Asked by: Ranil Jayawardena (Conservative - North East Hampshire)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if she will make an assessment of the potential impact of high-profile use of snus on young people's health.
Answered by Andrea Leadsom - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
Snus is banned in the United Kingdom and we have no plans to introduce additional tobacco products to the UK market. Alternative tobacco-free products exist, such as nicotine pouches, which are sometimes referred to as snus. Research suggests that, although nicotine pouch use is low among adults, with 0.26% or 1 in 400 users in Great Britain, it is increasingly popular with younger male audiences. We will continue to monitor the evidence on these products.
In our recent consultation, Creating a smokefree generation and tackling youth vaping, the Government explored whether further regulatory measures are needed for other nicotine consumer products such as nicotine pouches. The consultation closed on 6 December 2023 and we will publish a consultation response shortly.
Asked by: Ranil Jayawardena (Conservative - North East Hampshire)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment she made of the impact of lead pollution on (a) children's and (b) other people's health.
Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)
Exposure to lead can result in a range of adverse health effects, including effects on the cardiovascular, immune, reproductive and neurological systems. Unborn and young children are particularly at risk as lead exposure can adversely affect development of the nervous system.
Several measures have been implemented in the United Kingdom to reduce exposure to lead, including the phasing out of lead in paint, petrol, food cans and water pipes. The UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) runs the Lead Exposure in Children Surveillance System (LEICSS), for reporting cases of elevated lead exposure in England. The aim of LEICSS is to facilitate public health action in individual cases, to reduce the effects of lead exposure.
Information on the health effects of lead is available at the following link:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/lead-properties-incident-management-and-toxicology.
Asked by: Rebecca Long Bailey (Labour - Salford and Eccles)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether he plans to make financial support available for patients with (a) avoidant restrictive food intake disorder and (b) other eating disorders to help with the cost of living.
Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)
We have no plans to do so. Information on the support available to help with the cost of living is available at the following link:
https://www.gov.uk/cost-of-living
We have increased investment in children and young people's community eating disorder services every year, with this funding growing by £54 million in 2023/24. Over the five years from 2019/20, we will have also invested an extra £1 billion in community mental health care for adults with severe mental illness, including eating disorders, giving 370,000 more adults greater choice and control over their care and supporting them to live well in their communities.
Asked by: Andrew Lewer (Conservative - Northampton South)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent assessment he has made of the effectiveness of Mental Health Support Teams in reducing levels of demand on Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services.
Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)
An independent early evaluation commissioned by the Department of the Children and Young People’s Mental Health Trailblazer programme was published in January and is available at the following link:
The evaluation examines the development, implementation, and early progress of the first wave of mental health support teams in the first 25 ‘trailblazer’ areas participating in the programme, which became operational from January 2020.
A second independent evaluation, which will consider the longer-term impacts of Mental Health Support Teams has also been commissioned through the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR). This project commenced in June 2023 and is due to complete June 2026. The findings will be published once a final report has been submitted and approved by the NIHR.
Asked by: Andrew Rosindell (Conservative - Romford)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to (a) improve the training and (b) increase the funding provided to technical colleges in (i) Romford, (ii) London borough of Havering and (iii) Essex.
Answered by Robert Halfon
The government is committed to creating a world leading skills system which is employer-focused, high-quality and fit for the future. The department’s reforms are strengthening higher and further education to help more people get good jobs and upskill and retrain throughout their lives, and to improve national productivity and economic growth. The reforms are backed with an additional investment of £3.8 billion over the course of this Parliament to strengthen higher and further education.
This additional funding will help providers such as those in Romford, Havering and Essex to deliver high-quality education and training.
Apprenticeships are crucial in driving growth and social mobility; they boost skills across the economy and improve people's earnings and career opportunities nationwide. Since 2010, there have been 130,790 apprenticeship starts in Essex, 22,390 in London Borough of Havering and 9,080 in Romford constituency, and the department wants to ensure that this number continues to grow. To support this, the government is increasing its investment in apprenticeships to £2.7 billion by 2024/25, encouraging more employers across the country to recruit new apprentices.
The department is implementing major reforms to technical education to equip people with the technical skills that employers demand.
The department has introduced T Levels which will equip more young people with the skills, knowledge and experience to access skilled employment or further study. They represent a real shift in the quality of technical education and the department has invested heavily to support providers in their implementation. From September 2023, 18 T Levels will be available, being delivered through nearly 300 providers across all regions of the country. T Levels are being delivered widely by providers in Romford, Havering and Essex in subjects such as Engineering & Manufacturing, Digital, health and science.
The department plans to invest approximately £300 million to establish 21 IoTs across the country. The 21 IoTs include the East London IoT and the South East IoT. IoTs are partnerships between FE colleges, higher education and employers and provide access to industry standard facilities. They focus on the technical training needs of employers and learners in their local areas.
The department has introduced the Free Courses for Jobs scheme which enables eligible adults to gain a qualification for free. Residents in Romford, Havering and Essex can access provision that is delivered through colleges and training providers in the area across a range of sector subject areas. In addition, the department has also introduced Skills Bootcamps, which are free, flexible courses of up to 16 weeks, giving people the opportunity to build up sector-specific skills and fast-track to an interview with an employer.
Asked by: Dan Carden (Labour - Liverpool, Walton)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to increase young people's (a) awareness of and (b) ability to identify (i) disinformation and (ii) other online harms.
Answered by David Johnston - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
Pupils are taught about online safety and harms through the citizenship, computing and Relationships, Sex and Health Education (RSHE) curriculum.
Citizenship is statutory within the National Curriculum at key stages 3 and 4 and primary schools can also choose to teach it. Citizenship teaching should equip pupils with the skills and knowledge to explore political and social issues critically, to weigh evidence, debate and make reasoned arguments. Citizenship includes coverage of media literacy topics such as safeguarding democracy and a free media, understanding the role of responsible journalism in democratic society, identifying mis-, dis- and mal- information and countering the effects of negative and harmful news, events and information. The citizenship curriculum can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/national-curriculum-in-england-citizenship-programmes-of-study.
The computing curriculum is designed to ensure that pupils can evaluate and apply information technology, including new or unfamiliar technologies, analytically to solve problems, and that they are responsible, competent, confident and creative users of information and communication technology. Using technology safely, securely, respectfully and responsibly is taught at all key stages of the computing curriculum to provide pupils with the e-safety knowledge they need to make informed decisions whilst online. The computing curriculum can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/national-curriculum-in-england-computing-programmes-of-study.
The RSHE curriculum was introduced in 2020 and is compulsory. Pupils are taught about online relationships, the implications of sharing private or personal data online, harmful content and contact, cyberbullying, an over-reliance on social media and where to get help and support for issues that occur online. The RSHE statutory guidance also says that it is important for young people to know what the law says about sex, relationships and young people, as well as broader safeguarding issues. The RSHE statutory guidance can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/relationships-education-relationships-and-sex-education-rse-and-health-education.
In health education, under the topic of internet safety and harms, pupils should be taught about how advertising and information is targeted at them and how to be a discerning consumer of information online.
To support teachers to deliver these topics safely and with confidence, the department has produced the RSHE teacher training modules, ‘online and media’ and ‘internet safety and harms’. The modules can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/teaching-about-relationships-sex-and-health#train-teachers-on-relationships-sex-and-health-education.
To support schools further, the department has also published ‘Teaching online safety in schools’. This non-statutory guidance aims to support schools in teaching pupils how to stay safe online within new and existing school subjects, such as relationships education, relationships and sex education, health education, citizenship and computing. The guidance outlines the importance of teaching pupils the underpinning knowledge and behaviours that can help them navigate the online world safely and confidently, regardless of the device, platform, or app. This includes how to evaluate what they see online. This will enable pupils to make judgements about what they see online and not automatically assume that what they see is true, valid, or acceptable. The guidance can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/teaching-online-safety-in-schools.
Asked by: Elliot Colburn (Conservative - Carshalton and Wallington)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment he has made of the potential merits of expanding young people's access to occupational health services on their mental health.
Answered by Tom Pursglove - Minister of State (Minister for Legal Migration and Delivery)
The Government recognises that expert-led impartial advice, and interventions such as Occupational Health (OH), can provide appropriate and timely work-based support, including for young people, to manage mental health conditions in the workplace. OH as advisory support has a broad remit, including assessments of fitness for work, advice about reasonable adjustments, workability, or return to work plans and can signpost to treatment for specific mental health conditions.
In addition to this, the DWP Youth Offer provides individually tailored Work Coach support to young adults aged 16 to 24 who are in the Universal Credit Intensive Work Search group. Work Coaches and Disability Employment Advisors work with local partners to signpost young adults to appropriate support. Youth Hubs work with partners to address barriers to young adults moving into employment, including other risk factors that could be associated with mental ill health. The type of support provided in hubs aims to meet the needs of young adults in their local community. We have recommended that all new Youth Hubs consider the barriers young people are facing (including access to mental health support) when determining the support services and partners available from a hub.
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, if he will maintain the children and young people's hospice grant after 2024-25.
Answered by Helen Whately - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
NHS England has now confirmed that it will be renewing the grant for 2024/25, once again allocating £25 million of grant funding for children’s hospices. They will also confirm the funding mechanism and individual allocations in due course. Funding arrangements beyond 2024/25 will need to be confirmed by the next Spending Review.
Asked by: Munira Wilson (Liberal Democrat - Twickenham)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to page 13 of the NHS Benchmarking Network's Children and Young People’s Mental Health Workforce Census, published in January 2023, if he will publish the full-time equivalent number of people working in NHS children and young people's mental health services in (a) 2016, (b) 2019, (c) 2021 and (d) 2022, by (i) job role and (ii) integrated care system region.
Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)
There are no plans to do so. A breakdown of whole-time equivalents by job role for 2019, 2021 and 2022 is already available in the census report referred to.
Integrated care systems were not formally established until July 2022.
Asked by: Baroness Merron (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the effectiveness of specialist day care provision and home-based treatment for eating disorders, as compared to inpatient treatment for (1) children and young people, and (2) adults.
Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
NHS England is refreshing guidance on children and young people's eating disorders, with an increased focus on early identification and intervention. Updated guidance will highlight the importance of improved integration between community eating disorder services, wider children and young people's mental health services, schools, colleges and primary care. This will improve awareness, provide expert advice and improve support for children and young people presenting with problems with eating.
In 2019, NHS England published an addendum to the national Children and Young People’s Eating Disorder Guidance to include guidance on integration between community eating disorder services and inpatient and day care services, noting that “children and young people should be treated as close to home as possible, at the earliest opportunity, to substantially reduce the need for admission and length of stay”.
In 2022/23, 47% more children and young people have started National Institute for Health and Care Excellence concordant evidence-based treatment in the community, compared to 2019/20.
For adults, National Health Service guidance on intensive day patient treatment and home-based treatment outlines that intensive day patient treatment provides step-down care from inpatient treatment or an alternative to admission.
It may be provided by either an inpatient unit or a community eating disorder (CED) service, at least four to five times a week, and should include support around main meals as well as encouraging people to learn skills and engage in activities that contribute towards their recovery. Integrated working across day patient and CED services can help support people to live in the community and prevent relapse or readmission.