Asked by: Cherilyn Mackrory (Conservative - Truro and Falmouth)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether there are any urgent funding pools available for mental health charities facing imminent closure.
Answered by Maria Caulfield
The information requested is not held centrally. However, the Charity Commission provides guidance for charities on managing finances, including potential insolvency, which is available at the following link: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/managing-financial-difficulties-insolvency-in-charities-cc12/managing-financial-difficulties-insolvency-in-charities#dealing-with-potential-insolvency
Asked by: Cherilyn Mackrory (Conservative - Truro and Falmouth)
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 reduce unexpected deaths as a result of epilepsy.
Answered by Helen Whately - Shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions
The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence issues guidance for healthcare professionals and commissioners and the NHS RightCare Epilepsy Toolkit provides expert advice on improving support for people living with epilepsy. The New Medicine Service allows an expanded role for pharmacies in supporting those with epilepsy and other conditions, including potential harms caused by non-adherence to medicines.
Asked by: Cherilyn Mackrory (Conservative - Truro and Falmouth)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what steps his Department plans to take to (a) implement the provisions of the Energy Prices Act and (b) increase the use of renewable energy.
Answered by Graham Stuart
The Energy Prices Act gained Royal Assent on 25 October 2022. The Department has laid a number of statutory instruments to ensure the effective implementation of the energy support schemes brought forward by the Act.
The acceleration in renewable deployment will be supported by the UK's main renewable energy scheme, Contracts for Difference. The latest round delivered almost 11GW of new renewable projects, almost double achieved in the previous round. Future CfD rounds will be run annually to drive further deployment.
Asked by: Cherilyn Mackrory (Conservative - Truro and Falmouth)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether his Department is taking steps to increase the number of hospital beds for psychiatric care in Cornwall.
Answered by Maria Caulfield
NHS Cornwall and Isles of Scilly Integrated Care Board is supporting Cornwall Partnership NHS Foundation Trust to optimise the use of current bed capacity and re-open those beds which are not operational.
Local commissioners work in collaboration with service providers to expand and enhance community and crisis alternatives to reduce the number of people requiring an inpatient treatment and provide earlier intervention and prevention locally.
Asked by: Cherilyn Mackrory (Conservative - Truro and Falmouth)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent progress he has made on implementing the Adult Social Care Discharge Fund.
Answered by Helen Whately - Shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions
As announced on 16 November 2022, the Adult Social Care Discharge Fund will be distributed to integrated care boards and local authorities in two tranches. The first will be distributed in December 2022 and the second in January 2023. Details of these allocations is available at the following link:
Asked by: Cherilyn Mackrory (Conservative - Truro and Falmouth)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, whether he has any plans to extend the VAT reduction for hospitality businesses beyond April 2023.
Answered by Victoria Atkins - Shadow Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
The temporary reduced rate of VAT was introduced on 15 July 2020 to support the cash flow and viability of around 150,000 businesses and protect over 2.4 million jobs in the hospitality and tourism sectors, which were severely affected by COVID-19. The relief, which ended on 31 March 2022, cost over £8 billion.
All taxes are kept under review, but the Government has been clear that this was a temporary measure in response to COVID-19. It was appropriate that as restrictions were lifted and demand for goods and services in these sectors increased, the temporary VAT relief was first reduced and then removed in order to rebuild and strengthen the public finances.
Asked by: Cherilyn Mackrory (Conservative - Truro and Falmouth)
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 on and increase the capacity of the national dental helpline number.
Answered by Neil O'Brien - Shadow Minister (Education)
In order to ensure patients are given appropriate advice and support, the NHS 111 service uses a nationally agreed clinical algorithm which can refer patients to the most appropriate service to meet their needs, for example, a dental practice or urgent treatment centre.
Additional urgent care provision is commissioned locally and NHS England works across each region to ensure these local services are accessible via NHS 111. This allows patients to be directed to a wider range of services in their area where these are available.
Increasing the NHS 111 call handling provision ahead of winter continues, with recruitment and training of staff to meet the growing demands on the service as a whole.
Asked by: Cherilyn Mackrory (Conservative - Truro and Falmouth)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment he has made of the impact of the rise in the cost of living on the finances of students.
Answered by Robert Halfon
Decisions on student support are taken on an annual basis. The department recognises the additional cost of living pressures that have arisen this year and that have impacted students. Many higer education (HE) providers have hardship funds that students can apply to for assistance. There is £261 million of student premium funding available this academic year to support disadvantaged students who need additional help. The department has worked with the Office for Students to ensure universities support students in hardship, using both hardship funds and drawing on the student premium.
In addition, all households will save on their energy bills through the Energy Price Guarantee and the £400 Energy Bills Support Scheme discount. Students who buy their energy from a domestic supplier are eligible for the energy bills discount. The Energy Prices Bill introduced on 12th October 2022 includes the provision to require landlords to pass benefits they receive from energy price support, as appropriate, onto end users. Further details of the requirements under this legislation will be set out in regulations.
The department has continued to increase living costs support with a 2.3% increase for maximum loans and grants for living and other costs for the 2022/23 academic year. Students who have been awarded a loan for living costs for the 2022/23 academic year that is lower than the maximum, and whose household income for the 2022/23 tax year has dropped by at least 15% compared to the income provided for their original assessment, can apply for their entitlement to be reassessed.
In addition, maximum tuition fees, and the subsidised loans available to pay them, remain at £9,250 for the 2022/23 academic year in respect of standard full-time courses.
The department is also freezing maximum tuition fees for the 2023/24 and 2024/25 academic years. By 2024/25, maximum fees will have been frozen for seven years. As well as reducing debt levels for students, the continued fee freeze will help to ensure that the HE system remains sustainable, while also promoting greater efficiency at providers.
The department is reviewing options for uprating maximum loans and grants for the 2023/24 academic year, and an announcement will follow in the autumn. We need to ensure the HE student finance system remains financially sustainable, and the costs of HE are shared fairly between students and taxpayers, not all of whom have benefited from going to university. At a time of tight fiscal restrictions we will need to consider spending on student finance alongside other priorities.
Asked by: Cherilyn Mackrory (Conservative - Truro and Falmouth)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, whether he has made an assessment with Cabinet colleagues of the potential merits of (a) removing the prohibition on drilling access rights for land between the surface and 300 metres and (b) using such land to produce geothermal energy.
Answered by Lee Rowley
The Infrastructure Act 2015 established that a person has a right to use deep-level land for the purposes of exploiting geothermal energy. These provisions were limited to deep-level land exceeding 300m.
In limiting this unrestricted right to depths below 300m, the Government sought to ensure that the right of use applied only at depths where it would not affect landowners' use of their land, but that would be shallow enough to enable the industries to develop in a responsible way.
Following Royal Assent of the Infrastructure Act 2015, no further assessment has been made of establishing an equivalent right for land between the surface and 300m.
Asked by: Cherilyn Mackrory (Conservative - Truro and Falmouth)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, when he will announce further details on access to the energy discount provided for by the Energy Bills Support Scheme for park home owners.
Answered by Graham Stuart
The Government is finalising the details for the Energy Bills Support Scheme for park home owners, which will be set up for applications this winter.