Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, pursuant to the Answer of 4 December 2024 to Question 16662 on NHS: Public Consultation, what the budget is for deliberative engagement by type of spend in the 2024-25 financial year.

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

The public and staff must be at the centre of the development of the plan to make the National Health Service fit for the future, so that it makes a positive impact on their day-to-day lives. That is why we are running as series of in-depth deliberative events and have launched an open platform to hear from members of the public, and those who work in health and care.

Following an invitation to tender the competition process, we appointed Thinks Insight, Kaleidoscope Health and Care, and the Institute for Public Policy Research to support us to run this engagement exercise. A breakdown by type of spend is not available, for commercial confidentiality reasons.

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 potential impact of the delay to community pharmacy funding negotiations on community pharmacies.

Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

As identified by Lord Darzi’s review, primary care is under pressure and in crisis. The Government inherited a system that has been neglected for too long, and it remains very difficult for pharmacists to deliver for patients at a local level. I am committed to working with the sector to achieve what we all want, a service fit for the future.

Now that the Budget for Government has been set, we will shortly be resuming our consultation with Community Pharmacy England regarding the funding arrangements for community pharmacy.

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether the refreshed NHS workforce plan will include policies on the palliative care sector.

Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

The refreshed Long Term Workforce Plan will deliver the transformed health service that we will build over the next decade and will ensure that patients get the treatment they need, when and where they need it, including those at the end of their lives. In the development of the plan, we will engage with a range of stakeholders to ensure their needs are considered.

Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what guidance has been produced by his Department on the issuing of fines by local authorities on householders who leave items by the curtilage of their property to be given away and re-used.

Answered by Mary Creagh - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)

The department has not produced guidance for local authorities on issuing fixed penalty notices for householders who leave items by the curtilage of their property to be given away and re-used.

The principles of the Regulators’ Code applies, however, to enforcement action local authorities undertake. This states that regulatory activity should be carried out in a way which is proportionate, transparent, accountable and consistent. We are considering whether further guidance is necessary with regards to fly-tipping enforcement.

Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what (a) his Department’s policy is and (b) what guidance has been given to local authorities on the use of microchips in household wheelie bins.

Answered by Mary Creagh - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)

No, the department has not outlined a policy relating the use of microchips in household wheelie bins and has not issued guidance to local authorities in relation to this topic.

Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what information his Department holds on the frequency of household residual bin collections by local waste collection authorities.

Answered by Mary Creagh - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)

Defra does not routinely collect data on the frequency of household residual bin collections by waste collection authorities.

Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what information (a) his Department and (b) its agencies holds on the number of household receptacles required for rubbish and recycling collections by each local waste collection authority.

Answered by Mary Creagh - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)

Defra and the Environment Agency do not routinely collect data on the number of containers required for waste and recycling collections by each waste collection authority.

Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, pursuant to the Answer of 19 November 2024, to Question HL2390, on Waste: Codes of Practice, when his Department plans to respond to the consultation on making the Code of Practice a statutory code.

Answered by Mary Creagh - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)

The Code of Practice on Litter and Refuse is already a statutory document, and Local Councils must have regard to it when carrying out their duty to keep relevant land clear of litter and refuse.

Separate guidance on enforcement was published in 2019 and attached to the Code of Practice but is not statutory. Under the previous Government a consultation was run on making this enforcement guidance statutory.

At this stage, the Government has not yet made an assessment of how it can further support local authorities to tackle litter. Any decisions or updates will be communicated in due course.

Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment his Department has made of the potential impact of the frequency of residual waste household collections on (a) public health and (b) local amenities.

Answered by Mary Creagh - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)

Under section 89 of the Environmental Protection Act 1990, there is a duty on local authorities to keep land and highways clear of litter.

We recognise that as recycling services are expanded and improved under Simpler Recycling in England, local authorities may choose to review residual waste services to ensure they are providing the most appropriate service for local circumstances. The government’s priority is ensuring that households’ needs are met, and we expect local authorities to continue to provide services to a reasonable standard.

Defra recently published guidance to ensure that local authorities consider certain factors when they review services, to ensure that reasonable standards are maintained. These include ensuring that there are no disamenity impacts, such as the build-up of odorous waste at the kerbside or an increase in fly-tipping of residual waste.

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will take steps to ensure that fees paid by commissioners take into account changes in the costs faced by not-for-profit social care providers.

Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

Local authorities are best placed to understand and plan for the needs of their population, which is why, under the Care Act 2014, local authorities are tasked with the duty to shape their care market to meet the diverse needs of all local people. This includes negotiating and ensuring fee levels take into account the costs of delivering care, including inflationary and other pressures, to support market sustainability and provider viability.

The Government recognises the important role councils have in commissioning and delivering adult and children’s social care services. To support social care authorities to deliver these key services in light of pressures, the Government has this week announced a further £200 million for adult and children’s social care.

Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, pursuant to the Answer of 3 December 2024 to Question 14178 on Domestic Waste: Waste Disposal, whether he has made an assessment of the potential impact of the removal of the minimum residual bin collection requirement in the final Simpler Recycling policy on the prevalence of local waste collection authorities moving to three-weekly or monthly bin collections.

Answered by Mary Creagh - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)

Local authorities are already legally required to deliver waste collection services to all households in their area. Simpler Recycling in England will go further by mandating weekly food waste collections under the Environment Act 2021. Local authorities have always had flexibility to choose residual waste frequency, depending on local need.

Local authorities are best placed to determine the effective delivery of local services. We recognise that as recycling services are expanded and improved under Simpler Recycling, local authorities may choose to review residual waste services to ensure they are providing best value for money in line with local need. The Government’s priority is ensuring that households’ needs are met, and we expect local authorities to continue to provide services to a reasonable standard, as they do now.

Defra recently published guidance to ensure that local authorities consider certain factors when they review services, to ensure that reasonable standards are maintained. These include ensuring that there are no disamenity impacts, such as the build-up of odorous waste at the kerbside or an increase in fly-tipping of residual waste. We expect local authorities to monitor any changes to collection frequencies to ensure there are no unintended adverse consequences.

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how much funding (a) his Department and (b) NHS England has provided for the Global Majority Fellowship Programme in the last year for which figures are available.

Answered by Andrew Gwynne - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)

There is no such thing as the Global Majority Fellowship Programme. The NHS Global Fellowship programme offers volunteer reciprocal leadership development opportunities for clinical and non-clinical staff to experience health systems across the globe.

NHS England provided £441,773.27 for the NHS Global Fellowships Programme for the financial year 2023/24.

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether the 10-year health plan will include policies on palliative care.

Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

We have committed to developing a 10-year plan to deliver a National Health Service fit for the future. We will carefully be considering policies, including those that impact people with palliative and end of life care needs, with input from the public, patients, health staff, and our stakeholders, including those in the hospice sector, as we develop the plan.

The engagement process has been launched, and I would encourage the palliative and end of life care sector, including hospice providers, service users, and their families, to engage with that process to allow us to fully understand what is not working as well as it should, and what the potential solutions are. Further information is available at the following link:

https://change.nhs.uk/en-GB/

On 19 December the government announced the biggest investment in a generation for hospices to help ensure that hospices can continue to deliver the highest quality end of life care possible for their patients, families, and loved ones.

We are supporting the hospice sector with £100 million funding for adult and children’s hospices to ensure they have the best physical environment for care.

Children and young people’s hospices will also receive a further £26 million revenue funding for 2025/26. This is a continuation of the funding which until recently was known as the children and young people’s hospice grant.

We will set out the details of the funding allocation and dissemination in the new year.

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, pursuant to the Answer of 16 December 2024 to Question 16662 on NHS: Public Consultation, what the total budget is for deliberative engagement in the 2024-25 financial year.

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

Following an invitation to tender competition process, we appointed Thinks Insight, Kaleidoscope Health and Care, and IPPR to support us to run the 10-Year Health Plan engagement exercise. The awarded value of the contract is up to £2.96 million, and includes running online and in-person engagement activities, the Change NHS online portal, and analysis of the insight received.

The current contract start date is 13 September 2024 with an end date of 31 March 2025, with an option to extend by three months. This means that final costs, such as those to undertake analysis, are dependent on the level of engagement that takes place.

The details of this award and redacted contract are available at the following link:

https://www.contractsfinder.service.gov.uk/Notice/80963989-c4d6-4a16-8e12-c31b43a81dda

We will be able to provide full costs of the exercise once it is complete.

Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, how much the Environment Agency has spent on custom wheel lug nuts for Agency vehicles in each of the last three years; and for what purpose.

Answered by Emma Hardy - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)

A breakdown of how much the Environment Agency spent on its commercial fleet’s maintenance by vehicle type and fuel type in the last three financial years is shown in the table below. This does not include leased vehicles as maintenance costs are included in their monthly costs. Data on ‘non-essential modifications’ is not available.

The Environment Agency does not purchase customised wheel lug nuts. The ratio of staff to road vehicles in the Environment Agency, for the last three financial years, is shown in the below table:

Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, how much the Environment Agency spent on road vehicle fleet maintenance by (a) vehicle type, (b) fuel type and (c) non-essential modifications in each of the last three financial years.

Answered by Emma Hardy - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)

A breakdown of how much the Environment Agency spent on its commercial fleet’s maintenance by vehicle type and fuel type in the last three financial years is shown in the table below. This does not include leased vehicles as maintenance costs are included in their monthly costs. Data on ‘non-essential modifications’ is not available.

The Environment Agency does not purchase customised wheel lug nuts. The ratio of staff to road vehicles in the Environment Agency, for the last three financial years, is shown in the below table:

Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what the ratio of staff to road vehicles in the Environment Agency (a) is and (b) was in each of the last three years.

Answered by Emma Hardy - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)

A breakdown of how much the Environment Agency spent on its commercial fleet’s maintenance by vehicle type and fuel type in the last three financial years is shown in the table below. This does not include leased vehicles as maintenance costs are included in their monthly costs. Data on ‘non-essential modifications’ is not available.

The Environment Agency does not purchase customised wheel lug nuts. The ratio of staff to road vehicles in the Environment Agency, for the last three financial years, is shown in the below table:

Found: Beccy Cooper; Deirdre Costigan; Jen Craft; Josh Fenton-Glynn; Andrew George; Paulette Hamilton; Joe Robertson

Submit Evidence (by 4 Feb 2025)

The Committee is undertaking an inquiry into community mental health services. The inquiry will examine what good looks like from the perspective of service users and their families/carers. The Committee would like the inquiry to shine a light on case studies of innovative practice and high-quality care across the country, and to undertake meaningful and impactful engagement with people accessing these services.