Every parliamentary written question tabled by Al Pinkerton this session, with the full answer and department. See how every department answers, or back to the MP page.
Showing 1,241–1,260 of 1,421 · this parliament
What assessment she has made of the adequacy of support available to staff in asylum accommodation who experience harassment in Surrey.
The Home Office keeps all aspects of the immigration system under regular review, in consultation with a wide range of experts and stakeholders.
What steps he is taking to help ensure that healthcare services can (a) recruit and (b) retain physiotherapists in Surrey Heath constituency.
Decisions about recruitment are matters for individual National Health Service trusts. NHS trusts manage their recruitment at a local level, ensuring they have the right number of staff in place and with the right skills mix, to deliver safe and effective care. These staff include allied health professionals such as radiographers, speech therapists, occupational therapists, and physiotherapists.The Government is committed to making the NHS the best place to work, to ensure that we retain more of our skilled and dedicated staff. NHS England is leading work nationally through its retention programme to drive a consistent, system-wide approach to staff retention across NHS trusts. This ensures trusts have access to proven retention strategies, data-driven monitoring, and can foster a more stable, engaged, productive, and supported workforce.
What steps he is taking to help ensure that healthcare services can (a) recruit and (b) retain speech therapists in Surrey Heath constituency.
Decisions about recruitment are matters for individual National Health Service trusts. NHS trusts manage their recruitment at a local level, ensuring they have the right number of staff in place and with the right skills mix, to deliver safe and effective care. These staff include allied health professionals such as radiographers, speech therapists, occupational therapists, and physiotherapists.The Government is committed to making the NHS the best place to work, to ensure that we retain more of our skilled and dedicated staff. NHS England is leading work nationally through its retention programme to drive a consistent, system-wide approach to staff retention across NHS trusts. This ensures trusts have access to proven retention strategies, data-driven monitoring, and can foster a more stable, engaged, productive, and supported workforce.
What steps he is taking to help support the (a) recruitment and (b) retention of radiographers in Surrey Heath constituency.
Decisions about recruitment are matters for individual National Health Service trusts. NHS trusts manage their recruitment at a local level, ensuring they have the right number of staff in place and with the right skills mix, to deliver safe and effective care. These staff include allied health professionals such as radiographers, speech therapists, occupational therapists, and physiotherapists.The Government is committed to making the NHS the best place to work, to ensure that we retain more of our skilled and dedicated staff. NHS England is leading work nationally through its retention programme to drive a consistent, system-wide approach to staff retention across NHS trusts. This ensures trusts have access to proven retention strategies, data-driven monitoring, and can foster a more stable, engaged, productive, and supported workforce.
What steps he is taking to help ensure that healthcare services can (a) recruit and (b) retain occupational therapists in Surrey Heath constituency.
Decisions about recruitment are matters for individual National Health Service trusts. NHS trusts manage their recruitment at a local level, ensuring they have the right number of staff in place and with the right skills mix, to deliver safe and effective care. These staff include allied health professionals such as radiographers, speech therapists, occupational therapists, and physiotherapists.The Government is committed to making the NHS the best place to work, to ensure that we retain more of our skilled and dedicated staff. NHS England is leading work nationally through its retention programme to drive a consistent, system-wide approach to staff retention across NHS trusts. This ensures trusts have access to proven retention strategies, data-driven monitoring, and can foster a more stable, engaged, productive, and supported workforce.
What steps he is taking to help improve access to care need s assessments for (a) deaf and (b) blind people in Surrey Heath constituency.
Under the Care Act 2014, local authorities are responsible for ensuring that deaf and blind people can access needs assessments. Under the Equality Act (2010), local authorities must also make reasonable adjustments to ensure that disabled people are not disadvantaged.The Care Quality Commission (CQC) is assessing how well local authorities in England are performing against their duties under Part 1 of the Care Act 2014, including their duty to undertake needs assessments. Needs assessments for deaf and blind people will form part of the CQC’s overall assessment of local authorities’ delivery of adult social care. In that context, the CQC will report on how local authorities work with deaf and blind people when there is something important to highlight, such as something being done well, innovative practice, or an area for improvement. The CQC is assessing all 153 local authorities in England. So far, the CQC has published over twenty assessments, including an assessment for Surrey County Council, with further information available at the following link:https://www.cqc.org.uk/care-services/local-authority-assessment-reports/surrey-1124By identifying local authorities’ strengths and areas for improvement, CQC assessments facilitate the sharing of good practice and help us to target support where it is most needed. These steps will help to improve access to needs assessments for everyone who needs it, including deaf and blind people.
What steps her Department is taking to reduce knife crime in Surrey Heath constituency.
Halving knife crime over the next decade is a key part of the Government’s Safer Streets Mission.We have already taken radical action to get dangerous knives off Britain’s streets, including implementing a ban on the sale and possession of zombie-style knives and zombie-style machetes, and introducing new legislation to ban ninja swords which will come into effect from 1 August.We have also announced “Ronan’s Law” following an independent review into online knife sales by Commander Stephen Clayman, which sets out a range of measures including strengthened age verification and delivery checks and a requirement on retailers to report bulk sales to the police.With measures in the Crime and Policing Bill 2025, we are increasing the penalties for illegal sales of knives, creating a new offence of possessing a knife with the intention to commit unlawful violence and are giving the police a new power to seize knives when they believe they are likely to be used in connection with unlawful violence.The Young Futures Programme is another key part of the Safer Streets Mission and the Government’s ambition to halve knife crime over the next decade. Under this programme the Government will intervene earlier to ensure children and young people who are vulnerable to being drawn into crime are identified and offered support in a more systematic way.In Surrey, the government has allocated £1m for the Police and Crime Commissioner for the Hotspot Action Fund in 2025-2026 to deliver high visibility patrolling and problem-oriented policing tactics in the areas with the highest densities of knife crime and Anti-Social Behaviour (‘hotspots’).
Whether she plans to publish the DVSA's findings from the call for evidence on the experience of booking and managing car driving tests.
On the 18 December 2024, a call for evidence was launched, seeking views on the current rules to book tests. The Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency have been analysing the responses to this and have been working to develop proposals to improve the rules to make sure learner drivers can book their driving test easily and efficiently. This will lead to public consultation on the proposed improved rules, with potential future legislative changes. On the 23 April, the Secretary of State announced that this consultation has been fast-tracked and will launch in May 2025.
What recent assessment his Department has made of the adequacy of hospital access to medical equipment in the Surrey Heath constituency.
Individual National Health Service trusts and foundation trusts are responsible and accountable for their own purchasing decisions, which will include medical equipment. NHS organisations are independent commercial entities, and it is for an NHS procuring authority to satisfy itself on how best to obtain quality and value for money through its procurement activity. Local NHS organisations have access to a wide range of procurement routes, but the Government has put in place a range of initiatives to help NHS bodies make informed choices about the products and the route through which they are bought. These include NHS Supply Chain, a national body which is responsible for procuring and delivering most consumables, medical equipment and other supplies into the NHS. NHS Supply Chain was set up to leverage the collective buying power of the NHS to drive savings and provide a standardised range of clinically assured quality products at the best value.
What recent assessment her Department has made of the potential merits of enabling opposite-sex couples to convert a civil partnership to marriage.
In 2019, when civil partnerships were made available for opposite-sex couples in England and Wales, the Government ran a public consultation on the future of conversion rights between marriage and civil partnerships for both opposite and same-sex couples in England and Wales. This Government is considering all options, and we will update the House in due course.
What assessment her Department has made of the potential impact of the forthcoming immigration white paper on the ability of universities to attract international students.
The Home Office keeps all aspects of the immigration system under review, in consultation with a wide range of experts and other stakeholders.
What recent assessment her Department has made of the potential merits of providing redress to people impacted by forced adoptions between 1945 and 1976.
This abhorrent practice should never have taken place, and our deepest sympathies are with all those affected.We take this issue extremely seriously and are considering what more can be done for those who were impacted by historical forced adoption.
What steps his Department is taking to help reduce CAHMS waiting times in Surrey Heath constituency.
We know children and young people are not receiving the mental health care they need and that waits for mental health services are too long across England. We are determined to change that.Nationally, the Government is providing £7 million of funding to extend support for 24 Early Support Hubs that have a track record of helping thousands of young people in their community. We will also provide access to a specialist mental health professional in every school in England and roll out Young Futures Hubs to provide open access mental health support for children and young people.In addition, we plan to recruit an additional 8,500 mental health workers across children and adult mental health services in England to ease pressure on busy mental health services.Responsibility for onward commissioning of mental health services sits with integrated care boards (ICB). It is the role of local ICB decision-makers to consider the implications of mental health services, specific to each geography and including the perspectives of healthcare professionals, patient advocacy groups, and local authorities.
Communities and Local Government, what assessment she has made of the potential merits of requiring developers to include Blue Badge parking spaces in new residential housing developments.
The National Planning Policy Framework sets out that in assessing sites that may be allocated for development in plans, or specific applications for development, it should be ensured that safe and suitable access to the site can be achieved for all users. Within this context, applications for development should address the needs of people with disabilities and reduced mobility in relation to all modes of transport. Responsibility for traffic management and enforcement of all parking regulations, including the provision of disabled parking spaces, is the responsibility of local authorities. It is for individual authorities to decide on the nature and scope of these policies and to balance the needs of residents, emergency services, local business and those who work in and visit their areas. Where car parks are on private land and owned, for example, by a supermarket or retail park, it is for the landowner to determine the terms and conditions for how that land may be used, and how parking spaces may be allocated.
How many and what proportion of school children receive free school meals in Surrey Heath constituency.
The department publishes data annually on pupils who are eligible for free school meals in the ‘Schools, pupils and their characteristics’ statistics. This includes a school level underlying data file which indicates Parliamentary constituency. The data is available at the following link: https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/find-statistics/school-pupils-and-their-characteristics/2023-24. Please note that data on Parliamentary constituencies use boundaries as they were when the statistics were published. Constituency boundaries will be updated to the most recent ones in the next ‘Schools, pupils and their characteristics’ publication in June 2025.
What steps he is taking to support people with digestive system disorders in Surrey Heath constituency.
The Government is committed to putting patients first, by making sure that they are seen on time and that they have the best possible experience of care, including those with digestive system disorders. We have committed to getting back to the National Health Service constitutional standard that at least 92% of people should wait no longer than 18 weeks from referral to treatment, and we have already made progress, exceeding our pledge to deliver an extra two million operations, scans, and appointments, with over three million more delivered between July 2024 and January 2025.In January, we published the Elective Reform Plan. This commits to pathway reform starting in five areas, with gastroenterology being one. The commitment is to develop an integrated pathway across primary, community, and secondary care for common gastroenterology conditions. We will also drive the rapid adoption of remote monitoring in appropriate gastroenterology pathways, which reduces consultant-led outpatient appointments by over 50%.The plan also commits to work with patients, carers, and their representatives to publish the standards patients should expect to experience while they wait for care, including for those waiting for gastroenterology services.
What steps her Department is taking to invest in higher education facilities in Surrey Heath constituency.
Higher education (HE) providers are autonomous and decide where to locate and establish their facilities, providing tangible benefits to their local areas and constituencies.Providers registered with the Office for Students (OfS) and in the Approved (fee cap) category of registration are allocated targeted grant funding through the Strategic Priorities Grant. The government provides this funding on an annual basis to support teaching and students in HE, including expensive-to-deliver subjects, such as science and engineering, and for students at risk of discontinuing their studies. Of the £1.4 billion recurrent funding distributed by the OfS for the 2024/25 academic year, more than two-thirds is being directed to support the provision of high-cost courses.Providers in Surrey are in receipt of this funding, including the University of Surrey and Royal Holloway, University of London.
If she will provide an update on the progress of implementing the DVSA’s seven-point plan aimed at reducing driving test waiting times.
The Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency (DVSA) continues to work on implementing its 7-point plan to reduce waiting times and to encourage learner drivers to only book their driving test when they are ready.DVSA’s progress so far against the measures has seen: 154 new driving examiners complete their training and carrying out driving teststhe introduction of tougher terms and conditions for driving instructors who can book tests for their pupils (6 January).a call for evidence concluded on booking driving tests, which received almost 27,000 responses. DVSA expects to launch the consultation in spring 2025.on 8 April 2025 DVSA implemented changes to the short notice cancellation period, increasing the notice required from 3 to 10 days for learner drivers to cancel their driving test and receive a refund. On the 23 April the Secretary of State for Transport appeared before the Transport Select Committee and announced that DVSA will take further action to help reduce driving test waiting times.Further information on these actions and progress on the 7-point plan can be found on GOV.UK.
What steps her Department is taking to help improve road safety for vulnerable road users in Surrey Heath constituency.
This Government treats road safety with the utmost seriousness, and we are committed to reducing the numbers of those killed and injured on our roads. My Department is developing our road safety strategy and will set out more details in due course.
What steps her Department is taking to reduce private vehicle dependency in Surrey Heath constituency.
Since the beginning of this parliament the department has provided increased funding to Surrey County Council to deliver better bus services and active routes. Surrey County Council were awarded £12 million of bus funding in financial year 2025/26, an increase of £7 million from last year. At the Budget, the Government announced an additional £100m for active travel in England 2025/26, enabling local authorities to install cycling infrastructure and upgrade pavements and paths. Surrey County Council received just over £4.3m for active travel investment in 2025/26. How these funds are allocated within Surrey is a matter for Surrey County Council.