Oral Answers to Questions

Lord Spellar Excerpts

Wednesday 13th December 2023 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I thank my hon. Friend for raising this important issue. He is absolutely right about the work that needs to be done, and I am grateful to the Joint Committee on the Draft Mental Health Bill. Our intention is to bring forward a Bill when parliamentary time allows.

I would be happy to meet my hon. Friend and other colleagues to discuss this. I remind everyone that we are undertaking the largest expansion of mental health services in a generation, with £2.3 billion of extra funding by March 2024. We are increasing capital investment in mental health urgent care centres and, under the long-term workforce plan, providing the largest expansion of the mental health workforce we have ever seen in this country.

[John Spellar (Warley) (Lab)]

Q6. Rather than the Government chaos that is dominating media headlines, much more important to the public, businesses and organisations is their deeply unsatisfactory day-to- day experience of engaging with this dysfunctional Administration. As far as they can see, Britain is not working. When is the Prime Minister going to get a grip?

[The Prime Minister]

The most pressing issue facing families is the cost of living. That is why this Government have delivered what we said, which was to halve inflation, and not only that; we are supplementing it with significant tax cuts, which will benefit working families from January—£450 for a typical person in work—demonstrating that we are absolutely on the side of hard-working families. This Government are cutting their taxes.