Asked by: Holly Mumby-Croft (Conservative - Scunthorpe)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps her Department is taking to help protect rare breeds of native farm animals.
Answered by Mark Spencer - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
To support native breeds, Defra publishes the UK National Breed Inventory annually to help monitor populations of pedigree livestock, including native breeds. For breeders in England, support for native breeds is available under the SP8: Native Breeds at Risk Supplement, which can be accessed through the Countryside Stewardship scheme.
Defra has also published guidelines on contingency planning in the event of an outbreak of a notifiable disease to identify eligible native breeds on the breed at risk (BAR) list, that may be exempt from culling.
The Department recognises the important role local abattoirs play in supporting native breed farmers and the wider rural economy. We are very much committed to engaging with the smaller abattoir sector to maintain a robust and competitive industry. At the National Farmers Union Conference in February, I announced the Government’s intention to launch capital grant funding to support smaller abattoirs. I will shortly be holding a round table with experts from the native breeds community to explore how we can support this valuable resource.
Asked by: Holly Mumby-Croft (Conservative - Scunthorpe)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to support children with special educational needs and disabilities.
Answered by Claire Coutinho - Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero
On 2 March 2023, the department published the Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) and Alternative Provision (AP) Improvement Plan in response to the Green Paper. This outlines our approach to creating a sustainable system that is better for children with SEND and easier for their families to navigate.
The department will establish a single national system that delivers for every child and young person with SEND, so that they enjoy their childhood, achieve good outcomes, and are well prepared for adulthood and employment. We will also give families greater confidence that their child will be able to fulfil their potential through improved mainstream provision in their local setting.
For those children and young people with SEND who do require an Education Health Care (EHC) plans and specialist provision, the department will ensure they get prompt access to the support they need, and that parents do not face an adversarial system to secure this. We will strengthen accountability across the system so that everyone is held to account for supporting children and young people with SEND.
The department will test the key reforms by creating up to nine Regional Expert Partnerships through our £70 million Change Programme. Oversight of reform will be driven by a new national SEND and AP Implementation Board, jointly chaired by myself and my hon. Friend, the Minister for Mental Health and Women’s Health Strategy.
The department recognises that these reforms will take time to implement and continue to support the system in the immediate term to support children with SEND, which is why we are investing £2.6 billion between now and 2025 to fund new SEND and AP places and improve existing provision.
High needs revenue funding for children and young people with complex needs will be rising to £10.1 billion in this financial year 2023/24, which is an increase of over 50% from the 2019/20 allocations. This extra funding will help local authorities and schools with the increasing costs of supporting children and young people with SEND.
Asked by: Holly Mumby-Croft (Conservative - Scunthorpe)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps her Department is taking to support smaller farms that want to apply for a Farming Equipment and Technology Fund 2023 grant but cannot afford to pay for the items they applied for funding for before the grant is paid.
Answered by Mark Spencer - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
To support smaller farms wishing to apply for a Farming Equipment and Technology Fund 2023 grant we have reduced the minimum grant from £2,000 to £1,000 and introduced a range of lower priced items on to the list.
Asked by: Holly Mumby-Croft (Conservative - Scunthorpe)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, what steps his Department is taking to protect UK infrastructure from cyber attacks.
Answered by Jeremy Quin
Ensuring our infrastructure is secure and resilient against cyber attack, in the context of rapidly changing threat and technology, is at the heart of our national approach to cyber security.
Our National Cyber Strategy sets out how we will build a resilient and prosperous digital UK. We are setting clear expectations for operators of critical infrastructures, including ambitious targets for improvement. We have strengthened regulatory frameworks through the Telecoms Security Act, consulted on amendments to the Network and Information Systems Regulations and are considering options to go further.
Through the National Cyber Security Centre we support infrastructure operators with tailored technical advice, guidance, and threat intelligence to build resilience in the national interest. This includes the recent alert on the threat from state-aligned groups following the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Asked by: Holly Mumby-Croft (Conservative - Scunthorpe)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent steps his Department has taken to reduce elective surgery treatment waiting times for children.
Answered by Will Quince
In February 2022, the National Health Service published a delivery plan setting out a clear vision for how the NHS will recover and reduce waiting times for elective services including elective surgery for children and young people.
Steps being taken include increasing capacity, seeking alternate capacity in other trusts or the independent sector, and engaging with patients to understand their choices.
To support this recovery the Government plans to spend more than £8 billion from 2022/23 to 2024/25, in addition to the £2 billion Elective Recovery Fund and £700 million Targeted Investment Fund already made available to systems in 2021/22 to help drive up and protect elective activity.
Having virtually met our target to eliminate long waits of two years or more for elective procedures in July, we have also made significant progress in tackling waits of 78 weeks or more for elective services including elective surgery for children. NHS England will soon publish statistics that demonstrate what has been achieved to date.
Asked by: Holly Mumby-Croft (Conservative - Scunthorpe)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what steps his Department is taking to help increase the availability of private rental properties in England.
Answered by Rachel Maclean
The Government is driving up the supply of new homes by supporting diversification of the market, investing in affordable housing, and increasing land supply for new homes by investing in infrastructure. We also remain committed to continue working towards our ambition of delivering 300,000 homes per year to help create a more sustainable and affordable housing market.
We welcome new institutional investment in the Private Rented Sector and have made interventions to support the Build to Rent sector. Build to Rent boosts housing supply, diversifies the private rental sector, and increases quality and choice for renters in cities and towns across England.
Asked by: Holly Mumby-Croft (Conservative - Scunthorpe)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department are taking to reduce incidences of bullying in schools.
Answered by Claire Coutinho - Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero
The government has sent a clear message to schools that bullying, including cyberbullying, for whatever reason, is unacceptable. It can have a devastating effect on children, harm their education, and have serious and lasting consequences for their mental health.
All schools are required by law to have a behaviour policy which outlines measures to encourage good behaviour and prevent all forms of bullying amongst pupils. The policy should set out the behaviour expected of pupils, the sanctions that will be imposed for misbehaviour, and recognition for good behaviour. This should be communicated to all pupils, school staff, and parents. The department issues guidance to schools on how to prevent and respond to bullying as part of their overall behaviour policy. This was last updated in July 2017 and is available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/preventing-and-tackling-bullying.
The department is providing over £2 million of funding between 10 August 2021 and 31 March 2024 to five anti-bullying organisations to support schools to tackle bullying. This includes projects targeting bullying of particular groups, such as those who are victims of hate related bullying.
The department is also ensuring that all children in England will learn about respectful relationships, in person and online, as part of mandatory relationships, sex and health education (RSHE). The curriculum has a strong focus on equality, respect, the harmful impact of stereotyping, as well as the importance of valuing difference. Guidance on teaching RSHE is available at: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/teaching-about-relationships-sex-and-health.
Asked by: Holly Mumby-Croft (Conservative - Scunthorpe)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps her Department is taking to help police forces reduce incidences of vehicular-assisted anti-social behaviour; and whether she plans to grant the police additional powers to tackle those incidences.
Answered by Chris Philp - Minister of State (Home Office)
Enforcement of road traffic law is an operational matter for the Chief Constable based on local policing priorities.
We believe there are sufficient powers to address incidents of vehicular-assisted anti-social behaviour (ASB).
Section 59 of the Police Reform Act 2002 provides the police with the power to deal with ASB when a motor vehicle has caused, alarm, distress or annoyance to members of the public. This includes the power to seize the vehicles.
In addition, the Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014 provides the police, local authorities and other local agencies with a range of tools and powers that they can use to respond quickly and effectively to ASB. This includes Civil Injunctions and Public Space Protection Orders (PSPOs).
On 27 March 2023 the Government published the Anti-social Behaviour Action Plan. The Plan commits to tackling ASB across five key themes: stronger punishment; making communities safer; building local pride; prevention and early intervention; and improving data, reporting and accountability for action.
It is for local authorities, forces and agencies to decide how best to use these powers depending on the specific circumstances as they are best placed to understand what is causing the behaviour in question, the impact that it is having, and to determine the most appropriate response.
Asked by: Holly Mumby-Croft (Conservative - Scunthorpe)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps his Department are taking to increase (a) early diagnosis and (b) effective treatment of (i) Paediatric Acute-onset Neuropsychiatric Syndrome and (ii) Paediatric Autoimmune Neuropsychiatric Disorders Associated with Streptococcal Infections; and what steps his Department are taking to increase awareness of these conditions among medical professionals.
Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)
The Department has no plans to do so at present.
Should the evidence base develop further, clinical policy may be updated by relevant organisations such as the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence. NHS England would then consider the development of care pathways for those living with paediatric acute-onset neuropsychiatric syndrome and paediatric autoimmune neuropsychiatric disorders associated with streptococcal infections. In the meantime, integrated care systems are responsible for planning care for their populations.
Medical professionals, such as general practitioners, are responsible for ensuring their own clinical knowledge remains up-to-date and for identifying learning needs as part of their continuing professional development. This activity should include taking account of new research and developments in guidance to ensure that they can continue to provide high quality care to all patients.
Asked by: Holly Mumby-Croft (Conservative - Scunthorpe)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent steps his Department has taken to increase the retention rate of GPs.
Answered by Neil O'Brien
We are working with NHS England to increase the general practice (GP) workforce in England. This includes measures to boost recruitment, address the reasons why doctors leave, and encourage them to return to practice.
NHS England has made a number of recruitment and retention schemes available to boost the GP workforce. This includes the GP Retention Scheme, the GP Retention Fund, the National GP Induction and Refresher, the Locum Support Scheme, and the Supporting Mentors Scheme.
As announced in the 2023 Spring Budget, we are also increasing the annual allowance from £40,000 to £60,000 per year to encourage GPs to work more hours, and we are abolishing the lifetime allowance entirely so pension tax charges do not act as a driver for early retirements.