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 reduce the number of (a) autistic children and (b) children with learning disabilities in inpatient units.

The ‘Building the Right Support Action Plan’, published 14 July 2022, sets out actions to reduce reliance on inpatient care by strengthening community support. The NHS Long Term Plan committed to ensuring children and young people with a learning disability and autistic children with the most complex needs will have a designated keyworker by 2023/24. The keyworker programme was developed and tested in 13 pilot sites and the service is now operational in 26 integrated care boards. By March 2023, there will be a keyworker service in all areas.