Asked by: Peter Gibson (Conservative - Darlington)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps her Department is taking to reduce levels of liver disease in Darlington constituency.
Answered by Andrea Leadsom
Through the 2021 Drugs Strategy we are making the largest ever single increase in drug and alcohol treatment and recovery funding, with £780 million of additional investment. Of this, £532 million is being invested to rebuild local authority commissioned substance misuse treatment services in England. As alcohol and drug services are commissioned together, this will benefit people seeking treatment for alcohol use.
In the financial years 2022/23 to 2024/25, Darlington has been allocated just over £1.9 million through the Supplementary Substance Misuse Treatment and Recovery Grant and Inpatient Detoxification Grant, to increase the number of people benefiting from alcohol and drug treatment and recovery services, and the outcomes they achieve. This is additional to the amounts invested through the Public Health Grant.
Work in the National Health Service, specifically piloting early diagnosis and prevention through 19 community diagnostic hubs, is identifying undiagnosed liver disease. The North East and North Cumbria Integrated Care Board is enrolled in a Community Liver Health Check pilot in Newcastle, being delivered by the system’s Hepatitis C Operational Delivery Networks. This will provide FibroScans in one-stop community clinics, where patients also have other investigations, as required. The pilot has expanded into North Tyneside, and when resources allow, they intend to develop clinics elsewhere.
Beyond treatment, we are committed to tackling alcohol harms including reducing consumption levels, and in 2023 the Government introduced reforms to alcohol duty, meaning products are taxed directly in proportion to their alcohol content.
Asked by: Peter Gibson (Conservative - Darlington)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if she will make an estimate of average weekly expenditure on the NHS in real terms in each year since 2016.
Answered by Andrew Stephenson
The below table shows the average weekly and yearly expenditure on the National Health Service in real terms and nominally, each year since 2016, including spending against the Revenue Departmental Expenditure Limit (RDEL) by NHS England, the integrated care boards, and providers:
Year | RDEL spend per year in nominal terms | RDEL spend per year in real terms | RDEL spend per week in real terms |
2016/17 | £105,735,000,000 | £125,293,000,000 | £2,409,000,000 |
2017/18 | £109,605,000,000 | £127,879,000,000 | £2,459,000,000 |
2018/19 | £114,331,000,000 | £130,634,000,000 | £2,512,000,000 |
2019/20 | £123,750,000,000 | £138,145,000,000 | £2,657,000,000 |
2020/21 | £143,367,000,000 | £151,775,000,000 | £2,919,000,000 |
2021/22 | £149,322,000,000 | £159,379,000,000 | £3,065,000,000 |
2022/23 | £158,347,000,000 | £158,347,000,000 | £3,045,000,000 |
Source: table 66 of the Department of Health and Social Care’s annual report.
Note: figures have been adjusted for inflation using HM Treasury’s gross domestic product deflators, as of April 2024.
Asked by: Peter Gibson (Conservative - Darlington)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps he is taking to ensure that universities are following English proficiency requirements for foreign students.
Answered by Tom Pursglove
UK Visas and Immigration (UKVI), as part of their compliance activities, conduct on-site audits of sponsors and check what assessment methods sponsors have used and their relevant evidence. Where there are any compliance breaches, UKVI take compliance action which can include formal action plans or revocation of the sponsor licence. English language assessments are also considered as part of the Basic Compliance Assessment which sponsors are required to pass on an annual basis.
Asked by: Peter Gibson (Conservative - Darlington)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if she will make an assessment of the potential merits of providing lymphaticovenous anastomosis surgery on the NHS.
Answered by Andrew Stephenson
No formal assessment has been made of the potential merits of providing lymphaticovenous anastomosis surgery on the National Health Service. On 16 April 2024, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) published interventional procedures guidance that states that lymphovenous anastomosis during axillary dissection for preventing secondary lymphoedema in adults with breast cancer, can be used in the NHS while more evidence is generated, and that it can only be used with special arrangements for clinical governance, consent and audit, or research. The NICE’s interventional procedures guidance makes recommendations for the NHS on whether procedures are sufficiently safe and efficacious for use in routine clinical practice.
Asked by: Peter Gibson (Conservative - Darlington)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, if he will make an assessment of the potential merits of using recovered monies from the proceeds of crime to provide adaptive sports equipment for police officers.
Answered by Chris Philp - Shadow Leader of the House of Commons
Funds recovered under the Proceeds of Crime Act (POCA) are distributed under the Home Office’s Asset Recovery Incentivisation Scheme (ARIS). The objective of ARIS is to provide agencies with incentives to use POCA powers to recover more criminal assets, with the overall aim of cutting crime and delivering justice.
Under the scheme, a proportion of the assets recovered using powers under POCA are redistributed to the agencies involved in the recovery, based on their relative contributions. The current allocation sees ARIS receipts split 50:50 between central government and operational partners.
In the spirit of the Scheme, the Government encourages agencies to use ARIS funds to increase asset recovery and, where appropriate, fund local crime fighting priorities for the benefit of the community. However, the use of ARIS allocations/payments is a matter for each agency and is left to their discretion. Further information on ARIS and how funds are spent can be found at: Asset Recovery Statistical Bulletin: Financial years ending March 2018 to March 2023 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk).
Asked by: Peter Gibson (Conservative - Darlington)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment his Department has made of the challenges faced by local authorities to properly dispose of disposable vapes.
Answered by Robbie Moore - Shadow Minister (Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Earlier this year, Defra published a report outlining the environmental concerns of disposable vapes. These products are an inefficient use of resources, are frequently disposed of incorrectly, can be harmful when littered and are difficult and costly to recycle. That is why on 29 January the Government confirmed that we would introduce a ban on single-use vapes. Draft regulations for the ban were published on 11 March with a proposed coming into force date of 1 April 2025 pending parliamentary procedures.
Asked by: Peter Gibson (Conservative - Darlington)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if a Minister from her Department will visit Darlington to hold discussions with (a) the Police and (b) Trading Standards on the joint steps they are taking to help tackle the sale of illegal vapes and illicit tobacco.
Answered by Andrea Leadsom
Ministers in the department are always happy to consider meetings and visits to understand the impact of their policy areas, and we recommend reaching out to Ministers’ offices directly.
A strong approach to enforcement is vital if the smokefree generation policy is to have real impact. My Rt hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care recently visited a cargo warehouse at Heathrow Airport with Hillingdon Trading Standards to see first-hand the work they are doing to seize illicit vapes at the border, and prevent these products from being sold in the United Kingdom.
Underage and illicit sales of tobacco products, and more recently vaping products, is undermining the work the Government is doing to regulate the industry and protect public health. It also deprives the UK of vital money that could be used to fund essential public services, instead, putting it in the hands of criminals.
This is why alongside the measures in the Tobacco and Vapes Bill, we are supporting enforcement agencies with up to £30 million a year, to scale up their existing activities. This increased investment will help to stamp out criminal activity by boosting enforcement capacity, and help local trading standards tackle underage sales at a local level. Of this funding, over £100 million over five years will support HM Revenue and Custom’s and Border Force’s new illicit tobacco strategy. As is the case with existing age of sale legislation, breaches of the new law will primarily be dealt with by local authority trading standards, rather than by local police forces.
Asked by: Peter Gibson (Conservative - Darlington)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent progress the cross-government bereavement working group has made on ensuring support is available to bereaved people.
Answered by Andrew Stephenson
The cross-Government bereavement group was established in preparation for publication of the UK Commission on Bereavement’s (UKCB), Bereavement is Everyone’s Business report, from October 2022. The group includes representatives from over 10 Government departments.
The cross-Government bereavement group enables Government departments to share the best practice about bereavement support in the sectors for which they are responsible. The UKCB Steering Group has presented to the cross-Government working group on several occasions, and last attended a meeting of the group in September 2023.
Asked by: Peter Gibson (Conservative - Darlington)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps her Department is taking to ensure that providers of NHS services are protecting the whereabouts of domestic abuse victims from perpetrators.
Answered by Andrew Stephenson
There are security and legislative protections in place to protect patient data, and ensure data is used across the health and social care system in a safe, secure, and legal way. This includes data protection rules which prevent National Health Service employees from disclosing addresses of victims of domestic abuse.
Each organisation’s terms and conditions of employment include strict guidelines on how staff handle and protect patients’ information. Staff must also be regularly trained in information governance responsibilities. Professional bodies such as the General Medical Council also set out standards which their members must meet.
General practices have two options if they are worried that having access to their record might cause harm to a patient or another individual. They can either redact specific items on the record, or disable patient access entirely.
Asked by: Peter Gibson (Conservative - Darlington)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how much her Department spent in Darlington constituency in each financial year between 2019-20 and 2022-23.
Answered by Andrew Stephenson
Information on spending in the Darlington constituency is not available in the format requested. However, the following table shows the spend of the organisations that are the closest approximation to the Darlington constituency, each year from 2019/20 to 2022/23:
| 2019/20 | 2020/21 | 2021/22 | 2022/23 |
NHS Darlington Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) | £177,000,000 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
NHS Tees Valley CCG | 0 | £1,293,000,000 | £1,502,000,000 | £341,000,000 |
NHS North East and North Cumbria Integrated Care Board (ICB) | 0 | 0 | 0 | £5,171,000,000 |
The number and commissioning responsibilities of the CCGs, now ICBs, have changed during the period requested, and expenditure levels set out in the table are not directly comparable year-on-year. On 1 July 2022, the NHS North East and North Cumbria ICB replaced and took on responsibility for eight CCGs, including Tees Valley, which is reflected in the higher level of spend in 2022/23.