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 help ensure the equity of access to (a) general and (b) specialist palliative care throughout England.

The Government and the National Health Service are highly committed to everyone having access to high quality personalised end of life care built around their individual needs and preferences. NHS England has produced a number of resources for commissioners, service providers and health, care and support staff focused on ensuring equality in end of life care. More recently, the publication of the NHS Long Term Plan and associated document, Universal Personalised Care, make clear that the NHS wants to put health inequalities at the core of the personalised care agenda.

As outlined in the NHS Long Term Plan, this will be achieved by working with patients, families, local authorities and our voluntary sector partners both nationally and locally to roll out training to help staff identify and support relevant patients and to introduce proactive and personalised care planning for everyone identified as being in their last year of life.

NHS England and NHS Improvement Specialised Services is currently reviewing its published Specialised Palliative Care Service Specification (published in 2013).