Written questions by Dance.

Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment she has made of the potential merits of producing a horticulture strategy.

The Government is committed to the horticulture sector and its role in providing fresh, home‑grown produce that helps feed the nation. The sector’s needs are being addressed through steps we are taking to support increased domestic production. Building on this work, the Secretary of State has announced the Farming & Food Partnership Board to oversee a series of sector growth plans, the first of which will focus on horticulture. This approach is aimed at boosting productivity and profitability, reducing costs and opening new markets in ways that support health and environmental goals, with the first plan focused on the horticulture sector.

What assessment she has made of the potential merits of installing air filtration systems in schools in England.

The department regularly reviews its guidance to ensure that it aligns with best practice and industry standards, supporting the delivery of high quality school environments.The department has assessed the suitability of using air cleaning units, and the relevant information is included in our guidance on ventilation and indoor air quality in education and childcare settings, which can be accessed here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/ventilation-and-air-quality-in-education-and-childcare-settings/ventilation-and-air-quality-in-education-and-childcare-settings.

Communities and Local Government, pursuant to the answer of 13 March 2026 to Question 119636 on Shops: Rural Areas, what his planned timeline is for the publication of a new High Streets Strategy.

We will publish the High Streets Strategy later this year. The Strategy will be backed by £301 million investment in High Street Innovation Partnerships to help reimagine and revive some of the country’s most struggling high streets. We will set out further information in due course

Communities and Local Government, what steps he is taking to help tackle furniture poverty in rural communities across (a) Yeovil constituency, (b) Somerset and (c) England.

I refer the hon. Member to the answer given to Question UIN 84054 on 3 November 2025.

Food and Rural Affairs, what discussions she has had with representatives from the farming community on access to health food in (a) Yeovil constituency, (b) Somerset and (c) the South West.

Defra Minister’s and officials meet with a range of stakeholders based on policy need.

Communities and Local Government, whether he is taking steps is to strengthen legal protections for those with shared ownership properties in Yeovil constituency.

I refer the hon. Member to the answer given to Question UIN 101061 on 6 January 2026.

Communities and Local Government, what steps is he taking to strengthen protections for owners of shared ownership properties in Yeovil constituency from unaddressed instances of dangerous mould.

I refer the hon. Member to the answer given to Question UIN 101061 on 6 January 2026.

What assessment he has made of the potential impact of changes to Skills Bootcamp funding on the ability of the scheme to adapt to market and employer needs in (a) Yeovil constituency, (b) Somerset and (c) England.

I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave on 26 February 2026 to Question UIN 113868.

Innovation and Technology, what assessment she has made of the potential impact of cyber governance regulations on business growth in (a) Yeovil constituency, (b) Somerset, and (c) England.

The Cyber Security and Resilience (Network and Information Systems) Bill was introduced in November 2025 to increase UK defences against cyber attacks. These reforms will ensure the UK economy is better protected than ever by securing the most important essential and digital services and suppliers which businesses and public services rely on.The Department for Science, Innovation and Technology produced an Impact Assessment for the introduction of the Bill that identifies the expected impact the legislation will have on regulated entities. The assessment highlights that cyber security is a critical enabler of economic growth, and it is expected that the improved security resulting from businesses adhering to the regulations will mean the benefits of adherence outweigh the cost of adherence. Further analysis will be undertaken for relevant secondary legislation to support the implementation of the Bill, and the Impact Assessment will be updated upon Royal Assent.The government's forthcoming Modernising Corporate Reporting consultation will provide an opportunity for users of corporate reporting to comment on the effectiveness of the existing risk reporting framework which includes businesses' cyber risk reporting and the Department for Business and Trade will consider the impact on business growth of any changes to risk reporting following this consultation.

Pursuant to the answer of 06.01.2026 to question 103582 on Tourette’s Syndrome: Health Services, what steps he is taking to support Tourette’s Action to disseminate their e-learning module for GPs in (a) Yeovil constituency, (b) Somerset and (c) England.

The commissioning of services for Tourette’s syndrome is the responsibility of local integrated care boards (ICBs), which have a legal duty to plan comprehensive health services for their populations, including for conditions like Tourette’s. While Somerset NHS Foundation Trust has not been directly approached to promote these e-learning modules, it would welcome reviewing the content and, if appropriate, would be happy to share more widely.Cutting waiting lists is a key priority for the Government, including for neurology services. Between September 2024 and September 2025, the number of incomplete neurology pathways was reduced by 15,500, from 234,720 to 219,221, and the average waiting time for neurology services fell from 16.2 to 15.2 weeks. Over the same period, the proportion of patients seen within 18 weeks increased to around 57%, up from around 54% the previous year. We remain committed to returning to the NHS constitutional standard that 92% of patients wait no longer than 18 weeks from referral to consultant-led treatment by March 2029. As part of the Elective Reform Plan, we are investing in additional capacity and reforming outpatient services to help bring waiting times down, recognising that neurology is a particularly challenged specialty.NHS England’s Neuroscience Transformation Programme is supporting ICBs to improve pathways, reduce unwarranted variation and provide care closer to home for neurology patients, including for patients with Tourette’s.The Mental Health Act 2025 is a critical foundation to ensure that people with the most severe mental health conditions get better, more personalised care, and have greater choice and control over their treatment. NHS England’s mental health, learning disability and autism inpatient quality transformation programme will support cultural change and a new model of care for the future across all NHS-funded mental health inpatient settings. Local health systems have now published their three-year plans for localising and realigning inpatient care in line with this vision.

Pursuant to the answer of 06.01.2026 to question 103582 on Tourette’s Syndrome: Health Services, what assessment he has made of the quality of management of Tourette’s in mental health hospitals.

The commissioning of services for Tourette’s syndrome is the responsibility of local integrated care boards (ICBs), which have a legal duty to plan comprehensive health services for their populations, including for conditions like Tourette’s. While Somerset NHS Foundation Trust has not been directly approached to promote these e-learning modules, it would welcome reviewing the content and, if appropriate, would be happy to share more widely.Cutting waiting lists is a key priority for the Government, including for neurology services. Between September 2024 and September 2025, the number of incomplete neurology pathways was reduced by 15,500, from 234,720 to 219,221, and the average waiting time for neurology services fell from 16.2 to 15.2 weeks. Over the same period, the proportion of patients seen within 18 weeks increased to around 57%, up from around 54% the previous year. We remain committed to returning to the NHS constitutional standard that 92% of patients wait no longer than 18 weeks from referral to consultant-led treatment by March 2029. As part of the Elective Reform Plan, we are investing in additional capacity and reforming outpatient services to help bring waiting times down, recognising that neurology is a particularly challenged specialty.NHS England’s Neuroscience Transformation Programme is supporting ICBs to improve pathways, reduce unwarranted variation and provide care closer to home for neurology patients, including for patients with Tourette’s.The Mental Health Act 2025 is a critical foundation to ensure that people with the most severe mental health conditions get better, more personalised care, and have greater choice and control over their treatment. NHS England’s mental health, learning disability and autism inpatient quality transformation programme will support cultural change and a new model of care for the future across all NHS-funded mental health inpatient settings. Local health systems have now published their three-year plans for localising and realigning inpatient care in line with this vision.

Pursuant to the answer of 06.01.2026 to question 103582 on Tourette’s Syndrome: Health Services, what steps he is taking to continue to minimise waiting times for Tourette’s diagnosis.

The commissioning of services for Tourette’s syndrome is the responsibility of local integrated care boards (ICBs), which have a legal duty to plan comprehensive health services for their populations, including for conditions like Tourette’s. While Somerset NHS Foundation Trust has not been directly approached to promote these e-learning modules, it would welcome reviewing the content and, if appropriate, would be happy to share more widely.Cutting waiting lists is a key priority for the Government, including for neurology services. Between September 2024 and September 2025, the number of incomplete neurology pathways was reduced by 15,500, from 234,720 to 219,221, and the average waiting time for neurology services fell from 16.2 to 15.2 weeks. Over the same period, the proportion of patients seen within 18 weeks increased to around 57%, up from around 54% the previous year. We remain committed to returning to the NHS constitutional standard that 92% of patients wait no longer than 18 weeks from referral to consultant-led treatment by March 2029. As part of the Elective Reform Plan, we are investing in additional capacity and reforming outpatient services to help bring waiting times down, recognising that neurology is a particularly challenged specialty.NHS England’s Neuroscience Transformation Programme is supporting ICBs to improve pathways, reduce unwarranted variation and provide care closer to home for neurology patients, including for patients with Tourette’s.The Mental Health Act 2025 is a critical foundation to ensure that people with the most severe mental health conditions get better, more personalised care, and have greater choice and control over their treatment. NHS England’s mental health, learning disability and autism inpatient quality transformation programme will support cultural change and a new model of care for the future across all NHS-funded mental health inpatient settings. Local health systems have now published their three-year plans for localising and realigning inpatient care in line with this vision.

What steps she is taking to ensure young carers with neurodiverse learning needs are able to access additional support at school.

Every child deserves a high quality, inclusive education establishment in their community, including young carers with neurodiverse learning needs.We have now announced plans to reform the special educational needs and disabilities system, with further information available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/every-child-achieving-and-thriving.The department will introduce a new universal offer, ensuring all children receive the right support in mainstream schools. For all those with additional needs there will be layers of targeted support that remove barriers to learning, with schools working alongside parents and local partnerships.Regional improvements for standards and excellence has made a universal offer to equip mainstream schools with the expertise, evidence and networks they need to embed consistently high quality, inclusive practice and improve outcomes for every child, including young carers. Ofsted’s renewed inspection framework, introduced in November 2025, focuses explicitly on inclusion and their inspection toolkit is clear that inspectors will consider the impact of a school’s work to improve the attendance, behaviour, inclusive personal development and wellbeing of young carers.Furthermore, this government is preparing a cross-government action plan for unpaid carers of all ages which it plans to publish later this year. This will include actions to strengthen the support that is provided to young carers.

What estimate he has made of the number of small to medium sized enterprises that are planning to close or contract over the 2026-2027 financial year.

The government is not able to make predictions on total future numbers of businesses starting, closing or contracting. Our plan is to make the UK the best place to start and grow a business, with a culture that supports entrepreneurship in every community and high street.Our Small Business Plan, launched in July 2025, contains over 200 targeted actions, which will make a real difference to the day-to-day trading operations of small and medium sized businesses and give them the right support to grow and thrive.

What steps he is taking to support rural convenience stores to manage their operating costs.

From April 2026, we are introducing permanently lower business‑rates multipliers for retail, hospitality and leisure properties, worth nearly £900 million a year and benefiting over 750,000 premises. In recognition of the impact of the revaluation on bills, the government has introduced £4.3 billion transitional support package, to protect ratepayers from large overnight increases.We have more than doubled the Employment Allowance to £10,500, meaning around 865,000 employers will pay no NICs at all, and more than half of all employers will either gain or will see no change. The government and Ofgem are taking decisive action to inform and protect non-domestic energy consumers as well as improving access to redress when issues occur. Later this year, we will bring forward a new High Streets Strategy, to help reinvigorate our communities. These measures will provide meaningful, long-term support to rural retailers at the heart of their communities.

What assessment she has made of the potential impact of replacing the business rates system on businesses in Yeovil constituency.

The Government has already started the work of reforming our business rates system by introducing new permanently lower multipliers for eligible retail, hospitality and leisure (RHL) properties. These new multipliers are worth nearly £1 billion per year and will benefit over 750,000 properties. The Government is also supporting small businesses to grow. At Budget, the Government announced the extension of Small Business Rates Relief (SBRR) so that businesses opening second premises can retain their SBRR for three years, tripling the current allowance. The Call for Evidence, published at Budget, built on the findings of the Transforming Business Rates: Discussion Paper and asked stakeholders for more detailed evidence on how the business rates system influences investment decisions. We are carefully considering representations we’ve received, and a Government response to the Call for Evidence will be published in due course. Any reforms taken forward will be phased over the course of the Parliament.

What steps he is taking to improve public representation in NHS Foundation Trusts.

The removal of the councils of governors from National Health Service foundation trusts (FTs) forms part of the wider aim of the 10-Year Health Plan to ensure that hospitals put patient experiences and outcomes at the heart of their decision-making. The regulatory functions supporting oversight of the governance of FTs are underpinned by the NHS provider licence which will continue.While governors elected by the public and other stakeholders have provided helpful advice and oversight for some FTs, we now need to move to a more dynamic model, drawing on patient, staff, and stakeholder insight. For example, approaches to engagement that better reflect local demographics and geography rather than a ‘one size fits all’ governor model, as well as supporting an increasing focus on the outcomes of the engagement, including the evidence that local people are involved in key decisions about how care is provided and their voices are listened to.

What assessment he has made of the potential impact of rising medication costs on (a) pharmacies in Yeovil constituency and (b) their ability to provide prescriptions.

The Drug Tariff, a monthly publication, sets out reimbursement prices to be paid to pharmacy contractors for the medicines that they dispense. Whilst we do not look at specific areas of the United Kingdom or specific medicines, we do have arrangements in place to mitigate against rising medication costs for pharmacies, that ensure they are paid enough overall above what it costs them to purchase medicines.Where prices increase significantly and rapidly, concessionary prices can be granted by the Department to ensure that pharmacy contractors are paid fairly, and can access medicines for their patients, even when market prices increase.Concessionary prices are set using 'real time' market data provided to the Department under the Health Service Products (Provision and Disclosure of Information) Regulations 2018 on prices and stock levels intended for retail pharmacy businesses in England. This ensures that prices set are reflective of the market and aims to reimburse pharmacy contractors fairly.For branded medicine such as Actimorph the Department sets maximum list prices which are controlled through the Voluntary scheme for branded medicines Pricing, Access and Growth and the statutory scheme.

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.

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.

What assessment he has made of the potential impact of the removal of Council of Governors from foundation trusts on the governance of those trusts.

The removal of the councils of governors from National Health Service foundation trusts (FTs) forms part of the wider aim of the 10-Year Health Plan to ensure that hospitals put patient experiences and outcomes at the heart of their decision-making. The regulatory functions supporting oversight of the governance of FTs are underpinned by the NHS provider licence which will continue.While governors elected by the public and other stakeholders have provided helpful advice and oversight for some FTs, we now need to move to a more dynamic model, drawing on patient, staff, and stakeholder insight. For example, approaches to engagement that better reflect local demographics and geography rather than a ‘one size fits all’ governor model, as well as supporting an increasing focus on the outcomes of the engagement, including the evidence that local people are involved in key decisions about how care is provided and their voices are listened to.