Written questions by Cocking.

Pursuant to the Answer of 30 April 2025 to Question 49532 on NHS Low Income Scheme: Asylum, what the cost to the public purse has been of providing HC2 certificates to people seeking asylum since 5 July 2024.

The information is not held in the format requested. HC2 certificates are generic and do not have categories such as student or asylum seeker attributed to them. The NHS Business Services Authority does not collect information on what category a patient using the HC2 belongs to for any of the National Health Service charges covered by the scheme. Therefore, it is not possible to calculate the cost to the public purse in terms of lost NHS charge revenue.

If he will make an assessment of the potential merits of barring illegal migrants from being eligible to apply for an HC2 certificate.

The Department has no plans to make an assessment of the potential merits of barring illegal migrants from being eligible to apply for an HC2 certificate.An HC2 certificate is for full help with health costs and is received via the NHS Low Income Scheme, which anyone, regardless of their immigration status, can apply for if they do not have savings or investments over a certain limit.

What assessment he has made of the adequacy of the mental health support available to people in the Broxbourne constituency.

Local integrated care boards are responsible for ensuring that mental health services are safe, effective, sustainable, and meet the needs of the population.Long waits are being driven by increasing demand in a system in desperate need of change. We are already responding by delivering new, innovative models of care in the community. We are piloting six neighbourhood, 24/7 adult mental health centres to bring together community, crisis, and inpatient care.NHS England uses the Oversight Framework to assess the quality and safety of all mental health inpatient services in England, including services in Broxbourne. Risks and issues are escalated nationally using the quality risk and escalation framework.In addition, the Care Quality Commission carries out monitoring and assessments of providers in England to ensure they are providing safe and quality care to people using their services. The Care Quality Commission has a duty under the Mental Health Act 1983 to monitor how services exercise their powers and discharge their duties when patients are detained in hospital or are subject to community treatment orders or guardianship.

What steps he is taking to ensure hospital transport providers are meeting the needs of patients and their families.

It is the responsibility of local commissioners and providers to work together to ensure that hospital patient transport services are meeting the needs of their populations locally. National guidance for non-emergency patient transport services, to support them in becoming consistently more responsive, fair, and sustainable, is available at the following link:https://www.england.nhs.uk/publication/improving-non-emergency-patient-transport-services/

What steps his Department is taking to make it easier for patients in Broxbourne constituency to contact their GP practice to book appointments.

We know patients are struggling to contact their general practices (GP), including in the Broxbourne constituency. That is why we have committed to eliminating the 8:00am scramble for appointments by implementing a modern appointment booking system.The most recent data from the Health Insight Survey found that between July and August 2024, 78% of people had successfully contacted their GP on the same day, in the last 28 days. Of those who tried to contact their GP practice in the last 28 days, 72.6% of adults perceived their overall experience of their GP practice as either ‘Very Good’ or ‘Good’.99.4% of the primary care estate are now live with digital telephony and 90% have been enrolled to use online registration systems.We are determined to reduce bureaucracy, which is why the Government has launched a red tape challenge, ensuring GPs spend less time filling in forms and more time caring for patients.

Whether his Department plans to introduce mandatory dementia training for adult social care workers.

Providers must provide sufficient numbers of suitably qualified, competent, skilled, and experienced staff to meet the needs of the people using the service. Staff must receive the support, training, professional development, supervision, and appraisals that are necessary for them to carry out their role.We now have a national career framework for adult social car, the Care Workforce Pathway, which is linked to a number of existing competency frameworks, including the dementia training standards framework.The Department has also launched a new Level 2 Adult Social Care Certificate qualification which links to the outcomes in the Care Workforce Pathway. This contains the baseline knowledge required to provide quality care, and will make sure that those who are starting out their careers have an informed awareness of dementia.

If he will make an assessment of the potential merits of giving the responsibility for the allocation of GP surgeries to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government.

There are currently no plans for assessing whether the responsibility of the allocation of general practice surgeries should fall to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government. Upper-tier local authorities currently have a role in improving health and influencing health and care strategies through participation in integrated care partnerships (ICPs) and integrated care boards (ICBs). ICBs are National Health Service organisations responsible for planning health services for their local population, including Primary Medical Services. ICBs are legally required to have local government representation on their board. Each integrated care system (ICS) includes an ICP, formed of NHS organisations and upper-tier local authorities, which is responsible for developing an integrated care strategy. The ICB works to deliver this through developing a joint plan with partner local authorities, managing the NHS budget, and arranging for the provision of health services in the ICS area.The healthcare needs of local populations affect the funding which practices receive. Global sum payments for general practice contractors are based on a weighted sum for every person registered with the practice, using the Carr-Hill formula to estimate the practices’ workload.