane (Liberal Democrat - Ely and East Cambridgeshire)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, whether she plans to take steps to increase access to padel courts in Ely and East Cambridgeshire constituency.
Answered by Stephanie Peacock - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport)
The Government is determined to ensure that everyone has access to quality sport and physical activity opportunities. That is why we have committed another £400 million to transform facilities across the whole of the UK following the Spending Review. We are now working closely with sporting bodies and local leaders to establish what communities need and will then set out further plans. I have met with the Lawn Tennis Association, the National Governing Body for tennis and padel, along with representatives from other sports, to discuss this.
The Government provides the majority of support for grassroots sport in England through Sport England, which annually invests over £250 million in Exchequer and Lottery funding. This includes long term investment in the Lawn Tennis Association, which receives up to £10.2 million for five years from 2022 to 2027 to invest in community tennis and padel initiatives in England that will benefit as many people as possible.
Asked by: Charlotte Cane (Liberal Democrat - Ely and East Cambridgeshire)
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 15 September 2025 to Question 74866 on Palliative Care: Children, when he discussed the potential merits of introducing multi-year NHS funding for the health elements of children's palliative care with integrated care boards.
Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
Children and young people’s hospices do incredible work to support seriously ill children and their families and loved ones when they need it most, and we recognise the incredibly tough pressures they are facing.
We are providing £26 million in revenue funding to support children and young people’s hospices for 2025/26. This is a continuation of the funding which, until recently, was known as the Children’s Hospice Grant.
I can also now confirm the continuation of this vital funding for the three years of the next spending review period, 2026/27 to 2028/29 inclusive. This funding will see circa £26 million, adjusted for inflation, allocated to children’s and young people’s hospices in England each year, via their local ICBs on behalf of NHS England, as happened in 2024/25 and 2025/26. This amounts to approximately £80 million over the next three years.
This revenue funding is intended to be spent by hospices to provide high-quality care and support for the children and the families they care for, either in the hospice or in the community, including in children's homes. They can, for example, use this funding for providing respite care for children who have high health needs, by providing physiotherapy or occupational therapy, or by providing 24/7 nursing support for a child at the end of their life.
We are also supporting the hospice sector with a £100 million capital funding boost for eligible adult and children’s hospices in England to ensure they have the best physical environment for care.
Asked by: Charlotte Cane (Liberal Democrat - Ely and East Cambridgeshire)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether his Department has undertaken research on the potential impact of the the introduction of multi-year NHS funding for the health elements of children's palliative care on (a) fiscal and (b) health outcomes.
Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
Children and young people’s hospices do incredible work to support seriously ill children and their families and loved ones when they need it most, and we recognise the incredibly tough pressures they are facing.
We are providing £26 million in revenue funding to support children and young people’s hospices for 2025/26. This is a continuation of the funding which, until recently, was known as the Children’s Hospice Grant.
I can also now confirm the continuation of this vital funding for the three years of the next spending review period, 2026/27 to 2028/29 inclusive. This funding will see circa £26 million, adjusted for inflation, allocated to children’s and young people’s hospices in England each year, via their local ICBs on behalf of NHS England, as happened in 2024/25 and 2025/26. This amounts to approximately £80 million over the next three years.
This revenue funding is intended to be spent by hospices to provide high-quality care and support for the children and the families they care for, either in the hospice or in the community, including in children's homes. They can, for example, use this funding for providing respite care for children who have high health needs, by providing physiotherapy or occupational therapy, or by providing 24/7 nursing support for a child at the end of their life.
We are also supporting the hospice sector with a £100 million capital funding boost for eligible adult and children’s hospices in England to ensure they have the best physical environment for care.
Asked by: Charlotte Cane (Liberal Democrat - Ely and East Cambridgeshire)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps he is taking with Cabinet colleagues to improve health outcomes for agricultural sector workers.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
In line with its published Strategy 2022 to 2032, the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) focuses on the most effective and efficient ways to improve the health and safety performance of all industries in Great Britain, including farming.
Many of the health risks agricultural workers face are common to other industries such as manual handling and noise and vibration. However, some are very specific to agriculture, such as pesticides or zoonoses (animal diseases which may infect humans).
Between 2018 and 2024, in partnership with the industry, HSE ran a campaign to offer farmers free health and safety training which was then followed up by an inspection to a selection of those farms invited to take the training. HSE will continue to visit farms where they have intelligence to suggest risk is not being managed adequately and investigate incidents in line with their published selection criteria.
As well as appropriate site visits, HSE continues to engage with farming through a variety of other methods including delivering industry talks; webinars and presentations; engaging with the media and publishing targeted articles for farmers; producing industry notifications which include health messaging; and producing awareness raising campaigns. It also produces an extensive range of freely available guidance to enable farmers to comply with health and safety law and keep themselves and others safe.
HSE’s commitment to working with the agricultural industry through stakeholders such as Britain’s Farm Safety Partnerships (FSPs) remains strong.
Asked by: Charlotte Cane (Liberal Democrat - Ely and East Cambridgeshire)
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 research into (a) treatments and (b) a cure for postural tachycardia syndrome.
Answered by Zubir Ahmed - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Department funds health and care research through the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR). The NIHR funds clinical, public health, and social care research and works in partnership with the National Health Service, universities, local government, other research funders, patients, and the public. The NIHR welcomes proposals for research into a range of conditions, including postural tachycardia syndrome, at the following link:
https://www.nihr.ac.uk/get-involved/suggest-a-research-topic
Asked by: Charlotte Cane (Liberal Democrat - Ely and East Cambridgeshire)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment she has made of progress on eel (a) management and (b) protection since the publication of the eel management plans.
Answered by Angela Eagle - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Progress on eel management and protection was assessed in in the Implementation of UK Eel Management Plans (2020 – 2023) report, published in December 2024. The Environment Agency continues to implement the measures set out in the management plans aimed at the recovery and sustainable management of eel populations.
Asked by: Charlotte Cane (Liberal Democrat - Ely and East Cambridgeshire)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what steps he is taking to strengthen retrospective rural-proofing of his Department's policies.
Answered by Miatta Fahnbulleh - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Housing, Communities and Local Government)
I refer the hon. Member to the answer given to Question UIN 73926 on 12 September 2025.