Liam Fox: DHSC: Written Answers (22)

Written Question

General Practitioners: Bureaucracy

Monday 15th January 2024

Asked by: Liam Fox (Conservative - North Somerset)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps she is taking to reduce the number of administrative tasks which GPs are required to perform.

Answered by Andrea Leadsom - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)

The Delivery plan for recovering access to primary care, published by NHS England in May 2023, set out actions on how bureaucracy and workload can be cut by improving the interface between primary and secondary care, cutting unnecessary burdens on general practitioners (GPs) through the Bureaucracy Busting Concordat, published in August 2022, and streamlining the Investment and Impact Fund from 36 to five indicators from 2023/24.

In response to feedback from the profession to make incentive schemes more streamlined and focused, the Department has launched a public consultation on incentive schemes in general practice.

The expanded primary care teams funded through the Additional Roles Reimbursement Scheme add extra clinical capacity, helping to reduce the burden on GPs.

Written Question

General Practitioners

Monday 15th January 2024

Asked by: Liam Fox (Conservative - North Somerset)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps she is taking to reduce the workload of GPs.

Answered by Andrea Leadsom - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)

In response to feedback from the profession to make incentive schemes more streamlined and focused, the Department has launched a public consultation on incentive schemes in general practice.

The expanded primary care teams funded through the Additional Roles Reimbursement Scheme add extra clinical capacity, helping to reduce the burden on GPs.

Written Question

NHS: Pay

Monday 11th September 2023

Asked by: Liam Fox (Conservative - North Somerset)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many NHS mangers are paid over (a) £80,000, (b) £130,000, (c) £200,000 and (d) £250,000 a year as of 1 September 2023.

Answered by Will Quince

The following table shows the headcount number of managers in the National Health Service with total earnings of over the requested amounts in the 12 months to the end of March 2023, the latest period available. These are total earnings, which include non-basic-pay elements such as overtime, geographic allowances, or on-call payments, though these will not make a significant part of managers earnings.

Range	Headcount
£80,000 - £129,999	8678
£130,000 - £199,999	1248
£200,000 - £249,999	149
£250,000 and over	58

Source: NHS England Digital Earnings Statistics

Notes:

Data is sourced from the ESR, which is the Human Resources and Payroll system used throughout secondary care by organisations in the HCHS. It includes staff working for NHS trusts, NHS foundation trusts, integrated care boards and central and support organisations in England.
Data covers people in the staff groups of ‘managers’ and ‘senior managers’ as defined by their NHS Occupation Code. All managers/senior managers who need to be a qualified doctor, qualified nurse, qualified therapist, qualified scientist, or trained ambulance personnel should be coded in their professional staff group, for example as a nurse and are not included in these figures.
If an individual worked in more than one managerial role over the course of the year the earnings are summed to give a person level total. Earnings for roles outside of management are not included.

Written Question

Health Services: Waiting Lists

Wednesday 19th July 2023

Asked by: Liam Fox (Conservative - North Somerset)

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 industrial action on patient waiting lists.

Answered by Will Quince

Following any period of strike action, NHS England publish data on their website on the impact of industrial action. This sets out the number of staff absent as a result of industrial action, and the number of procedures and appointments rescheduled. The data do not include the impact on waiting lists. The data is available at the following link:

https://www.england.nhs.uk/publication/preparedness-for-potential-industrial-action-in-the-nhs/

Written Question

General Practitioners: Employment

Wednesday 19th July 2023

Asked by: Liam Fox (Conservative - North Somerset)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

Answered by Neil O'Brien

The table below shows the number full-time equivalent GPs were active in 2020, 2015, 2005, 2000 and 1995.

Year	All GPs (full time equivalent)
September 1995	29,248
September 2000	26,114
September 2005	31,901
September 2015	34,392
September 2020	35,393

Source: https://digital.nhs.uk/data-and-information/publications/statistical/general-and-personal-medical-services

Notes

Full-Time Equivalent (FTE) refers to the proportion of full-time contracted hours that the post holder is contracted to work. 1 would indicate they work a full set of hours (37.5), 0.5 that they worked half time. For GPs in Training Grades’ contracts 1 FTE = 40 hours and in this table these FTEs have been converted to the standard wMDS measure of 1 FTE = 37.5 hours for consistency.
Figures shown do not include staff working in prisons, army bases, educational establishments, specialist care centres including drug rehabilitation centres, walk-in centres, and other alternative settings outside of traditional general practice such as urgent treatment centres and minor injury units.

Data from September 2015 onwards was collected using a new methodology and should therefore not be directly compared with data from before September 2015. Figures from September 2015 should be treated with caution as the data submission rates under the new methodology from practices were appreciably lower than for subsequent reporting periods. This means that the reported figures for the early years of the collection may be lower than the true picture. In September 2015, which was the first extract from the new Workforce Minimum Data Set, only three of four Health Education England regions submitted data.
It is not recommended that comparisons be made between quarterly or monthly figures (e.g. Mar 16 to Sept 16) due to the unknown effect of seasonality on workforce numbers. Any such comparisons should therefore be treated with extreme caution.
Figures from earlier collections (September 2005 to September 2015) should be treated with caution as the data submission rates from practices were appreciably lower than for subsequent reporting periods. This means that the reported figures for the early years of the collection may be lower than the true picture.

Written Question

General Practitioners: Staff

Wednesday 19th July 2023

Asked by: Liam Fox (Conservative - North Somerset)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many full-time general practice staff were (a) male and (b) female in (i) 2020, (ii) 2015, (iii) 2010, (iv) 2005, (v) 2000 and (vi) 1995.

Answered by Neil O'Brien

The table below shows the number of full-time general practice staff who were male and female in September 2005, 2010, 2015 and 2020. Data is not broken down by gender for all practice staff for 2000 and 1995.

Year	Female (all practice staff)	Male (all practice staff)
September 2005	12,192	19,710
September 2010	15,361	19,881
September 2015	91,902	20,414
September 2020	108,682	23,081

Source: https://digital.nhs.uk/data-and-information/publications/statistical/general-and-personal-medical-services

Notes

Full-Time Equivalent (FTE) refers to the proportion of full-time contracted hours that the post holder is contracted to work. 1 would indicate they work a full set of hours (37.5), 0.5 that they worked half time. For GPs in Training Grades’ contracts 1 FTE = 40 hours and in this table these FTEs have been converted to the standard wMDS measure of 1 FTE = 37.5 hours for consistency.

Figures shown do not include staff working in prisons, army bases, educational establishments, specialist care centres including drug rehabilitation centres, walk-in centres and other alternative settings outside of traditional general practice such as urgent treatment centres and minor injury units.
Data from September 2015 onwards was collected using a new methodology and should therefore not be directly compared with data from before September 2015. Figures from September 2015 should be treated with caution as the data submission rates under the new methodology from practices were appreciably lower than for subsequent reporting periods. This means that the reported figures for the early years of the collection may be lower than the true picture. In September 2015, which was the first extract from the new Workforce Minimum Data Set, only three of four Health Education England regions submitted data.
It is not recommended that comparisons be made between quarterly or monthly figures (e.g. Mar 16 to Sept 16) due to the unknown effect of seasonality on workforce numbers. Any such comparisons should therefore be treated with extreme caution.
Figures from earlier collections (September 2005 to September 2015) should be treated with caution as the data submission rates from practices were appreciably lower than for subsequent reporting periods. This means that the reported figures for the early years of the collection may be lower than the true picture.

Written Question

Parkinson's Disease: Health Services

Thursday 3rd November 2022

Asked by: Liam Fox (Conservative - North Somerset)

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 regional differences in access to multidisciplinary support on Parkinson's care.

Answered by Helen Whately - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

No assessment has been made.

Written Question

Incontinence: Health Services

Monday 28th March 2022

Asked by: Liam Fox (Conservative - North Somerset)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent assessment he has made of levels of adherence to the guidance entitled Excellence in Continence Care.

Answered by Gillian Keegan - Secretary of State for Education

Integrated care boards (ICBs) will take on the commissioning functions of clinical commissioning groups and some of NHS England’s commissioning functions. While there are no specific requirements to assess local continence needs, ICBs will be responsible for providing a comprehensive health service for the local population based on its needs.

No assessment has yet been made of levels of adherence to the Excellence in Continence Care guidance. However, NHS England is planning an assessment of adherence to Excellence in Continence Care, which is anticipated to start later in 2022.

Written Question

Incontinence: Health Services

Monday 28th March 2022

Asked by: Liam Fox (Conservative - North Somerset)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether integrated care systems have assessed local continence needs; and whether his Department has a strategy in place to meet such needs from April 2022.

Answered by Gillian Keegan - Secretary of State for Education

Written Question

Hospitals: Discharges

Thursday 20th January 2022

Asked by: Liam Fox (Conservative - North Somerset)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many Delayed Transfers of Care were recorded in the NHS in England in (a) January 2016, (b) July 2016, (c) January 2017, (d) July 2017, (e) January 2018, (f) July 2018, (g) January 2019, (h) July 2019, (i) January 2020, (j) July 2020, (k) January 2021 and (l) July 2021.

Answered by Edward Argar - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)

The collection and publication of data on delayed transfers of care (DToC) was paused in March 2020 to release capacity across the National Health Service to support the COVID-19 pandemic response. Therefore data on DTOCs in each of the last six months is not available.

Monthly data on the number of DTOCs in England is not held in the format requested. NHS England and NHS Improvement’s data collection is based on the average number of people delayed per day. This is calculated by dividing the number of delayed days during the month by the number of calendar days in the month. This measure was previously known as DToC beds. The following table shows the average number of delayed discharges in England in the NHS and social care until January 2020.

Date	Average number of delayed discharges
January 2016	5,144
June 2016	5,771
January 2017	6,371
June 2017	5,929
January 2018	4,883
June 2018	4,503
January 2019	4,368
June 2019	4,502
January 2020	5,183

Since 9 December 2021, NHS England and NHS Improvement have published weekly data on daily discharge figures across England. This is the first published data on hospital discharges since the DToC collection was paused in March 2020 and is available at the following link:

https://www.england.nhs.uk/statistics/statistical-work-areas/uec-sitrep/urgent-and-emergency-care-daily-situation-reports-2021-22/