Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what progress his Department has made in ensuring additional NHS appointments are made available to people in North East Somerset and Hanham constituency.

Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

Tackling waiting lists is a top priority for this Government. We have exceeded our pledge to deliver over two million more elective care appointments. More than double that number, 4.9 million more appointments, have now been delivered in England.

On 6 January, NHS England published a plan titled Reforming elective care for patients, which sets out a whole-system approach to delivering on the commitment that 92% of patients will wait no longer than 18 weeks from referral to consultant-led treatment, in line with the NHS constitutional standard, by March 2029. The plan is available at the following link:

https://www.england.nhs.uk/publication/reforming-elective-care-for-patients/

Progress is being made in the North East Somerset and Hanham constituency, which spans two integrated care boards (ICBs). In both ICBs, around 60% of patients wait under 18 weeks for elective care.

As of June, average waiting times have decreased across both ICBs, compared to the same period last year. Over the last 12 months there has been a 3.5 percentage point increase in the number of people waiting less than 18 weeks. The number of patients waiting over a year has also decreased by 2%.

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment he has made of the adequacy of progress on reducing NHS waiting lists in North East Somerset and Hanham constituency.

Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

As set out in the Plan for Change, we have committed to return to the National Health Service constitutional standard that 92% of patients wait no longer than 18 weeks from referral to treatment by March 2029. We provided additional investment in the Autumn Budget that has enabled us to fulfil our pledge to deliver over two million more elective care appointments early. More than double that number, 4.9 million more appointments, have now been delivered.

Planning Guidance for 2025/26 sets a target that 65% of patients wait for 18 weeks or less by March 2026, with every trust expected to deliver a minimum 5% improvement on current performance over that period.

The North East Somerset and Hanham Constituency spans two integrated care boards (ICBs). From June 2024 to June 2025, the NHS Bristol, North Somerset and South Gloucestershire ICB’s waiting list decreased by 0.8%. The NHS Bath and North East Somerset, Swindon and Wiltshire ICB’s waiting list increased by 2.4%. However, average wait times have decreased across both ICBs. Over the last 12 months there has been a 3.5% increase in the number of people waiting less than 18-weeks. The number of patients waiting over a year has also decreased by 2%.

Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what recent progress her Department has made in tackling knife crime.

Answered by Sarah Jones - Minister of State (Home Office)

Halving knife crime is a central mission for this Government and since day one we have acted with urgency to turn the tide on this truly devastating crime. We have seen early signs of progress, with overall knife crime down for the first time in four years, but we need to supercharge these efforts.

To date, we banned zombie knives in September 2024 and introduced a ban on ninja swords from 1 August 2025 - it is now illegal to sell or own these weapons. We have also implemented, “Ronan’s Law”, a range of measures which will include stricter rules for online sellers of knives.

We are increasing the penalties for illegal sales of knives, creating a new offence of possessing a knife with the intention to commit unlawful violence and are giving the police a new power to seize knives when they believe they are likely to be used in connection with unlawful violence.

The Home Secretary and Policing Minister launched a Knife-Enabled Robbery (KER) Taskforce in October 2024 in the highest volume police force areas. The Taskforce met its ambition to halt the rise of KER in Taskforce areas (as a collective) within 6 months.

The Prime Minister launched the Coalition to Tackle Knife Crime in September 2024, which brings together campaign groups, bereaved families, people who have been impacted by knife crime and community leaders, united in their mission to save lives, to help us drive forward our plans and to hold us to account on progress.

Over £66 million is available to all 43 police force areas to fund the 'Hotspot Action' programme in 2025/26.  This programme is a combination of increased high visibility foot patrols and funding of problem-oriented policing (POP) tactics.

Tackling county lines is key to delivering our pledge to halve knife crime within the decade. That is why we are investing more than £42m this financial year in the County Lines Programme to target violent and exploitative drug dealing gangs driving knife crime and violence in communities. Since July 2024 the County Lines Programme has resulted in more than 1,200 deal lines closed, 2,000 arrests, 2,100 safeguarding referrals and provided specialist support to over 460 children and young people to enable them to exit their involvement in violence and county lines.

We have introduced a new offence of child criminal exploitation in the Crime and Policing Bill to go after the gangs who are luring young people into violence and crime. As part of this legislation we are also delivering new civil preventative orders which will disrupt and prevent child criminal exploitation from occurring or re-occurring. We are also going further in our response to wider criminal exploitation, introducing a new offence of ‘cuckooing’ and an offence to tackle coerced internal concealment. These three new offences will all work to tackle the interconnected and exploitative practices often used by criminal gangs, especially in county lines.

Through the Young Futures Programme, the Government will introduce Prevention Partnerships across the country, to intervene earlier and ensure that children and young people vulnerable to being drawn into crime and violence are identified and offered support in a more systematic way.

As we design the Young Futures Programme, we will ensure that it learns from and builds on the work of the Violence Reduction Units (VRUs). VRUs bring together partners, including from the voluntary and community sector, to understand and tackle the drivers of serious violence in their area.

A further £14.3m in grant funding has been made available across all 43 local policing body areas to deliver the Serious Violence Duty.

Question to the Department for Energy Security & Net Zero:

To ask the Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero, what assessment he has made of the adequacy of progress towards making the UK a clean energy superpower.

Answered by Michael Shanks - Minister of State (Department for Energy Security and Net Zero)

We have made an excellent start delivering our Clean Energy Superpower Mission. We are bearing down on energy bills and identifying options to lower energy costs. We have secured over £50 billion of private investment in clean energy, backed the next generation of nuclear power with £14.2 billion of funding for Sizewell, and invested in a £1 billion supply chain fund under Great British Energy to unlock investment in offshore wind jobs and our clean energy supply chains. Industry stakeholders have acknowledged and welcomed the acceleration in our ambition and progress we're making to deliver our objectives. We recognise there is much work to do, and our long-term plan will take time, requiring extensive engagement across all sectors of our society. But we won’t be deterred by the scale of the task, and this Government will not waste a moment delivering it.

Question to the Department for Energy Security & Net Zero:

To ask the Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero, what assessment he has made of the adequacy of progress in transitioning to net zero across the economy.

Answered by Michael Shanks - Minister of State (Department for Energy Security and Net Zero)

The Climate Change Act (2008) made the UK the first country to introduce a legally binding, long-term emissions reduction target. This sets our commitment to reach net zero emissions by 2050 in law. The UK has already halved its emissions, having cut them by around 53% between 1990 and 2023, while growing the economy by over 80% in the same period.

We will deliver an updated plan that sets out the policy package out to the end of Carbon Budget 6 in 2037 for all sectors of the economy by October 2025. The Climate Change Committee published its 2025 progress report in June, and we will also formally respond to this report by October 2025.