Written questions by Goldman.

What steps he is taking to ensure that hospitals have sufficient capacity for patients.

Integrated care boards are responsible for commissioning healthcare services, including hospitals, to meet the needs of their local populations. We are asking trusts to place a special focus on reducing bed occupancy ahead of Christmas, creating additional capacity and improving patient flow.The New Hospital Programme (NHP) will build “right-sized” hospitals, based on robust assumptions appropriate for local health needs that support the shift from hospital to community. The NHP has developed a National Health Service demand and capacity model which reflects changes in demographics, including predictions for population growth, which will underpin assumptions when right-sizing hospitals. The NHP Plan for Implementation, published on the GOV.UK website, sets out the delivery timeline for the schemes in the programme. Further information on the NHP Plan for Implementation is available at the following link:https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/new-hospital-programme-review-outcome/new-hospital-programme-plan-for-implementation

What steps he is taking to ensure that people born with cleft (a) lips and (b) palates have access to appropriate dental care.

I refer the Hon. Member to the answer I gave to the Hon. Member for Eastleigh on 21 November 2025 to Question 89684.

Whether his Department will take steps to help ensure that health (a) boards and (b) trusts (i) collect and (ii) publish data on the provision of respiratory diagnostics.

Activity and waiting times for the main respiratory tests, for instance spirometry and lung function tests, are not included in the National Diagnostic Activity and Waiting Times Collection.However, NHS England undertakes a number of internal assurance data collection exercises on activity and waiting times. The National Diagnostic Programme undertakes an annual snap-shot data collection on respiratory diagnostics to understand the levels of activity and waiting times for a range of respiratory tests within trusts across England.NHS England’s Respiratory Programme, in collaboration with national stakeholders, has also developed a standardised spirometry data capture template. This tool is designed to support integrated care boards in consistently recording and reporting spirometry activity, enabling improved oversight, service planning, and equitable access to respiratory diagnostics.There are no current plans to publish these collections.

What steps his Department is taking to help (a) increase capacity and (b) reduce inequalities in accessing respiratory diagnosis.

The Government is committed to increasing the capacity of respiratory services and is improving access to these services through new community diagnostic centres (CDCs).All standard and large CDCs are required to offer diagnostic respiratory tests such as spirometry and full lung function tests as part of their core testing offer.The 2025/26 capital guidance confirmed that £1.65 billion of capital funding is being allocated to support National Health Service performance across secondary and emergency care across 2025/26 more broadly. This includes funding to enable the completion of 2024/25 CDC schemes, as well as to expand existing and build new CDCs.

What steps his Department is taking to help tackle staff shortages in cancer care.

We will continue to ensure that we train the staff we need to ensure patients are cared for by the right professional, when and where they need it, and the cancer plan will reflect this. We will publish a new National Cancer Plan, which will include further details on how we will improve outcomes for cancer patients. The Government recognises that a cancer-specific approach is needed to meet the challenges in cancer care, and to improve outcomes for people living with cancer.NHS England is currently improving the recruitment of radiographers and radiologists to improve earlier diagnosis and treatment of cancer, through a range of different initiatives. This includes increasing priority medical specialities, including clinical oncologists. We are also supporting employers to train new radiographers through the apprenticeship pathway. Furthermore, we will ensure that imaging training academies can increase training capacity in addition to reforming training to support rapid development for both radiologists and radiographers.

What steps he is taking to ensure the NHS is sufficiently staffed over summer holiday periods.

Individual NHS Trusts and other providers are responsible for ensuring that there are sufficient staff to provide safe care.Trusts already have a duty to regularly review the number of staff and range of skills needed to safely meet the needs of people using their services.

If he will implement localised reporting of CAMHS (a) funding and (b) performance.

Every local integrated care board (ICB) has a legal duty to produce an annual report on how it has discharged its functions in the previous financial year. This provides the opportunity for ICBs to demonstrate the full breadth of their work with people and communities and involves people and communities in decision-making, and includes working with children and young people.

When his Department plans to publish (a) the full impact assessment and (b) equality impact assessment of the changes to the length of time between cervical cancer screenings.

Both the impact assessment and the equality impact assessment on the changes to the frequency of cervical screening have been published and are available at the following link:https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/cervical-screening-risk-stratification-impact-assessments

If he will make an assessment of the adequacy of provisions for involuntary mental health interventions for children and young adults.

Our aim is to ensure that children and young people are only detained under the Mental Health Act for involuntary mental health interventions when it is absolutely necessary. The Mental Health Bill, currently being considered by the House of Commons, will strengthen the rights of children and young people detained under the act so they are involved in decisions about their care and so they can challenge these decisions. This includes statutory care and treatment plans, the right to choose a ‘Nominated Person’ to look after their interests, and expanded access to independent mental health advocates. As part of our mission to build a National Health Service fit for the future, we are focussing treatment away from hospital and inpatient care and improving community and crisis services, so that fewer children and young people need to be detained in hospital. We will also take action to ensure that young people in mental health inpatient settings are supported through a safe and effective transition to adult mental health services, to ensure they are treated with more dignity, given a greater say in their care, and that their health, education, and social needs are appropriately met.

What steps he is taking to reduce therapy waiting times for young people with mental health challenges.

The Government is investing an extra £688 million this year to transform mental health services by hiring more staff, delivering more early interventions, and getting waiting lists down so children can have the best possible start in life. We are delivering on our commitment to recruit an additional 8,500 staff across children and adult mental health services by the end of the Parliament, with 6,700 of these extra workers having been recruited since July 2024.We also want to intervene much earlier to support better outcomes for children and young people. That is why the 10-Year Health Plan sets out how we will work with schools and colleges to better identify and meet children's mental health needs by expanding mental health support teams in schools to cover 100% of pupils by 2029/30, and by embedding mental health support in the new Young Futures hubs, to ensure there is no 'wrong front door' for people seeking help.Additionally, we are continuing to provide top-up funding of £7 million to 24 existing early support hubs to expand their services and to take part in an ongoing evaluation of these services in 2025/26. This funding will enable the supported hubs to deliver at least 10,000 additional mental health and wellbeing interventions, so that more children and young people are supported.

If he will take legislative steps to ensure vapes have a minimum number of refill options to be defined as reusable.

The Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs introduced a ban on single use vapes on 1 June, which ensures that all products must be designed and intended to be reused. To be refillable, a product should have a replaceable pod or a tank that a user can add liquid to.To compliment this and tackle youth vaping, the Department for Health and Social Care is also taking powers through the Tobacco and Vapes Bill to enable regulation of many features of the design of a vape. This may include regulations on the size of a tank or refill container, the amount of liquid that can be included, as well as powers to standardise the size and shape of vapes, and to further restrict liquid availability.The Government will consider this issue further as part of its secondary legislation programme following Royal Assent of the bill.

What plans his Department has for supporting community pharmacy, in the context of the NHS 10 Year Health Plan.

For 2025/26, funding for the core community pharmacy contractual framework has been increased to £3.073 billion. This represents the largest uplift in funding of any part of the National Health Service, over 19% across 2024/25 and 2025/26. The Government is clear that it wants to make full use of the skill sets of both pharmacists and pharmacy technicians to help patients, which is why the Government has laid legislation that enables all pharmacies to use hub and spoke dispensing and will shortly lay legislation to enable the better use of people with mixed skills. This builds on the legislation to allow pharmacies to dispense in original packs and for pharmacy technicians to supply medicines. All of these measures support pharmacists to provide more care in the communities they serve and supports the Government’s ambition to ensure patients and their families receive personalised care in the most appropriate setting close to home. We have also improved and continue to work on the digital transfer of information between settings, allowing pharmacies to have access to patient records and to record the outcomes of the care they provide, supporting another of our ambitions to move from analogue to digital. The 10 year plan will build on these foundations and set out how we will build a health service fit for the future.

What assessment his Department has made of the potential impact of the Community Pharmacy Contractual Framework funding settlement for 2024-25 and 2025-26 on future levels of pharmacy closures.

The Community Pharmacy Contractual Framework funding settlement for 2024/25 and 2025/26 provides the largest uplift in funding of any part of the National Health Service representing a 19.7% increase, with the total of £3.073 billion committed to community pharmacies.The individual financial positions of pharmacy contractors are not visible to the Government. It is therefore not possible for the impact on pharmacy closures to be quantified. However, we expect that this significant increase in funding will support contractors and begin to stabilise a sector that has been neglected for too long. This settlement was agreed with Community Pharmacy England as the representatives for the community pharmacy sector.

Whether he plans to increase funding for community pharmacies.

Funding for the core community pharmacy contractual framework has increased to £3.073 billion for 2025/26. This represented the largest uplift in funding of any part of the National Health Service, over 19% across 2024/25 and 2025/26.Decisions on funding for community pharmacies beyond 2025/26 are subject to the current Spending Review. As is custom and practice, the Department will consult Community Pharmacy England on any proposed changes to the reimbursement and remuneration of pharmacy contractors later this year.

Whether he plans to ensure annual health checks for all adults with cerebral palsy.

The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) has published guidance on care and support for adults with cerebral palsy, which is available at the following link:https://www.nice.org.uk/guidance/ng119The guidance recommends that people with cerebral palsy should have an annual review of their clinical and functional needs, carried out by a healthcare professional with expertise in neurodisabilities.Whilst NICE guidelines represent best practice, they are not mandatory, although the Government expects healthcare commissioners to take the guidelines fully into account in designing services that meet the needs of their local population, and to work towards their implementation over time.

When he expects the NHS-commissioned report on community pharmacy funding to be published.

NHS England commissioned Frontier Economics to undertake an independent economic analysis of National Health Service pharmacy funding in 2024. This work is nearing completion and will be published.

What assessment he has made of the potential merits of standardising of NHS IT systems to help increase levels of efficiency.

Interoperability between IT systems would improve the quality of care and safety for patients, as well as enabling better informed clinical and care decision-making, by allowing for information to be shared easily, in real time, between organisations that use different systems. Information standards relating to information technology would enable such interoperability. The Government will shortly commence section 95 of the Health and Care Act 2022 and introduce regulations, which will, with Parliament’s approval, set out the procedure for preparing and publishing mandatory information standards for public and private health and adult social care providers. The Data (Use and Access) (DUA) Bill will, Parliament permitting, subsequently make standards mandatory for IT providers in the health and care system, and make provision for ensuring compliance. The impact assessment for these measures in the DUA Bill estimates benefits in terms of efficiencies of over £100 million over ten years. This is available at the following link: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/6719388b0d1a5bc610b778cd/data_use_and_access_bill_open_data_architecture_information_standards_impact_assessment.pdf

Whether he has made an assessment of the potential merits of introducing a hardship fund for parents of children who have been diagnosed with chronic illnesses and have been hospitalised for more than 2 months.

The Building the Right Support Action Plan, published in 2022, contains commitments which have not yet passed their delivery dates, including the commitment to reform the Mental Health Act.We do not plan to create new actions in a new action plan while the bill is before Parliament. However, we recognise that this is a vitally important area, and we are considering how to ensure that more people with a learning disability and autistic people are supported well in the community, ahead of the commencement of the Mental Health Act reforms.

If she will make an assessment of the adequacy of levels of carers pay.

Adult social care is a historically low paid sector, as most care workers are paid at or just above the National Living Wage. The recently introduced Employment Rights Bill aims to address this by establishing a framework for Fair Pay Agreements, through which an agreement on pay and other terms and conditions for the adult social care sector can be negotiated and reached by employers, worker representatives, and others in partnership.

If his Department will make an assessment of the potential merits of an NHS-funded salaried training route to becoming a school counsellor.

We have no plans to do so, as there is already an existing National Health Service-funded salaried training route for education based mental health practitioners, which enables them to work across education and healthcare to provide mental health support for children and young people in schools and colleges.