Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, for what reason the Fire and Rescue Service is not receiving the exemption from the rise in National Insurance contributions as the other Emergency Services.

Answered by James Murray - Exchequer Secretary (HM Treasury)

To repair the public finances and help raise the revenue required to fund public services, the Government has taken the difficult decision to increase employer National Insurance.

The Government will provide support for public sector employers, including fire and rescue authorities, for the additional costs of Employer National Insurance Contributions. This is in line with the approach taken under the previous government’s Health and Social Care Levy. Further details will be set out in due course.

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what his policy is on (a) doctors and (b) other qualified medical personnel administering pain-relieving drugs which may shorten lives; and whether regulations on that issue changed after the conviction of Harold Shipman.

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

A wide variety of medicines are used for the purpose of pain-relief, and they have differing levels of regulation. Some items can be bought off-the-shelf without a prescription, whilst others require authorisation from a medical professional. The Human Medicines Regulations 2012 set out the responsibilities which certain medical professionals may undertake regarding the supply and administration of regulated medicines. The Misuse of Drugs Act 1971 sets out the legal framework for the prevention of misuse of controlled drugs.

Decisions about what medicines to prescribe and administer are made by the doctor or other qualified medical personnel responsible for that part of the patient’s care. They must always satisfy themselves that the medicines they consider appropriate for their patients can be safely prescribed and administered, and they must take account of appropriate national guidance on clinical effectiveness. Clinicians are responsible for the decisions they make regarding the administration of medicines, and they are regulated by the relevant regulatory body for their profession.

Professional regulators are responsible for setting and enforcing their own standards for the healthcare professionals that they regulate. The General Medical Council (GMC) is the regulator of all medical doctors practising in the United Kingdom, and the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) is the regulator of nurses and midwives in the UK. Both the GMC and the NMC are independent of the Government, are directly accountable to Parliament, and are responsible for operational matters concerning the discharge of their statutory duties.

Following the Shipman Inquiry's Fourth Report, published on 14 July 2004, the Government introduced tighter controls on the procurement, storage, supply and prescribing of controlled drugs, and established national and regional monitoring by the Care Quality Commission (CQC) and a network of regional NHS Controlled Drug Accountable Officers. The CQC is responsible for making sure that health and care service providers, and other regulators, maintain a safe environment for the management and use of controlled drugs in England. The CQC does this under the Controlled Drugs (Supervision of Management and Use) Regulations 2013. These regulations strengthened system governance to monitor the safe use and prescribing of controlled drugs, and require greater co-ordination between the health system and police, to investigate and take action, to protect patients and the public against the misuse and diversion of controlled drugs. Further information on these regulations is available at the following link:

https://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2013/373/contents/made

Institutes of Technology

Found: supported by Rachael Maskell , Sir John Hayes , Danny Kruger , Sir Christopher Chope , Sir Julian Lewis