Asked by: Wes Streeting (Labour - Ilford North)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what the age profile is for ambulance staff working in the NHS broken down by (a) occupation group and (b) each year since 2010.
Answered by Will Quince
The age profile for professionally qualified clinical ambulance staff and for support to ambulance staff working in National Health Service trusts and other core organisations in England is published quarterly by NHS England as part of their NHS Workforce Statistics collection. The latest data can be found at the following link:
Asked by: Ruth Cadbury (Labour - Brentford and Isleworth)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what discussions he has had with ambulance trusts on ensuring that new build residential properties appear on the navigation software used by ambulance crews.
Answered by Will Quince
No such discussions have taken place.
All ambulance services use Ordnance Survey (OS) maps for their mapping and address systems. OS maps are updated with new addresses as they are registered and made available to ambulance services for download every six weeks.
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 discussions has he had with the ambulance service on reducing ambulance waiting times in winter 2023-4.
Answered by Will Quince
We have already published our ‘Delivery plan for recovering urgent and emergency services’, which set out the priorities and actions to be taken to support and improve performance this year, including during the winter period. This includes the ambition to improve accident and emergency wait times to 76% of patients being admitted, transferred or discharged within four hours by March 2024, and to reduce Category 2 response times to 30 minutes on average this year. The plan is backed by £1 billion of dedicated funding to support additional National Health Service capacity. Ministers regularly discuss the delivery of these ambitions with NHS England, and the priorities for the winter period.
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 steps has he taken to reduce the sickness levels of staff working in the ambulance services.
Answered by Will Quince
NHS England publish staff sickness absence rates by organisation type. The latest data for February 2023 shows that ambulance trusts had a sickness absence rate of 7.0%. This is lower than the 7.6% rate in January 2023 and lower than the rate in February 2022 where the sickness absence rate was 8.5%.
NHS England is working closely with ambulance trusts to ensure there is an effective health and wellbeing offer that has a focus on prevention. This has included working in collaboration with ambulance trusts and the Association of Ambulance Chief Executives to develop rehabilitation pathways for staff who have been on long term sickness and to improve the mental health and wellbeing support available to staff. During 2022/23, a sector wide Attendance Management group chaired by West Midlands Ambulance Service and London Ambulance Service and facilitated by NHS England worked to review best practice on attendance to standardise approaches across the sector.
The NHS Long Term Workforce Plan requires integrated care systems to develop and implement plans to invest in occupational health and wellbeing services. These should align with the NHS England strategy to grow occupational health and wellbeing, published earlier this year, which sets out a roadmap for the National Health Service and partner organisations to work together to develop and invest in occupational health and wellbeing services for NHS staff over the next five years.
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 steps his Department is taking to reduce sickness absence levels in the ambulance service.
Answered by Will Quince
NHS England publish staff sickness absence rates by organisation type. The latest data for February 2023 shows that ambulance trusts had a sickness absence rate of 7.0%. This is lower than the 7.6% rate in January 2023 and lower than the rate in February 2022 where the sickness absence rate was 8.5%.
NHS England is working closely with ambulance trusts to ensure there is an effective health and wellbeing offer that has a focus on prevention. This has included working in collaboration with ambulance trusts and the Association of Ambulance Chief Executives to develop rehabilitation pathways for staff who have been on long term sickness and to improve the mental health and wellbeing support available to staff. During 2022/23, a sector wide Attendance Management group chaired by West Midlands Ambulance Service and London Ambulance Service and facilitated by NHS England worked to review best practice on attendance to standardise approaches across the sector.
The NHS Long Term Workforce Plan requires integrated care systems to develop and implement plans to invest in occupational health and wellbeing services. These should align with the NHS England strategy to grow occupational health and wellbeing, published earlier this year, which sets out a roadmap for the National Health Service and partner organisations to work together to develop and invest in occupational health and wellbeing services for NHS staff over the next five years.
Asked by: Gareth Bacon (Conservative - Orpington)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many times his Department has made an estimate of the savings to the public purse attributable to charity air ambulance services in the last five years.
Answered by Will Quince
We recognise the vital role the air ambulance service plays in providing life-saving treatment to patients across the country.
The National Health Service does not directly fund air ambulances, which are operated by independent charities. No such estimate has been made by the Department.
Asked by: Lord Bishop of St Albans (Bishops - Bishops)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what was the average ambulance response time in (1) NHS Bedfordshire, Luton and Milton Keynes Integrated Care Board, and (2) NHS Hertfordshire and West Essex Integrated Care Board, in (a) 2019, (b) 2020, (c) 2021, and (d) 2022.
Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
Ambulance response times by Integrated Care Board (ICB) area are not centrally collected
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, with reference to the oral evidence session of 9 May 2023 of the Health and Social Care Committee on Industrial action in the NHS, HC 1341, if he will make it his policy to prioritise holding local negotiations during public service industrial action.
Answered by Will Quince
When strike action takes place NHS England works with providers, professional bodies, trade unions and other bodies to agree the safe level of cover for days when industrial action is taking place. Even when these rigorous contingency plans are in place, the risk of industrial action endangering the lives and health of patients and the public remains if we continue to rely on a patchwork of locally agreed voluntary derogations from strike action. These derogations are often not confirmed until very late in the day, or indeed might not materialise on strike days as they are voluntary, and staff and unions can withdraw these.
The Government has consulted on whether minimum service levels should be in place for ambulance services during strike action. The consultation closed and we are considering the responses. As strike action is now increasingly being taken without voluntary derogations being agreed by unions, whether at a local or national level, the Government is now considering whether to consult on introducing minimum service levels for a wider range of health services in order to protect the lives and health of the public.
Asked by: Andrew Percy (Conservative - Brigg and Goole)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, how many and what proportion of dual crewed emergency ambulances have entered service with Vehicle Certification Agency Whole Vehicle Type Approval since 1 April 2022.
Answered by Richard Holden - Minister without Portfolio (Cabinet Office)
Information on the number of dual crewed emergency ambulances that have entered service with Vehicle Certification Agency Whole Vehicle Type Approval is not recorded.
Asked by: Rushanara Ali (Labour - Bethnal Green and Bow)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to the policy paper entitled Delivery plan for recovering urgent and emergency care services, published on 30 January 2023, what recent progress his Department has made on introducing 800 new ambulances.
Answered by Will Quince
All ambulance trusts have now placed their ambulance orders for delivery in the current year under existing contracts, and tenders have been received for the mental health ambulances which are being evaluated by NHS England.
In total, NHS England expect delivery in 2023/24 of:
- 628 dual crew ambulances;
- 154 lightweight ambulances;
- 40 mental health ambulances; and
- 11 electric ambulances.