Asked by: Vikki Slade (Liberal Democrat - Mid Dorset and North Poole)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what discussions she has had with police forces on the effectiveness of their complaints system for police officers who believe that a miscarriage of justice has taken place against them.
Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Home Office)
There are separate routes of appeal depending on whether a police officer is appealing against the conviction of a criminal offence or the finding or outcome at disciplinary proceedings.
Where an officer believes they have been wrongly convicted of a criminal offence, they can appeal a criminal conviction in the normal way through the standard appeals process. Separately, police officers who wish to challenge a disciplinary finding or outcome may do so to the Police Appeals Tribunal (PAT). Following the decision of the PAT, officers have a further appeal route through the judicial review process.
Asked by: Vikki Slade (Liberal Democrat - Mid Dorset and North Poole)
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 poverty on access to (a) minimally processed and (b) healthy food (i) for children and young people and (ii) in general.
Answered by Ashley Dalton - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
Delivering on our commitment to tackle child poverty is an urgent priority for the Government, and the Ministerial Child Poverty Taskforce is working to publish the Child Poverty Strategy.
Evidence suggests that in the long-term, food insecurity may be associated with poorer diets and poorer health, including higher risk of overweight and obesity. Further information on the evidence is available at the following link:
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6426124/
The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs’ UK Food Security Report 2024, which pulls together data from a range of sources including the Department of Work and Pensions’ Family Resources Survey, found that 90% of United Kingdom households were food secure in 2022/23. Further information on the UK Food Security Report 2024 is available at the following link:
Data from the latest National Diet and Nutrition Survey report shows that participants in higher income households, and households in less deprived areas, were closer to meeting some dietary recommendations. However, where diets failed to meet recommendations, this was consistent across the range of income and deprivation. Further information is available at the following link:
Healthy Start was introduced in 2006. It helps to encourage a healthy diet for pregnant women, babies, and young children under four years old from very low-income households, supporting the Government’s aim to create the healthiest generation of children in our history.
Healthy Start is a demand-led, statutory scheme and aims to support those in greatest need. We recently announced in Fit for the Future: 10 Year Health Plan that we will uplift the value of weekly payments by 10%, boosting the ability to buy healthy food for those families who need it most. From April 2026, pregnant women and children aged over one years old and under four years old will each receive £4.65 per week, up from £4.25, and children under one years old will receive £9.30 per week, up from £8.50.
Through the Food Strategy, the Government is also transforming the food system in the UK to make good, healthy food more accessible and affordable, as part of the Government's Plan for Change.
Asked by: Vikki Slade (Liberal Democrat - Mid Dorset and North Poole)
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 hormone treatments on the mental health of patients with prostate cancer.
Answered by Ashley Dalton - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The forthcoming National Cancer Plan for England will seek to improve both the physical and mental health aspects of cancer care. The plan will have patients at its heart and will cover the entirety of the cancer pathway, from referral and earlier diagnosis to accessing treatment and ongoing care, and will apply to all cancer types, including prostate cancer.
For this reason, the Department has not made a formal assessment specifically on the potential impact of hormone treatments on the mental health of patients with prostate cancer.
Asked by: Vikki Slade (Liberal Democrat - Mid Dorset and North Poole)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether she plans to reduce space requirements for children under two years of age in early years education settings.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
We are currently considering the feedback to the department’s consultation on the use of ‘free flow’ outdoor space for children aged two years and above in early years settings.
Asked by: Vikki Slade (Liberal Democrat - Mid Dorset and North Poole)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of the potential impact of changes to nurseries pricing structures on families who usually use fewer than 30 funded hours of nursery provision and are being asked to increase these hours to ensure nurseries can keep operating.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The department is committed to rolling out the expanded childcare entitlements, working hand in hand with the early years sector.
In 2026/27, the government is expecting to spend over £9 billion on early years entitlements, supporting more parents to balance family life and work.
The department updated existing statutory guidance for local authorities, which emphasises transparency at the heart of how the entitlement should be passed on to parents.
Providers should set out how many government-funded hours parents are receiving, to ensure parents understand their usage of the entitlements.
Providers remain able to charge parents for any additional, private paid hours according to their usual terms and conditions, provided taking up private paid hours is not a condition of accessing the entitlements place.
Asked by: Vikki Slade (Liberal Democrat - Mid Dorset and North Poole)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether he plans to reopen the New to Partnership Payment Scheme to support healthcare professionals to become GP partners.
Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Department has no current plans to reopen the New to Partnership Payment Scheme, which was launched by NHS England and ran from July 2020 to June 2023.
We recognise that fewer general practitioners (GPs) are interested in going into partnership, and that the partnership model is not the only model currently delivering general practice. General practices can and do choose to organise themselves in different ways, many of which cite evidence of good outcomes in terms of staff engagement and patient experience.
Reasons for GPs not wanting to take on a contractor role or moving back to a salaried role from a contractor role can vary and include concerns about workload and work/life balance, the personal financial risk involved or a lack of interest in aspects of the work, such as managing income and expenditure.
Where the traditional GP partnership model is working well, it should continue, but through the delivery of the 10-Year Health Plan we want to create an alternative that supports the neighbourhood health model, provides resilience and allows economies of scale, securing the sustainability of general practice into the future.
We have committed to substantive GP contract reform within this Parliament following acceptance of the 2025/26 contract by the England general practitioners committee of the British Medical Association. As part of this, we expect to consider a breadth of topics, which may include updates to the partnership model.
Asked by: Vikki Slade (Liberal Democrat - Mid Dorset and North Poole)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of the impact of the current funding model for higher education on (a) students and (b) University staff.
Answered by Janet Daby - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The government is committed to creating a secure future for our world-leading higher education (HE) sector and has already taken a number of actions to help move the sector towards a more stable financial footing, including the difficult decision to increase maximum tuition fee limits for the 2025/26 academic year by 3.1%, in line with the forecast rate of inflation.
We have published an Equality Impact Assessment of the impact of changes to fee limits and student support for the 2025/26 academic year on undergraduate students with protected characteristics and disadvantaged students.
The department recognises that some HE providers are making difficult decisions around staffing in order to safeguard their financial sustainability. Ultimately the sector is independent from government and as such must continue to make the necessary and appropriate financial decisions to ensure their long-term sustainability.
However, we expect providers to work with staff, to help identify how best to operate efficiently. All efficiency measures taken by the sector should provide a better long-term future for students, staff and the country.
Asked by: Vikki Slade (Liberal Democrat - Mid Dorset and North Poole)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what estimate his Department has made of the number of partner GPs in each of the next 10 years.
Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
As self-employed contractors, general practitioners (GPs) act as providers making their own decisions based on local workforce needs. This includes decisions about the number of partners and salaried GPs at the practice.
GPs will be the cornerstone of the Neighbourhood Health Service. The excellent GP leaders we currently have across the system, and those we will nurture and develop for future generations, will be integral in shaping and delivering it.
Following the publication of the 10-Year Health Plan, we will publish a 10 Year Workforce Plan to create a workforce ready to deliver a transformed service. They will be more empowered, more flexible, and more fulfilled. The 10 Year Workforce Plan will ensure the National Health Service has the right people in the right places, with the right skills to deliver the best care for patients, when they need it. From now on, we will ensure that staff will be better treated, have better training, more fulfilling roles, and hope for the future, so they can achieve more.
Asked by: Vikki Slade (Liberal Democrat - Mid Dorset and North Poole)
Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:
To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, what steps his Department is taking to (a) require broadband providers to share infrastructure and (b) ensure that (i) lamp posts and (ii) other publicly-owned infrastructure are accessible for usage in (A) 5G, (B) broadband and (C) mobile development.
Answered by Chris Bryant - Minister of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport)
Duties and obligations relating to telecommunications installations are included in the Electronic Communications Code (Conditions and Restrictions) Regulations 2003, which include requirements to share apparatus where practicable. This is supported by the Cabinet Siting and Pole Siting Code of Practice 2016 and the recently published Telecommunications Poles Working Group Best Practice Recommendations, published by the Internet Services Providers’ Association.
The Communications (Access to Infrastructure) Regulations 2016 give operators the right to request access to another operator’s infrastructure. Furthermore, the government supports Ofcom’s Physical Infrastructure Access framework, which facilitates the sharing of Openreach’s infrastructure, such as ducts and poles.
We have encouraged the use of public sector assets for digital infrastructure, including via the £7 million Digital Connectivity Infrastructure Accelerator programme, which helped councils and industry identify publicly owned assets suitable for telecoms deployment. Our £1.3m Smart Infrastructure Pilots Programme funded six local authorities to install "smart" multi-purpose columns or lamp posts that provide wireless connectivity services and other uses, such as EV charging and WiFi.
Asked by: Vikki Slade (Liberal Democrat - Mid Dorset and North Poole)
Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:
To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, if he will hold discussions with the Advanced Research and Innovation Agency on holding a public consultation before external trials of sun dimming take place.
Answered by Feryal Clark - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)
The Advanced Research and Invention Agency’s (ARIA) ‘Exploring Climate Cooling’ programme, backed by £56.8 million, has been designed to build an evidence base which will enable scientists to better understand and properly assess whether or not Earth cooling approaches could help to mitigate climate change safely.
ARIA is an independent research body, and they are conducting cautious, controlled research aimed at improving understanding of the risks and impacts of Solar Radiation Modification. This will produce important information for decisions around the world.
Whilst ARIA is not intending to hold a public consultation on the Exploring Climate Cooling programme, ARIA has put in place an independent oversight committee, made up of international experts, to support governance of outdoor experiments and communication of their findings. Projects with field trial components will be subjected to risk and impact assessment by an independent team of experts and subjected to a degree of co-design with local communities; the results of both exercises will be publicly available prior to any outdoor experiment taking place. An independent assessment will also take place on completion of any outdoor experiment, also to be made publicly available.