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 provision of end of life care provided in the community in response to Hospice UK’s estimate that almost 67,000 people have died at home since the start of the covid-19 pandemic without the right end of life care in place.

During the pandemic, over £400 million has been made available to hospices to increase additional capacity and enable patients to be discharged from hospitals. Palliative and end of life care (PEoLC) services are commissioned by clinical commissioning groups (CCGs), which are responsible for planning and commissioning of high-quality, cost-effective services that meet the needs of the local population. NHS England and NHS Improvement have developed seven PEoLC strategic clinical networks to work with CCGs to develop and implement sustainable commissioning models, including provision of services in the community where appropriate.