Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what plans NHS England has to (a) work with commissioners, provider organisations and patients to identify metrics to indicate progression in children and young people with speech, language and communication needs and (b) support providers to collect and benchmark that data.

The long-term plan being developed by NHS England, following the announcement by the Prime Minister in June 2018, will set out how the National Health Service will develop over the coming years, supported by the significant additional funding of £20.5 billion. This provides an excellent opportunity to consider how services for children and other services can be further improved over the next decade. The plan is currently in development and will be published later in the year.

Detailed assessments of children’s speech, language and communication needs (SLCN) is being undertaken by Public Health England, who are developing a new national tool for health visitors with the Department for Education. Health visitors consider SLCN at the universal health review they undertake with children at two to two and a half years of age. This information is used by health visitors to help them decide if further, more specific assessments for communication and language development are required, in order to assess need and inform next steps. Annual data on child development outcomes at two to two and a half years for 2017/18 can be found at the following link:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/child-development-outcomes-at-2-to-2-and-a-half-years-metrics-2017-to-2018

Information on surveillance using child development outcome indicators is at the following link:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/population-surveillance-using-child-development-outcome-indicators