We are aware of supply issues with three pancreatic enzyme replacement therapies: Creon 10,000 gastro-resistant capsules; Creon 25,000 gastro-resistant capsules; and Nutrizym 22 gastro-resistant capsules. We understand that these are due to limited availability of active pharmaceutical ingredients, and manufacturing constraints in producing the volumes required to meet demand. The Department has issued guidance to healthcare professionals regarding treatment of patients while there is a disruption to the supply of these pancreatic enzyme replacement therapies. We are having regular conversations with the suppliers of these products to ask that they expedite deliveries and increase production forecasts, and to confirm that they are taking action to address the root causes of the issues, to ensure continuity of supply. We are also working with specialist importers to source unlicensed imports from abroad.

Whilst we can’t always prevent supply issues, we have a range of well-established tools and processes to mitigate risks to patients. These include close and regular engagement with suppliers, use of alternative strengths or forms of a medicine to allow patients to remain on the same product, expediting regulatory procedures, sourcing unlicensed imports from abroad, adding products to the restricted exports and hoarding list, use of Serious Shortage Protocols, and issuing National Health Service communications to provide management advice and information on the issue to healthcare professionals, so they can advise and support their patients.

HMCTS remains focused on increasing outputs to reduce overall timeliness on all types of applications. Management information published by HMCTS shows the average mean length of time taken for a grant of probate (following receipt of the documents required) reduced by 3 weeks in March 2024 compared to February 2024. The average timeliness in March was 9 weeks.

The first quarter of 2024 (January to March 2024) saw the highest quarterly number of grants issued on record.

A full time series of Official Statistics back to Q3 2019 is published in the Family Court Statistics Quarterly https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/family-court-statistics-quarterly and currently covers the period up to December 2023.

More recent management information published by HMCTS (which does not go through the same level of quality assurance and analysis as the Family Court Statistics Quarterly) provides waiting time information up to March 2023 https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/hmcts-management-information.

My Rt hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care has written to Royal Mail regarding proposed reforms to the universal postal service, to ask what consideration has been given to patients and National Health Service impacts. A meeting with the Group Chief Executive of Royal Mail is currently being considered.

Landlords are required by law to protect a deposit in relation to most Assured Shorthold Tenancies and are free to choose with which government-authorised scheme they protect a tenant’s deposit.

The TDP providers are private companies that are operationally independent of Government. TDP providers are contractually obliged to avoid any conflict of interest arising which prejudices the independence and objectivity of the service provided.

The Department invests over £1 billion per year into health research, through the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR), whose research spending for all cancers was £121.8 million in 2022/23. Funding for the delivery of brain cancer studies in the National Health Service cannot be disaggregated from other studies, but to indicate scale, in 2022/23 the NIHR Clinical Research Network supported 61 brain cancer studies and recruited 4,317 participants to these studies.

Over the past five financial years, the NIHR has spent over £11.3 million in funding for brain cancer research. The following table shows the amount of funding awarded for brain cancer research, from 2018/19 to 2022/23:

Note: the amount of funding awarded will differ to actual spend in a given year, as total spending will include that of multi-year awards made in previous years.

The NIHR funds research in response to proposals received from scientists, rather than allocating funding to specific disease areas. It is not usual practice to ring-fence funds for particular topics or conditions. Applications are subject to peer review and judged in open competition, with awards made on the basis of the importance of the topic to patients and health and care services, value for money, and scientific quality.

To increase the quality, diversity, and number of brain cancer research proposals, the NIHR is working with the Tessa Jowell Brain Cancer Mission and the research community, to develop research capacity in the brain cancer community.

New cars and light commercial vehicles require systems to prevent unauthorised use, immobilisers and a vehicle alarm system to enable them to be registered.

Department for Transport officials regularly liaise with representatives of the motor insurance industry on a variety of issues such as the cost of insurance. However individual insurers are responsible for setting the terms and conditions of the policies that they offer. The Government does not intervene or seek to control the market.

The Government have cancelled plans for new smart motorways, recognising the lack of confidence felt by drivers and cost pressures. This will allow us to track public confidence and consider safety and economic data over a longer period. The most recent comparative assessment is contained in National Highways Smart motorways stocktake Third year progress report, published in December 2023 (www.nationalhighways.co.uk/our-work/smart-motorways-evidence-stocktake/). In terms of deaths or serious injuries, the latest safety data continues to show that overall, all smart motorway types are safer than conventional motorways.

I am very sorry to hear about the experience of my hon. Friend’s constituent. That level of care is absolutely unacceptable. I know he has raised this particular issue with the Patient Safety Commissioner, Henrietta Hughes, but I am very happy to meet with my hon. Friend and his constituent to discuss those complaints, because that care is not acceptable.

I would refer the Hon. Gentleman to the previous response. It is not convention to disclose policy discussions between Ministers and officials as a matter of course.

No decisions have been made with regard to the reserves held by the Pension Protection Fund (PPF). Operational decisions about the PPF are a matter for the Board of the PPF, who have a key role to play in considering the use of its reserves.

The government does not collect the specific information requested. The legal responsibility for providing free home-to-school travel for eligible pupils sits with local authorities, who will hold any data available on the amount spent on taxis for children with an Education, Health and Care plan.

However, the government does publish local authority expenditure data based on Section 251 outturn returns, which includes total expenditure on home-to-school travel for children of compulsory school age where the travel is agreed for reasons of the child’s Special Educational Needs and Disabilities. Local authorities spent a total of £1.25 billion in the 2022/23 financial year on this type of home-to-school travel. The data is available via the following link: https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/find-statistics/la-and-school-expenditure.

The Home Office does not collect information on the length of service of police officers leaving the police service.

The Home Office collects and publishes data annually on the number of police officer leavers in the ‘Police Workforce, England and Wales’ statistical bulletin which can be accessed here: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/police-workforce-england-and-wales

Information on the number of police officers leaving the Metropolitan Police Service, between the years ending 31 March 2007 and 2023, by reason for leaving, can be found in the ‘Leavers Open Data Table’ here: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/64ba76662059dc000d5d27c0/open-data-table-police-workforce-leavers-260723.ods

Voluntary resignation rates in the Metropolitan Police Service, at around 3%, are low compared to other sectors.

Collisions across all motorway types that involve a stopped vehicles account for 3.9% of all collisions on the strategic road network. The causes of such a stopped vehicle can be due to breakdown or various other reasons.

The information sought is not held in the requested format. Breakdown information is not captured by the Department to this level of detail when compared with other road traffic collision data.

It is the responsibility of the permit holder to ensure that any vehicle used under a permit is in a safe and roadworthy condition. The Guide to Maintaining Roadworthiness (GTMR): Commercial Goods and Passenger Carrying Vehicles (https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/guide-to-maintaining-roadworthiness), produced by the Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency, reflects that older vehicles will need more frequent maintenance. It provides information to help ensure that a vehicle is fully roadworthy when in use.

The GTMR helps permit holders to identify and implement systems that ensure vehicular roadworthiness requirements are met. It is a mandatory requirement that a vehicle is fully roadworthy whenever it is being used, regardless of age, as referenced in the GTMR.

We are working with the British Wild Venison Working Group, and others involved in the venison supply chain, to keep the situation under review to ensure that capacity to process deer carcases and increase supply of venison aligns with an increased effort to manage deer and reduce their impact on food crops, forestry and biodiversity.

It is always a pleasure to meet my hon. Friend. He mentioned the important issue of seabirds. He will have noticed yesterday’s announcement of two major positive steps. The No. 1 issue of the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds for the last 25 years has been tightening up the overfishing of sand eels. We are closing English waters to sand eel fishing, which is hugely important to seabirds, particularly the puffin. Secondly, we announced 13 marine designated areas—to put that into context, that is an area equivalent to the size of Suffolk. It is a huge step forward in protecting seabirds, on which the UK has a leading position globally.

Defra is working with stakeholders including Grown in Britain, game dealers and shooting and conservation associations to support development of the wild venison supply chain.

This includes facilitating an industry GB Wild Venison Working Group to improve sector resilience, develop branding, traceability and promote the British Quality Wild Venison Standard and exploring opportunities for more public procurement of wild venison, with the aim of increasing overall demand for wild venison. We are also providing funding towards wild venison related projects in a number of our National Parks and Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty, through the Farming in Protected Landscapes scheme.

The forthcoming deer management strategy will set out actions that will go further in supporting domestic wild venison.

Vehicle categorisation is very important to enable effective regulation and enable investment planning by industry. The current, temporary, type-approval scheme for these L-category vehicles ends on 31^st December 2027 and the Government expects to have a full GB approval scheme in place before then. We will consult stakeholders as part of this process and consider any evidence on the potential for additional categories.

The UK’s exit from the European Union has provided the opportunity for this country to develop its own regulatory approach to decarbonising its entire fleet of new road vehicles, which will support UK industry and riders in the process. As previously stated in the answer to Question 369, the Government will consult on any future regulatory framework to deliver and enforce the end of sale dates for new non-zero emission L-category vehicles as is appropriate.

On 30^th June 2023 the International Council for the Exploration of the Seas (ICES) issued zero-catch advice for pollack 6 and 7 for the first time. In the annual UK-EU negotiations on fishing opportunities, our approach to negotiating catch limits is based on the best available scientific advice, balanced with commitments to economic sustainability and providing opportunities for the UK fleet, consistent with the objectives of the Fisheries Act and Joint Fisheries Statement.

We are aware of the significant potential implications of a zero-catch fishery for pollack. In line with our approach to other zero-advice stocks, we negotiated an allocation of pollack to address unavoidable bycatch by the UK fleet, to avoid choking related fisheries.

While the evidence base is limited, the ICES advice for pollack in area 6 and 7 notes that recreational catch is likely to be a large component of the total catch. Further work is needed to explore the potential to reduce pressure on the stock through management of the recreational fishery, underpinned by data and the best available scientific evidence. This is in line with our commitments under the Joint Fisheries Statement, including ensuring that recreational sea fishing is environmentally, socially and economically sustainable.

As this is a jointly managed stock with the EU, we have committed to take forward work on this important issue in the Specialised Committee on Fisheries as a matter of urgency in 2024. We will work closely with the recreational sector throughout this process.