Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Laurence Robertson and Jo Churchill

Monday 18th March 2024 Commons Chamber

[The Minister for Employment (Jo Churchill)]

The plan is to roll out those migration notices by 31 March. We intend to publish data for the hon. Gentleman’s constituency. We are committed to ensuring that the transition works as smoothly as possible for everyone.

[Mr Laurence Robertson (Tewkesbury) (Con)]

T4. Has the Minister made any recent assessment of what trades or occupations are short of workers at the moment, and what steps are being taken to persuade people—perhaps more experienced people—back into the workforce to fill those vacancies?

[Jo Churchill]

We are working with other Departments, employers and stakeholders to isolate where those vacancies are, and on sector-based work academy programmes. We have put over 266,000 people through construction, care, tourism, hospitality—all those gaps that we need to fill.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Laurence Robertson and Jo Churchill

Tuesday 8th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Mr Laurence Robertson (Tewkesbury) (Con)]

What steps he is taking to increase the range of work carried out by pharmacies.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Jo Churchill)]

The pandemic has proven to the public how vital our highly skilled pharmacy teams are in supporting their communities. Pharmacies have massive potential to build on the new services they are already delivering, and we will continue to look at how we can use them further.

[Mr Robertson]

I thank the Minister for that answer. Can we also make sure that the public are aware of everything that pharmacies can do, so that they can use them to take pressure off GPs?

[Jo Churchill]

Indeed we can. I would be honoured to work with my hon. Friend to do that so that people think “pharmacy first”. Pharmacies are delivering lateral flow devices into our communities; 500 of them have stood up to be vaccination sites; and we can now refer from NHS 111 and GPs into community pharmacies for the supply of prescribed medicine and for minor illnesses. We need our pharmacies to show their skill base; they are a highly skilled group that we should all be asking to do more and celebrating.