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 that mental health providers in Newbury have the resources they need to support people diagnosed with a serious life-threatening illness.

The Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire and Berkshire West NHS Integrated Care Board is responsible for commissioning services to meet the mental health needs of people in Newbury.

Nationally, the Government is investing an extra £688 million in 2025/26 to transform mental health services by hiring more staff and delivering more talking therapies. Almost 7,000 extra mental health workers have been recruited since July 2024, against our target of 8,500 by the end of this Parliament. We are expanding NHS Talking Therapies so that 915,000 people complete a course of treatment by March 2029, with improved effectiveness and quality of services.

We recognise that some people with a serious life-threatening illness may need emotional and psychological support. The team responsible for a patient’s health care should discuss and review their emotional and psychological status regularly and support them with access to information and services for their mental health if needed.