Asked by: Pippa Heylings (Liberal Democrat - South Cambridgeshire)
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 help ensure that GPs are able to access their pension information.
Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
NHS Pension Scheme members, including general practitioners (GPs), can access information about their pension via My NHS Pension, an online portal from the NHS Pension Service, which is available at the following link:
https://www.nhsbsa.nhs.uk/member-hub/my-nhs-pension
To provide accurate pension information for practitioners, the NHS Business Services Authority needs a fully up to date record in respect of their NHS Pension Scheme membership. This means practitioners must submit their Annual Certificate(s) of Pensionable Profits to Primary Care Support England (PCSE), so that PCSE can keep their record updated.
PCSE launched the PCSE Online GP Pensions system in 2021 to provide GPs and practices with greater convenience, and more transparency and security when it comes to their pension contributions data. Supporting GPs to accurately submit current and historic Type 1 or Type 2 annual certificates remains a priority for NHS England and PCSE. Since the PCSE Online solution for submitting Type 1 and Type 2 certificates electronically went live in 2021, PCSE have developed user guides and held webinars to educate GPs on how to complete forms accurately.
Asked by: Pippa Heylings (Liberal Democrat - South Cambridgeshire)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, whether she plans to provide additional support for owners of listed buildings.
Answered by Chris Bryant - Minister of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport)
In terms of financial support, the National Lottery Heritage Fund’s current 10 year strategy, Heritage 2033, increased the maximum funding available to owners from £100,000 to £250,000 to support designated assets, such as listed buildings. Owners must demonstrate that the public benefit of their project outweighs any private gain.
Historic England also offers repair grants to owners of listed buildings, which in total amounts to between £8.5 - £9 million per year. Historic England also offers various guidance and resources which may be useful to owners and occupiers of listed buildings, as well as the heritage sector more broadly, such as the guidance on Adapting Historic Buildings for Energy and Carbon Efficiency, published July 2024.
Asked by: Pippa Heylings (Liberal Democrat - South Cambridgeshire)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what recent assessment her Department has made of the adequacy of the compensation provided to Equitable Life policyholders.
Answered by Emma Reynolds - Economic Secretary (HM Treasury)
The Equitable Life Payment Scheme has been fully wound down and closed since 2016 and there are no plans to reopen any decisions relating to the Payment Scheme or review the £1.5 billion funding allocation previously made to it. Further guidance on the status of the Payment Scheme after closure is available at: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/equitable-life-payment-scheme#closure-of-the-scheme.
Asked by: Pippa Heylings (Liberal Democrat - South Cambridgeshire)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, if she will make an assessment of the potential merits of increasing the level of the compensation tariff for whiplash in line with inflation.
Answered by Sarah Sackman - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
The Civil Liability Act 2018 allows the Lord Chancellor to set fixed compensation tariff amounts for whiplash injuries from road traffic accidents lasting two years or less. The tariff amounts were first set via the Whiplash Injury Regulations 2021, and the Civil Liability Act 2018 requires the tariff to be reviewed every three years.
The first statutory review was completed on 22 May 2024. The Lord Chancellor’s report of the review was published on 21 November 2024. The report concluded that the original whiplash tariff amounts should be increased by roughly 15% to account for the impact of inflation since the tariff was introduced on 31 May 2021, and to include a three-year buffer to account for projected inflation until the next review in 2027.
This increase to the whiplash tariff will be implemented by the draft Whiplash Injury (Amendment) Regulations 2025, which was laid in Parliament on 20 March 2025. Subject to approval from both Houses, the new tariff will apply to relevant whiplash injuries that occur on or after 31 May 2025.
Asked by: Pippa Heylings (Liberal Democrat - South Cambridgeshire)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will make an assessment of the potential merits of mandating changes to NHS systems to ensure that it is possible to update the gender marker associated with an NHS number.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
Sex and gender identity are not always the same thing, and it is important for patients that we record both accurately. On 20 March 2025, my Rt Hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care instructed the health service to immediately suspend applications for National Health Service number changes for under 18 year olds, to safeguard children.
Taking such action does not prevent the NHS from recording, recognising, and respecting trans people’s gender identity. General practitioners are currently able to rename a patient and manually input preferred pronouns and expressed gender in free text without affecting the formal marker.
Asked by: Pippa Heylings (Liberal Democrat - South Cambridgeshire)
Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, what his Department's policy is on the use of co-operatives in supporting the Government's international development objectives.
Answered by Stephen Doughty - Minister of State (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
The Government recognises the important contribution cooperatives make in serving local communities around the world. Cooperatives are a tried-and-tested model in international development, that can enable citizens and producers to access services or markets and strengthen their voice in local processes. Cooperatives can enable sustainable and inclusive development centred on self-help, democratic ownership, and concern for the community. The UK has supported cooperatives and producer organisations in developing countries, including, for example in agriculture through funding to the Global Agriculture and Food Security Programme (GAFSP), which supports producer organisations, and the Commercial Agriculture for Smallholders and Agribusiness Programme (CASA), which partners with cooperatives and small agribusinesses in low-income countries to improve smallholder farmers' access to markets.
Asked by: Pippa Heylings (Liberal Democrat - South Cambridgeshire)
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 closing Long Covid clinics on patients with Post-Covid syndrome.
Answered by Ashley Dalton - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
Integrated care boards (ICBs) are responsible for commissioning services for people with long COVID. ICBs are allocated funding by NHS England to meet local need and priorities, and to improve outcomes.
NHS England has recently completed a long COVID and myalgic encephalomyelitis, also known as chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS), stocktake, aiming to provide a nationwide overview of service delivery in commissioning and contracting, assessing access, activity, and outcomes. The findings confirmed the widely recognised challenges of significant variation in care delivery across England and a lack of comprehensive activity data.
Executive NHS England board members were updated on the current provision of long COVID and ME/CFS services, noting those challenges. Discussions considered service prioritisation and potential COVID Inquiry recommendations. It was agreed that long COVID and ME/CFS services are rightly commissioned by ICBs, which have responsibility for ensuring coverage for their population.
Asked by: Pippa Heylings (Liberal Democrat - South Cambridgeshire)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps she is taking to prevent foreign lorries without adequate safety features using UK roads.
Answered by Lilian Greenwood - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
All lorries using GB roads must meet safety standards. The Driver and vehicle Standards Agency (DVSA) conduct enforcement of this, including roadside checks.
DVSA use data and intelligence to target those vehicles that present the highest risk to road safety. Where vehicles do not meet standards, they are prohibited from continuing their journey until the defects are fixed and until any penalties are paid.
Asked by: Pippa Heylings (Liberal Democrat - South Cambridgeshire)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment she has made of trends in the level of claims made to the Health and Safety Executive that are subsequently referred by the HSE to local authorities for resolution.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Health and Safety at Work Act establishes a co-regulatory partnership between the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) and local authorities (LAs). This co-regulatory partnership sees HSE and LAs working closely to ensure consistent enforcement of health and safety legislation.
The Enforcing Authority Regulations (EA Regulations) 1989 determine allocation of enforcement responsibility. LAs are responsible for enforcing health and safety requirements at 65% of business premises in Great Britain, which employ 46% of the national workforce. In general, LAs are the enforcing authority for retail, wholesale distribution and warehousing, hotel and catering premises, offices, and the consumer/leisure industries. HSE has the policy lead for all other sectors, and enforcement responsibilities for those sectors that traditionally have higher hazards/risks, e.g. factories, construction, agriculture, and off-shore industries.
Regulation 5 of the EA Regulations allows enforcement responsibility for any premises or any activity carried on there, to be transferred from HSE to the LA or vice versa. A transfer may be made only by agreement between the two enforcing authorities involved. The number of transfers under Regulation 5 from HSE to LAs show no discernible trend.
Asked by: Pippa Heylings (Liberal Democrat - South Cambridgeshire)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, if she will increase the cap on Lifetime ISAs.
Answered by Emma Reynolds - Economic Secretary (HM Treasury)
Data from the latest UK House Price Index shows that while the average price paid by first-time buyers has increased, it is still below the LISA property price cap in all regions of the UK except for London, where the average price paid is affected by boroughs with very high property values.
The Government keeps all aspects of savings tax policy under review.