Asked by: Emma Lewell-Buck (Labour - South Shields)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if she will make it her policy to (a) review and (b) update the National Radiological Protection Board report published on 4 January 1988.
Answered by Andrew Gwynne - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The National Radiological Protection Board report that was published in 1988 has been updated a further three times. The publications are available at the following link:
A summary of the fourth analysis published in 2022 is available at the following link:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/nuclear-weapons-test-participants-study/plan-for-the-fourth-analysis-of-the-nuclear-weapons-test-participants-study
Asked by: Emma Lewell-Buck (Labour - South Shields)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if his Department will take steps to automatically enrol eligible families in the NHS Healthy Start programme.
Answered by Andrew Gwynne - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Healthy Start scheme was introduced in 2006 to encourage a healthy diet for pregnant women, babies and young children under four from very low-income households. It can be used to buy, or put towards the cost of, fruit, vegetables, pulses, milk and infant formula. Healthy Start beneficiaries have access to free Healthy Start Vitamins for pregnant women and children aged under four.
Healthy Start now supports over 353,000 beneficiaries. This figure is higher than the previous paper voucher scheme.
The NHS Business Services Authority (NHS BSA) operates the Healthy Start scheme on behalf of the Department. All applicants to the Healthy Start scheme, where they meet the eligibility criteria, must accept the terms and conditions of the prepaid card at the point of application. As the prepaid card is a financial product and cannot be issued without the applicant accepting these terms, NHS BSA is not able to automatically provide eligible families with a prepaid card. However, the Healthy Start scheme is kept under review we are exploring all viable routes to improve uptake.
Asked by: Emma Lewell-Buck (Labour - South Shields)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what the average weekly payment to beneficiaries on the Healthy Start scheme was in June 2024.
Answered by Andrew Gwynne - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The average weekly payment to beneficiaries on the Healthy Start scheme in June 2024 was £5.68.
Asked by: Emma Lewell-Buck (Labour - South Shields)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many never events occurred in each NHS Trust in each year since 2019.
Answered by Maria Caulfield
Information on Never Events is published by NHS England. All available data on Never Events, including a breakdown for individual National Health Service trusts, is available at the following link:
https://www.england.nhs.uk/patient-safety/never-events-data/
Asked by: Emma Lewell-Buck (Labour - South Shields)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many physician associates have been employed in each NHS Trust in each year since 2019.
Answered by Andrew Stephenson
NHS England publishes Hospital and Community Health Services workforce statistics for England. These include staff working for hospital trusts and other core organisations, but excludes staff working for other providers such as in primary care, general practice, or social care.
A table showing the number of full time equivalent (FTE) Physician Associates working in National Health Service trusts in England, broken down by organisation, from December 2019 to December 2023, is attached. This data is drawn from the Electronic Staff Record, the human resources system for the NHS. From this data, the table attached presents the number of FTE staff who have a job role recorded as being a Physician Associate.
Asked by: Emma Lewell-Buck (Labour - South Shields)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many never events occurred within NHS England in each year since 2019; and how many and what proportion of these incidents involved Physician Associates in each year.
Answered by Maria Caulfield
Information on Never Events is published by NHS England, and all available data on Never Events is available at the following link:
https://www.england.nhs.uk/patient-safety/never-events-data/
NHS England does not collect specific data relating to Physician Associate involvement in Never Events, and as such the information is not held.
Asked by: Emma Lewell-Buck (Labour - South Shields)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, when her Department plans to respond to the correspondence of November 2023 to the Minister for Primary Care and Public Health from public healthcare professionals on the Healthy Start scheme.
Answered by Andrea Leadsom
The Department has received the correspondence and will respond in due course. The Healthy Start scheme is an important nutritional safety net for families who need support and the interest from public healthcare professionals is welcomed.
Asked by: Emma Lewell-Buck (Labour - South Shields)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many people were eligible for Healthy Start vouchers in January (a) 2022 and (b) 2023.
Answered by Andrea Leadsom
The number of those eligible for Healthy Start in January 2022 was 553,601, and the number of those eligible in January 2023 was 578,067.
Asked by: Emma Lewell-Buck (Labour - South Shields)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how much her Department spent on the Healthy Start Scheme in the (a) 2021-22 and (b) 2022-23 financial year.
Answered by Andrea Leadsom
The cost of operating the Healthy Start scheme was £78,148,555 in 2021/22 and £78,761,339 in 2022/23.
Asked by: Emma Lewell-Buck (Labour - South Shields)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to the correspondence from the Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Public Health, Start for Life and Primary Care to the hon. Member for South Shields of December 2023, for what purpose her Department requested personal identifiable data from the Department for Work and Pensions on people who are eligible for Healthy Start.
Answered by Andrea Leadsom
The Department of Health and Social Care does not receive personal data from the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) on those eligible for the Healthy Start scheme. The NHS Business Services Authority (NHS BSA) runs the scheme on behalf of the Department of Health and Social Care. The Department is continuing to work closely with the NHS BSA and the DWP, in order for the NHS BSA to receive the personal data held by the DWP for those potentially eligible citizens, as soon as possible. The NHS BSA will use this data to reach out to those eligible, who are not currently in receipt of Healthy Start, to encourage them to apply for the Healthy Start scheme.