Asked by: Nicholas Brown (Independent - Newcastle upon Tyne East)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to Table 2.2 on page 131 of the Levelling Up White Paper, what proportion of the 380 Department for Health and Social care roles moving outside London by 2025 will be moved to Newcastle.
Answered by Edward Argar - Shadow Secretary of State for Justice
The Department is committed to playing its full part in the levelling-up agenda. This includes through shifting 380 roles outside London as part of ‘Places for Growth’, as summarised in the recent ‘Levelling Up the United Kingdom White Paper’. Specific and quantified plans for the location of roles across our estate are not yet finalised.
Asked by: Nicholas Brown (Independent - Newcastle upon Tyne East)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to increase the diagnosis rate of people suffering with dementia in Newcastle upon Tyne.
Answered by Gillian Keegan
NHS England and NHS Improvement continue to monitor the dementia diagnosis rate each month and provide analysis on trends at a regional and sustainability and transformation partnership (STP) level to aid targeted recovery efforts.
Earlier this financial year the government allocated £17m to NHS England and NHS Improvement to specifically address dementia waiting lists and increase the number of diagnoses. This funding was made available to Clinical Commissioning Groups in June 2021.
We will be setting out our plans on dementia for England for future years later this year which will include a focus on dementia diagnosis.
Asked by: Nicholas Brown (Independent - Newcastle upon Tyne East)
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 2 February 2022 to Question 113694 on mental health support teams, how many staff make up the average mental health support team.
Answered by Gillian Keegan
The average mental health support team will typically consist of eight whole time equivalent (WTE) staff, including four WTE education mental health practitioners, three WTE senior clinicians or higher-level therapists, 0.5 WTE team manager and 0.5 WTE administration support officer.
Asked by: Nicholas Brown (Independent - Newcastle upon Tyne East)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether the Government plans to make changes to the Mental Health Support Teams model to ensure that it is fit for purpose in SEN schools.
Answered by Gillian Keegan
No formal assessment has been made of the adequacy of the mental health support team model for delivery in special educational needs (SEN) schools.
Mental health support teams are trained to deliver specific interventions for mild to moderate mental health needs. These interventions can benefit children or young people with special educational needs who have co-occurring mild to moderate mental needs. The core functions of the mental health support team model can also be used to support education settings such as SEN schools to develop their whole school approach to mental health, and to facilitate access to appropriate external specialist services to help children and young people get the right support and stay in education.
There are currently no plans to make changes to the model. Mental health support teams have adapted their offer to provide tailored support in SEN schools. However, as these are relatively new teams, it is too soon to be able to share learning from those teams, or to make changes to the model.
Asked by: Nicholas Brown (Independent - Newcastle upon Tyne East)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what changes have been made to mental health services provision for children to help those services respond to increasing demand as a result of covid-19 outbreak.
Answered by Gillian Keegan
We are investing at least an additional £2.3 billion a year to expand mental health services by 2023/24 to enable an extra 345,000 more children and young people to access National Health Service-funded mental health support.
In March 2021, we announced an additional £79 million for children’s mental health services in 2021/22 to allow approximately 22,500 more children and young people to access community health services, 2,000 more children and young people to access eating disorder services and accelerate the coverage of mental health support teams in schools and colleges. NHS England and NHS Improvement are also investing a further £40 million in 2021/22 to address the impact of COVID-19 on children and young people’s mental health.
Asked by: Nicholas Brown (Independent - Newcastle upon Tyne East)
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 adequacy of the Mental Health Support Teams model for delivery in SEN schools.
Answered by Gillian Keegan
No formal assessment has been made of the adequacy of the mental health support team model for delivery in special educational needs (SEN) schools.
Mental health support teams are trained to deliver specific interventions for mild to moderate mental health needs. These interventions can benefit children or young people with special educational needs who have co-occurring mild to moderate mental needs. The core functions of the mental health support team model can also be used to support education settings such as SEN schools to develop their whole school approach to mental health, and to facilitate access to appropriate external specialist services to help children and young people get the right support and stay in education.
There are currently no plans to make changes to the model. Mental health support teams have adapted their offer to provide tailored support in SEN schools. However, as these are relatively new teams, it is too soon to be able to share learning from those teams, or to make changes to the model.
Asked by: Nicholas Brown (Independent - Newcastle upon Tyne East)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many full-time equivalent professional mental health workers belonging to mental health support teams are supporting pupils in schools.
Answered by Gillian Keegan
Data on the current number of whole-time equivalent (WTE) mental health workers in mental health support teams is not held centrally. However, mental health support teams will typically be made up of eight WTE staff. There are 183 teams now operational, covering approximately one million pupils in 3,000 schools and colleges. An additional 104 teams were commissioned in 2020/21, with a further 112 which began training in 2021/22. By 2023, 399 teams will be supporting almost three million pupils.
The eight WTE staff within a mental health support team will usually include four WTE Education Mental Health Practitioners, three WTE senior clinicians or higher-level therapists, 0.5 WTE team manager and 0.5 WTE admin support.
Asked by: Nicholas Brown (Independent - Newcastle upon Tyne East)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what the minimum requirements are for mental health support teams in relation to (a) the number of staff and (b) their roles.
Answered by Gillian Keegan
Data on the current number of whole-time equivalent (WTE) mental health workers in mental health support teams is not held centrally. However, mental health support teams will typically be made up of eight WTE staff. There are 183 teams now operational, covering approximately one million pupils in 3,000 schools and colleges. An additional 104 teams were commissioned in 2020/21, with a further 112 which began training in 2021/22. By 2023, 399 teams will be supporting almost three million pupils.
The eight WTE staff within a mental health support team will usually include four WTE Education Mental Health Practitioners, three WTE senior clinicians or higher-level therapists, 0.5 WTE team manager and 0.5 WTE admin support.
Asked by: Nicholas Brown (Independent - Newcastle upon Tyne East)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, on average how many schools does a mental health support team provide services to.
Answered by Gillian Keegan
On average, each mental health support team will work across 10 to 20 schools and colleges. Provision is agreed locally, with consideration given to health inequalities and disadvantage.
Asked by: Nicholas Brown (Independent - Newcastle upon Tyne East)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps his Department is taking to ensure that there is capacity at local GP practices or other providers to deliver covid-19 vaccines to people who are housebound.
Answered by Maggie Throup
Every adult in England has now been offered a COVID-19 booster vaccination, including all those who are housebound. To ensure these patients can access vaccines and booster doses, general practitioners work alongside community teams, based on their knowledge of the patient and circumstances. Some patients may be able to attend Primary Care Network (PCN) designated sites with assistance and discussions should be held with families and/or carers to facilitate this. For those who are unable to travel, vaccinations will be delivered via roving units directly to an individual’s home.