Asked by: Al Pinkerton (Liberal Democrat - Surrey Heath)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent estimate his Department has made of ambulance handover times at accident and emergency departments in Surrey Heath constituency.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
Surrey Heath is served by the South East Coast Ambulance Service NHS Foundation Trust (SECAMB). The most recent National Health Service performance figures show that the average handover time in SECAMB is 18 minutes and 37 seconds. This is over two minutes faster than the same period last year.
Our Urgent and Emergency Care Plan for 2025/26 sets out clear actions to deliver improvements this winter and make services better every day, including reducing ambulance handovers to a maximum of 45 minutes, helping get more ambulances back on the road for patients, and reducing category 2 ambulance response times to 30 minutes on average. NHS England continues to monitor average hospital handover times, sharing data with regions to support focussed discussions and identify improvement actions with those trusts not achieving handovers in 45 minutes.
Asked by: Helen Morgan (Liberal Democrat - North Shropshire)
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 hospital handover delays on ambulance response times in (a) Shropshire and (b) the West Midlands.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Department of Health and Social Care has indicated that it will not be possible to answer this question within the usual time period. An answer is being prepared and will be provided as soon as it is available.
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, what the average waiting time is for an emergency ambulance response.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Government recognises that in recent years ambulance response times have not met the high standards patients should expect.
We are determined to turn things around. Our Urgent and Emergency Care Plan 2025/26 is backed by almost £450 million of capital investment, and commits to reducing category 2 ambulance response times to 30 minutes on average this year.
The latest data from December 2025 for ambulance response times in England shows progress, with category 2 incidents responded to in 32 minutes 43 seconds on average, this is 14 minutes and 43 seconds faster than the same period last year.
Asked by: Shivani Raja (Conservative - Leicester East)
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 improve ambulance response times in (a) Leicester and (b) the East Midlands.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Government recognises that in recent years ambulance response times have not met the high standards patients should expect.
We are determined to turn things around. Our Urgent and Emergency Care Plan 2025/26, is backed by almost £450 million of capital investment, and commits to reducing category 2 ambulance response times to 30 minutes on average this year. The East Midlands Ambulance Service is investing over £4 million for additional clinicians in its control rooms to help patients with urgent care needs who call 999 to get signposted to the right care at the right time in the right place.
The latest data from December 2025 for ambulance response times for East Midlands Ambulance Service shows progress, with category 2 incidents responded to in 44 minutes 19 seconds on average, which is 21 minutes and 56 seconds faster than the same period last year.
Asked by: Shivani Raja (Conservative - Leicester East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether she has considered requiring state-funded schools with defibrillators to make those devices publicly accessible where it is safe and practicable to do so.
Answered by Josh MacAlister - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The department’s defibrillator programme provided over 20,000 defibrillators to state-funded schools in England, ensuring that all schools have access to a device.
Schools are best placed to make decisions on community access based on their individual circumstances. The primary concern should be locating defibrillators where they will best meet the needs of the school, and community access will not be suitable in all circumstances.
The department’s defibrillator guidance advises schools on the factors they should consider when deciding whether to allow community access. More information can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/automated-external-defibrillators-aeds-in-schools.
The department encourages all schools to register their defibrillators on the national defibrillator network, The Circuit. This ensures that local ambulance services know where defibrillators are kept, meaning they can be called upon in an emergency to help save a life. More information, including how to register, can be found here: https://www.thecircuit.uk/.
Asked by: James McMurdock (Independent - South Basildon and East Thurrock)
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 reduce avoidable ambulance demand in the East of England.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Government is taking a comprehensive approach to reducing avoidable ambulance demand across the country including in the East of England. Our Urgent and Emergency Care (UEC) Plan for 2025/26 aims to improve UEC performance with a focus on reducing ambulance handover delays by introducing a maximum 45-minute standard, freeing up ambulances to get back on the road.
The plan also commits to increasing the number of patients receiving urgent care in the community by expanding services such as urgent community response, neighbourhood multidisciplinary teams, and increasing the use of virtual wards. By boosting the capacity and accessibility of these services, people can receive the care they need closer to home, reducing the need to call an ambulance or attend accident and emergency.
NHS 111 continues to play a crucial role in managing demand by providing clinical advice and triage over the phone or online, ensuring patients are directed to the most appropriate service for their needs. This includes supporting more ‘hear and treat’ and ‘see and treat’ responses, where patients receive advice or treatment without the need for an ambulance to convey them to hospital.
Asked by: James McMurdock (Independent - South Basildon and East Thurrock)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to his Department's press release entitled New ambulances deployed to boost NHS winter response, published on 31 December 2025, how many new ambulances have been allocated to Essex.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The 500 new ambulances announced in the Department’s press release of 31 December 2025 form part of East of England Ambulance NHS Foundation Trust’s wider ambulance replacement and expansion programme.
Allocations have not been finalised at individual county level, meaning it is not possible at this stage to confirm how many of these vehicles will be deployed in Essex.
Asked by: Al Pinkerton (Liberal Democrat - Surrey Heath)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps her Department is taking to ensure the adequacy of national standards and guidance for managing incidents on strategic road networks.
Answered by Simon Lightwood - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
National Highways works closely with emergency service partners and other specialist responders to ensure England’s motorways and larger A-roads are as safe and reliable as they can be.
National Highways developed the Strategic Road Responders Agreement which partners in the police, fire and ambulance services have all signed up to.
This agreement identifies the CLEAR initiative (Collision, Lead, Evaluate, Act, Re-open) as a tool that responders commit to using and, in doing so, helps to minimise the impact of incidents and ensures national standards and guidance are available and understood.
Asked by: Al Pinkerton (Liberal Democrat - Surrey Heath)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what estimate his Department has made of the ambulance costs from road collisions in Surrey in the past five years.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
No specific estimation has been made. Data on the number of road traffic collisions is collected and published by the Department for Transport.
Ambulance services do not routinely report costs at the level of individual incident types. However, the most recent National Cost Collection indicates that the average cost of an ambulance ‘see, treat and convey’ response is approximately £489.
Asked by: Jas Athwal (Labour - Ilford South)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps is his department taking to improve record keeping and documentation within the emergency departments and observation units.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Government is committed to improving how information is recorded, stored, and used across the National Health Service, including in emergency departments and observation units.
Regarding accident and emergency data, NHS England has published a Data Quality Improvement Plan for the Emergency Care Data Set. NHS England is supporting trusts to improve data quality collection and compliance.
Through our Urgent and Emergency care plan, we are expanding the use of integrated data systems such as the Federated Data Platform and Connected Care Records. We are investing in secure digital platforms and interoperability standards to ensure clinicians can access real-time patient information across hospitals, ambulance services, and community settings. Improving interoperability helps reduce duplication, minimise the risk of errors, and support clinicians to provide safe and timely care.