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 improve support for families affected by baby loss including (a) access to counselling services, (b) support for siblings and (c) training for healthcare professionals in providing compassionate care.

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

NHS England’s Three Year Delivery Plan for Maternity and Neonatal services sets out how the National Health Service will make care safer, more personalised, and equitable. The plan includes a commitment to provide compassionate and high-quality care for bereaved families.

To deliver on this commitment, NHS England has made additional funding available to ensure all trusts can offer a seven day a week bereavement service. NHS England has also invested in Maternal Mental Health Services to provide care for women with moderate to complex or severe mental health difficulties, and published the Core Competency Framework for providers, to address known variation in multi-professional training and competency assessment, including for bereavement care.

Additionally, the National Bereavement Care Pathway (NBCP) aims to reduce the variation in the quality of bereavement care provided by the NHS to ensure that parents receive quality and consistent care after pregnancy or baby loss. The pathway acts as a set of standards and guidance that trusts should follow when a patient has suffered a pregnancy or baby loss, with the aim of ensuring that all bereaved parents are offered equal, high quality, individualised, safe, and sensitive care. Since June 2024, all NHS England trusts had signed up to the NBCP.

To support NHS staff to handle a range of difficult situations, NHS England has also launched an e-learning module, Handling difficult situations – Caring for yourself and others with compassion, for NHS staff in frontline, patient facing roles. This e-learning module, which is available for free, aims to help upskill colleagues in how to handle difficult situations with compassion, using appropriate communication techniques and active listening skills.

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 (a) the potential effectiveness of carbon capture technologies in reducing emissions and (b) whether investment in such technologies is the most (i) efficient and (ii) cost-effective way to meet the climate targets.

Answered by Sarah Jones - Minister of State (Department for Energy Security and Net Zero)

Carbon Capture, Usage and Storage (CCUS) technology has been proven in many countries across the world, and the Climate Change Committee have described it as a “necessity not an option” for reaching Net Zero. As a part of the initial assessment for choosing the first CCUS clusters, projects were assessed against five criteria including deliverability, under which technical viability was considered. It enables the lowest cost pathway to Net Zero and is a tried and tested technology that has been deployed across industry and power generation at scale. Geological carbon storage is a proven technology that has been in operation globally for decades.

Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:

To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, if her Department will make an assessment of the potential merits of removing the 10% commission charge on the sale of park homes.

Answered by Matthew Pennycook - Minister of State (Housing, Communities and Local Government)

I refer the hon Member to the answer given to Question UIN 11995 on 6 November 2024.

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 impact of the Listed Places of Worship Grant Scheme on the preservation of historic churches; and whether her Department plans to renew the scheme beyond March 2025.

Answered by Chris Bryant - Minister of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport)

The Department monitors the implementation and impact of the grant scheme through the regular reporting of the grant administrator. Since 2010, the grant scheme has returned over £350 million to listed places of worship including churches.

Departmental settlements have been set following the Budget announcement on October 30. Individual programmes will now be assessed during the departmental Business Planning process.

Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:

To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, if she will make an assessment of the potential merits of providing additional funding to local authorities to support them to meet their statutory homelessness duties effectively.

Answered by Rushanara Ali - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Housing, Communities and Local Government)

Homelessness levels are far too high. This can have a devastating impact on those affected, especially children. Too many families are spending years in temporary accommodation, at a point in a child’s life when they need space to play and develop, nutritious food to thrive and access to education.

We must address this and deliver long term solutions. The Government is looking at these issues carefully and will develop a new cross government strategy, working with mayors and councils across the country to get us back on track to ending homelessness once and for all. This includes a dedicated Inter-Ministerial Group, chaired by the Deputy Prime Minister, bringing together ministers from across government.

More widely, we are taking action to tackle the root causes of homelessness by delivering the biggest increase in social and affordable housebuilding in a generation and building 1.5 million new homes over the next parliament. The government is also abolishing Section 21 ‘no fault’ evictions, preventing private renters being exploited and discriminated against, and empowering people to challenge unreasonable rent increases.

We are already taking the first steps to get back on track to ending homelessness. As announced at the Budget, funding for homelessness services is increasing next year by £233 million compared to this year (2024/25). This increased spending will help to prevent rises in the number of families in temporary accommodation and help to prevent rough sleeping. This brings total spend to nearly £1 billion in 25/26. Allocations for individual local authorities in England will be set out later in December.

The department regularly collects homelessness data, including on out of area placements, which can be found here in table TA 1 and are published quarterly: Statutory homelessness in England: April to June 2024 - GOV.UK. Records on the location of accommodation where accommodation is secured to end the prevention or relief duties, including where that accommodation is out of area, are published annually and can be found in tables P4 and R4 here: Detailed_LA_20232024.xlsx.

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 ensure that retired NHS staff affected by the McCloud Judgement receive their full pension entitlements for the remedy period between 1 April 2015 and 31 March 2022; and whether his Department will publish a timeline for implementing the second phase of the McCloud Remedy.

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

The NHS Business Services Authority (NHSBSA) is implementing the McCloud remedy for impacted members of the NHS Pension Scheme. Remedy implementation is a complex and large-scale undertaking. The core element of the remedy will provide members with a choice of benefits at retirement for the period the discrimination identified by the McCloud judgment was effective. Approximately 350,000 retired members will be offered this choice retrospectively.

The Department expects that the majority of impacted retired members will not receive their choice until after April 2025. Whilst the majority of impacted retired members are likely to already be in receipt of their most beneficial set of benefits, the Department is working with the NHSBSA to accelerate the provision of this choice, prioritising members for whom there would be a significant and immediate financial impact. The NHSBSA will communicate revised timelines with members once these are confirmed.

The EU and the arms trade, human rights, and the Israel-Gaza conflict

Democratic violations and violence in Georgia

Protecting children from sexual abuse

Disclosure and Barring Service checks for hon. Members and Peers

Fife Carers Centre recognition as a Carer Positive Exemplary employer

Domestic Abuse Offences

Registration scheme for short-term lets and local communities

Apprenticeships in the trades industry

Residence-based voting rights

Merry Christmas Harrogate single

British Council International School Award for Wallace Fields Junior School in Epsom

University of St Andrews cost of living and sustainability initiatives

Bowel Cancer UK report into NHS services

Bath Young Carers

50th anniversary of Epsom Common Association

Assistance and access for disabled people at railway stations

Potential closure of post offices

Fuel Poverty Awareness Day

New University of Surrey United Nations CIFAL Centre

Review into breast cancer screening

Celebrating Ahmad Tea

Role of small family farms in Somerset

Water quality in Sri Lanka

Peace, democracy and accountability in Syria

McLaren Racing Formula 1 Constructors' Championship

Academic performance of Emmbrook School

Democracy and human rights in Myanmar

20 years of service at the Highway Avenue Post Office

Dr Mackay appointed Scotland's new Makar

Flood recovery framework

Chris McCausland and Dianne Buswell

Renewal of the Listed Places of Worship Grant Scheme

World Darts Championship

Sage House Dementia Hub

UN Special Rapporteur's report on atrocity crimes in Iran

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