Asked by: Adam Dance (Liberal Democrat - Yeovil)
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 support NHS services in Somerset to improve coordination between community mental health teams and specialist diabetes services in (a) Yeovil constituency and (b) Somerset.
Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
Improving the integration between community mental health services and other physical health services and meeting the holistic needs of people with severe mental health problems is a priority, as set out in the Community Mental Health Framework.
The National Health Service in Somerset, including Yeovil, has a personalised care programme which seeks to recognise individual needs, knowledge, and priorities. Where someone has needs that encompass mental health and diabetes services, Somerset’s personalised care programme will meet those needs by bringing together tailored input from specialist teams. This work will be developed as part of neighbourhood commissioning in the coming years, enabling services to work together to meet complex needs.
Asked by: Aphra Brandreth (Conservative - Chester South and Eddisbury)
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 improve integration between hospitals, GP practices and district nursing services to streamline care for older patients and prevent long delays in accessing medical assessment for potentially serious conditions such as infection or deep vein thrombosis.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The 10-Year Health Plan sets out how we will fundamentally transform the National Health Service, through shifting resources from hospital to community, with a focus on population health. We know that reform cannot be achieved by simply shifting care to other parts of the health and care system working as they are now, and that more integrated working between primary and secondary care will be vital.
We are improving access to the front door of the NHS, for example by increasing capacity in general practice. More timely access to primary care and better proactive care for long term conditions will reduce demand into urgent and emergency care and reduce pressure in hospitals, freeing them up to providing faster and productive care for those who most need it, including older patients.
One example of the left-shift in practice is the pan-Sussex community project. Here patients with suspected deep vein thrombosis are seen in the community under the care of their general practitioner, leading to a substantial reduction in the number of patients needing to visit their local acute hospital.
We are also committed to reducing long waits and improving patient experience in urgent and emergency care. The NHS Medium Term Planning Framework sets out a clear trajectory to improve performance year-on-year toward the constitutional standard. This will be supported by investment in staff, digital triage, and community urgent care.
Asked by: Jayne Kirkham (Labour (Co-op) - Truro and Falmouth)
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 improve the MHRA's yellow card system.
Answered by Zubir Ahmed - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) is committed to continually strengthening the Yellow Card scheme to support patient safety. The MHRA regularly promotes awareness through public health campaigns, conferences, established networks, and new educational resources available on the Yellow Card website. Further information is available at the following link:
https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/medicines-and-healthcare-products-regulatory-agency
The MHRA is expanding and improving digital reporting routes. Every National Health Service webpage relating to a medicine or vaccine now links to the Yellow Card scheme, and the MHRA is working with NHS colleagues to enhance integration with the NHS App to increase visibility and reporting by the public. Yellow Card reporting is now embedded in almost all general practice clinical IT systems, enabling healthcare professionals to submit reports directly on behalf of patients.
Over recent years, the MHRA has delivered a major upgrade programme to modernise the Yellow Card scheme’s technology and infrastructure. This includes improving the quality and timeliness of submitted information, making it easier to report, adding conditional questions to reduce follow up, and support real time signal detection of safety issues.
The Yellow Card app has also been modernised to mirror the website, broaden reporting options, including defective and counterfeit medicines, and improve access to safety data. Multi‑factor authentication has been introduced to enhance account security and enable future integration with NHS login. The app has also been upgraded to a progressive web application, providing a seamless and engaging user experience across devices.
Together, these improvements increase public awareness, make reporting easier, and enhance the MHRA’s ability to identify and assess emerging safety concerns across healthcare products.
Asked by: Adam Jogee (Labour - Newcastle-under-Lyme)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what steps his Department is taking to promote community cohesion in a) Newcastle-under-Lyme and b) Staffordshire.
Answered by Miatta Fahnbulleh - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Housing, Communities and Local Government)
MHCLG’s Community Cohesion Unit supports and promotes cohesion across England by working closely with local authorities, voluntary and community sector and faith organisations, and other government departments.
Following the disorder in summer 2024, several areas in Staffordshire have received sustained support. In Stoke-on-Trent, MHCLG has supported a multi-agency partnership approach to strengthen cohesion and resilience, aligned with the development of the city’s cohesion strategy. This brings together statutory and community partners to address integration, cohesion and tensions monitoring. Two areas, Bentilee and Ubberley, and Meir North, have each been awarded Pride in Place Programme funding, with £20 million invested over ten years to deliver long-term, preventative improvements to community cohesion.
In Tamworth, MHCLG supported the Borough Council following unrest in summer 2024, addressing immediate challenges and strengthening longer-term cohesion capability through initiatives such as the ‘We Are Tamworth’ programme. Glascote Heath has also been allocated Pride in Place funding.
Nationally, MHCLG is coordinating cross-government work on a longer-term approach to social cohesion. Protecting What Matters, published on 9 March 2026, sets out HMG’s vision to build stronger, more cohesive communities through sustained investment, improved integration, strengthened English language provision, and robust action against hate and extremism.
Asked by: Juliet Campbell (Labour - Broxtowe)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether he will make an assessment of the potential merits of reducing the number of hospitals and departments that doctors rotate through as part of Internal Medical Training.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Government recognises the importance of continuity in postgraduate medical training for both doctors and patients.
Following the 2024 Resident Doctors Agreement, the Department, working in partnership with NHS England and the British Medical Association, established a review of rotational training. This review drew on some 13,000 responses to surveys and found that rotations can provide valuable breadth of experience, but that in some cases frequent moves can disrupt learning, wellbeing, team integration, and patient care
NHS England has developed pilots within the Rotations Review programme, and these are being recruited to with start dates in August of this year. As set out in the 10-Point Plan to Improve Resident Doctors’ Working Lives, these test longer placements, smaller geographic footprints, and more flexible arrangements for less-than-full-time trainees. The future work will become part of the Medical Education and Training Review. One of these pilots has focussed on Internal Medicine Training programmes being based at a single provider for the entire three years.
The evaluation of these pilots will inform future policy decisions on placement length and continuity benefits.
Asked by: Jim Dickson (Labour - Dartford)
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 help ensure that people experiencing suicidality or who have attempted suicide receive sustained, trauma-informed and long-term support beyond crisis intervention, including through better integration of NHS services with community-led organisations such as Body & Soul, particularly for people from marginalised communities.
Answered by Zubir Ahmed - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (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: Alex Ballinger (Labour - Halesowen)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, if he will set out the basis for determining the funding level of the UK Integrated Security Fund multi-year allocations for (a) conflict prevention and (b) Women, Peace and Security, including the advice and impact assessment she received; and whether it remains her policy to implement conflict prevention programmes.
Answered by Dan Jarvis - Minister of State (Cabinet Office)
The Integrated Security Fund (ISF) will narrow its focus towards the UK’s top national security priorities, as set out in the Written Ministerial Statement of 10 February 2026. This includes tackling five key threat areas (Russia; Iran & its proxies; threats emanating from the Asia Pacific region; Serious & Organised Crime; and Terrorism) and building UK sovereign capabilities in four other areas (Cyber & Tech, Biosecurity, Counter State & Hybrid Threats and Economic Security). ISF allocations to each of these areas were driven by an assessment of the UK’s most acute national security threats and programmes’ alignment with the ISF’s principles (agility, integration, high risk appetite and catalytic effect).
The ISF will also continue to deliver conflict and instability programming, where there is a direct link to UK national security. ISF teams are also expected to continue to mainstream gender throughout their work across the ISF’s priorities, including through projects which focus specifically on gender and social inclusion.
Asked by: Alex Ballinger (Labour - Halesowen)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, what assessment his Department made of the potential impact of the level of conflict prevention on UK national security when determining the of the multi-year level of funding for the UK Integrated Security Fund; and for what reason was the level of prioritisation for conflict prevention so determined.
Answered by Dan Jarvis - Minister of State (Cabinet Office)
The Integrated Security Fund (ISF) will narrow its focus towards the UK’s top national security priorities, as set out in the Written Ministerial Statement of 10 February 2026. This includes tackling five key threat areas (Russia; Iran & its proxies; threats emanating from the Asia Pacific region; Serious & Organised Crime; and Terrorism) and building UK sovereign capabilities in four other areas (Cyber & Tech, Biosecurity, Counter State & Hybrid Threats and Economic Security). ISF allocations to each of these areas were driven by an assessment of the UK’s most acute national security threats and programmes’ alignment with the ISF’s principles (agility, integration, high risk appetite and catalytic effect).
The ISF will also continue to deliver conflict and instability programming, where there is a direct link to UK national security. ISF teams are also expected to continue to mainstream gender throughout their work across the ISF’s priorities, including through projects which focus specifically on gender and social inclusion.
Asked by: Bobby Dean (Liberal Democrat - Carshalton and Wallington)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, when funding for Start for Life services will be confirmed for Sutton Council; and what assessment he has made of the potential impact of the absence of such funding on support for babies and new parents in Carshalton and Wallington constituency in 2025–26.
Answered by Ashley Dalton
The 10-Year Health Plan sets out an ambitious agenda on how we will improve the nation’s health by creating a new model of care that is fit for the future.
We recognise that local authorities such as Sutton Council are ambitious, seeking to deliver universal support to babies, children, and their families, and prevent escalating need. We are committed to delivering the 10-Year Health Plan’s ambition to match Healthy Babies, formerly Start for Life, to Best Start Family Hubs over the next decade.
Healthy Babies funding is helping families during the critical 1,001 days, and parents have said they are more confident in feeding their babies and have better perinatal mental health because of this support. We continue to assess how we can best support early-years service integration across the country and remain committed to working with delivery partners locally to achieve this.
Healthy Babies is one element of our broader commitment to supporting babies, children and families. From April 2026, Best Start Family Hubs will expand to every single local authority, including Sutton Council, backed by over £500 million to reach up to half a million more children and families. This funding will help all local authorities to integrate a range of statutory and non-statutory health and family services.
Asked by: Alex McIntyre (Labour - Gloucester)
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 improve community health services in Gloucester constituency.
Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
Community health services are a fundamental part of the health and care system and an essential building block in developing a neighbourhood health service. That is why we have set a clear ambition for community health services through our Medium Term Planning Framework.
For the first time, we have set a target for systems to work to reduce long waits for community health services. By 2028/29 at least 80% of community health services activity should take place within 18 weeks, bringing community health services in line with targets for elective care.
To support the shift to neighbourhood health, we have published for the first time an overview of the core community health services, via Standardising Community Health Services, that integrated care boards should consider when planning for their local populations to support improved commissioning and delivery of community health services.
In Gloucestershire, we remain committed to the principle of joined up services and support being delivered in neighbourhoods and communities where possible. In line with the 10-Year Health Plan, we will continue to support integration from the bottom up through our dedicated and innovative work in primary care networks and further development of integrated neighbourhood teams.
Community health services in Gloucester continue to be strengthened through the development of primary care networks and integrated neighbourhood teams. These bring together general practices, community clinicians, social care, and voluntary sector partners to provide more joined up and proactive support.