Asked by: Joe Robertson (Conservative - Isle of Wight East)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what proportion of hospice funding for dementia end-of-life care is provided by central government and local authorities; and whether he plans to increase statutory funding for hospices.
Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Department has not had any recent discussions with local authorities about the funding of hospice services.
Palliative care services are included in the list of services an integrated care board (ICB) must commission. To support ICBs in this duty, NHS England has published statutory guidance and service specifications. The statutory guidance states that ICBs must work to ensure that there is sufficient provision of care services to meet the needs of their local populations, which can include hospice services available within the ICB catchment.
Local authorities don't have direct responsibility for end of life care. However, statutory guidance encourages local authorities to prioritise integration activity in areas where there is evidence that effective integration of services materially improves people’s wellbeing, for example, end of life care.
As the majority of hospices are independent charitable organisations, neither the Government nor NHS England collect data on their financial accounts. As such, we do not hold data on the proportion of the total income that hospices receive that is provided by central Government.
In December 2024, we announced a £100 million capital funding boost for adult and children’s hospices in England. We are pleased to say that this capital funding has just been increased by a further £25 million.
The Government will consider contracting and commissioning as part of developing the forthcoming Palliative Care and End of Life Care Modern Service Framework for England. We recognise that there is currently a mix of contracting models in the hospice sector. By supporting ICBs to commission more strategically, we can move away from grant and block contract models. In the long term, this will aid sustainability and help hospices’ ability to plan ahead.
Asked by: Matt Vickers (Conservative - Stockton West)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether his Department plans to develop a national service framework or equivalent long-term strategy for the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of kidney disease.
Answered by Ashley Dalton - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
As announced in the 10-Year Health Plan, as well as an overall quality strategy, the National Quality Board is overseeing the development of a new series of service frameworks to accelerate progress in conditions where there is potential for rapid and significant improvements in quality of care and productivity.
Early priorities include cardiovascular disease, severe mental illness, and the first ever service framework for frailty and dementia. The Government will consider other long-term conditions with significant health and economic impacts for future waves of modern service frameworks.
Asked by: Lee Dillon (Liberal Democrat - Newbury)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, when he plans to announce the next phase of the National Service Frameworks.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
Early priorities for Modern Service Frameworks will include cardiovascular disease, sepsis, severe mental illness and the first ever service framework for frailty and dementia. As advised by the National Quality Board, the Government will consider other conditions for future phases of MSFs and has recently announced an MSF on palliative and end-of-life care.
Asked by: James Naish (Labour - Rushcliffe)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, when he plans to announce the next phase of the Modern Service Frameworks.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
Early priorities for Modern Service Frameworks will include cardiovascular disease, sepsis, severe mental illness and the first ever service framework for frailty and dementia. As advised by the National Quality Board, the Government will consider other conditions for future phases of MSFs and has recently announced an MSF on palliative and end-of-life care.
Asked by: Jim Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party - Strangford)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, when he plans to announce the next phase of modern service frameworks.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
Early priorities for Modern Service Frameworks will include cardiovascular disease, sepsis, severe mental illness and the first ever service framework for frailty and dementia. As advised by the National Quality Board, the Government will consider other conditions for future phases of MSFs and has recently announced an MSF on palliative and end-of-life care.
Asked by: Rachael Maskell (Labour (Co-op) - York Central)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment he has made of the potential impact of York Frailty Hub on his Department's screening and prevention agenda.
Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The UK National Screening Committee has not been asked to look at frailty as a screening programme and no specific assessment has been made of the potential impact of York Frailty Hub on the Department's screening and prevention agenda.
The provision of frailty health care services is the responsibility of local integrated care boards (ICBs), and may include services like the York Frailty Hub, which contain an element of frailty prevention. We expect ICBs to commission services based on local population needs, taking account of National Institute for Health and Care Excellence guidelines.
The 10-Year Health Plan sets out how we will work towards a Neighbourhood Health Service, which will give us a significant opportunity to radically change how resources are deployed across health, social care, and wider services in local communities. There needs to be a stronger focus on prevention and early intervention, both to improve outcomes for people and to reduce pressure on both National Health Service and local government services.
We will also deliver the first ever Frailty and Dementia Modern Service Framework to deliver rapid and significant improvements in quality of care and productivity. This will be informed by phase one of the independent commission into adult social care, which is expected this year. The Frailty and Dementia Modern Service Framework will seek to reduce unwarranted variation and narrow inequality for those living with dementia and will set national standards for dementia care and redirect NHS priorities to provide the best possible care and support.
Asked by: Lisa Smart (Liberal Democrat - Hazel Grove)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps his Department is taking to reimburse or provide financial support to families of dementia patients who are required to pay for care while local authorities consider their applications for support.
Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
Local authorities are responsible for assessing individuals’ care and support needs and, where eligible, for meeting those needs, as set out in the Care Act 2014.
The Care and Support Statutory Guidance states that “an assessment should be carried out over an appropriate and reasonable timescale taking into account the urgency of needs and a consideration of any fluctuation in those needs”. In addition, under Section 19 of the Care Act 2014, local authorities have powers to meet urgent needs for care and support without first carrying out a needs assessment or financial assessment.
There is no legal entitlement to reimbursement for care costs incurred prior to a local authority decision.
Individuals who are concerned about delays or decisions may raise these through local authority complaints processes or with the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman.
Asked by: Adrian Ramsay (Green Party - Waveney Valley)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, when will he announce the next phase of Modern Service Frameworks, and what consideration has been given to including musculoskeletal conditions in the next phase of the Modern Service Frameworks.
Answered by Ashley Dalton - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
As announced in the 10-Year Health Plan, as well as an overall quality strategy, the National Quality Board will oversee the development of a new series of service frameworks. These modern service frameworks will define an aspirational, long-term outcome goal for a major condition and will then identify the best evidenced interventions and the support for delivery.
Early priorities will include cardiovascular disease, sepsis, severe mental illness, and the first ever service framework for frailty and dementia. As advised by the National Quality Board, the Government will consider other conditions for future phases of modern service frameworks, and has recently announced a Modern Service Framework on Palliative and End of Life Care.
We are advancing modern service frameworks for those conditions where we can swiftly and significantly raise the quality of care and productivity. Future phases will address conditions that carry substantial health and economic consequences.
To support people with musculoskeletal (MSK) conditions, we are working to deliver the Getting It Right First Time (GIRFT) MSK Community Delivery Programme. GIRFT teams are working with health system leaders to reduce MSK community waiting times, which are the highest of all community waits, and improve data and metrics and referral pathways to wider support services.
Asked by: Rachel Gilmour (Liberal Democrat - Tiverton and Minehead)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent progress his Department has made on implementing the Dame Barbara Windsor Dementia Goals programme.
Answered by Zubir Ahmed - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Dame Barbara Windsor Dementia Goals programme, with up to £150 million expected to be allocated to, or aligned with it, aims to speed up the development of new treatments for dementia and neurodegenerative conditions by accelerating innovations in biomarkers, clinical trials, and implementation. This is co-chaired by Hilary Evans-Newton CBE and Professor Nadeem Sarwar.
So far, the programme has invested approximately £100 million into biomarker innovation projects, experimental medicine studies, and clinical trial infrastructure. This covers a broad range of biomarker technologies and studies to help researchers, patients, and industry partners work together to better understand how dementia begins and progresses. This amount also supports the Medical Research Council’s Dementia Trials Accelerator which aims to embed more innovation in how clinical trials are designed and delivered in order to increase the speed and quality, while driving down the cost of large-scale trials, as well as the National Institute for Health and Care Research’s UK Dementia Trials Network which seeks to speed up early-stage clinical trials.
The programme is now setting up the Neurodegeneration Initiative, which will be a globally unique, not-for-profit, industry led, public-private partnership with charitable status, that will work together across the Government, industry, academia, the National Health Service, and third sector, and will deliver the programme’s remaining objectives.
Asked by: Baroness Freeman of Steventon (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Baroness Merron on 19 December 2025 (HL12718), whether they will ask the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation to set up a subcommittee on dementia to assess the evidence regarding vaccination against various infections and reduced risk of dementia.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The independent departmental expert committee, the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) advises the Government on matters relating to vaccination and immunisation.
At this time, there are no plans to establish a JCVI sub-committee on dementia.
However, the JCVI continues to monitor emerging evidence relating to all immunisation programmes and, where appropriate, this can include evidence on a potential link between vaccination and reduced risk of dementia.
It is possible for evidence on the link between vaccination and the reduced risk of dementia to be assessed within the existing committee structure, as was the case when research studies suggesting a link between shingles vaccination and reduced dementia risk were considered by the committee last year.