Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps her Department is taking to reduce waiting lists for autism assessments (a) nationally and (b) in County Durham.

We expect integrated care boards (ICBs) to have due regard to relevant National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) guidelines on autism when commissioning services. It is the responsibility of ICBs to make available appropriate provision to meet the health and care needs of their local population, in line with these NICE guidelines.

Each ICB in England, including in the North East and North Cumbria, is expected to have an Executive Lead for learning disability and autism, supporting the board in planning to meet the needs of its local population of people with a learning disability and autistic people, including in relation to appropriate autism assessment pathways. NHS England has published guidance on these roles.

On 5 April 2023, NHS England published a national framework and operational guidance for autism assessment services. This guidance will help the National Health Service improve autism assessment pathways and improve the experience for people referred to an autism assessment service.

In addition, NHS England publish quarterly data on how many people are waiting for an autism assessment and for how long. These are experimental statistics; however, the data does provide useful information nationally and locally to support local areas to improve their performance and to reduce assessment waiting times.

We have invested in improving autism assessment services over recent years. Building on the 2021/22 investment of £13 million, we invested £2.5 million in 2022/23 to support local areas with improvements in autism assessment pathways. In 2023/2024, £4.2 million of funding is available across England to improve services for autistic children and young people, including autism assessment services.