Homelessness and rough sleeping is far too high. That is why we have made homelessness prevention a core pillar of our National Plan to End Homelessness, and increased funding for homelessness and rough sleeping services to a record £4 billion over the next three years.

The government publishes quarterly homelessness statistics, including data on homelessness applications and how many households were living in temporary accommodation which can be found on gov.uk here.

Homelessness and rough sleeping is far too high. That is why we have made homelessness prevention a core pillar of our National Plan to End Homelessness, and increased funding for homelessness and rough sleeping services to a record £4 billion over the next three years.

The government publishes quarterly homelessness statistics, including data on homelessness applications and how many households were living in temporary accommodation which can be found on gov.uk here.

Homelessness and rough sleeping is far too high. That is why we have made homelessness prevention a core pillar of our National Plan to End Homelessness, and increased funding for homelessness and rough sleeping services to a record £4 billion over the next three years.

The government publishes quarterly homelessness statistics, including data on homelessness applications and how many households were living in temporary accommodation which can be found on gov.uk here.

The government is committed to working with social housing providers to ensure that homes are safe, decent, warm, and free from damp and mould.

The Deputy Prime Minister made a Written Ministerial Statement on 6 February (HCWS423) confirming that the government will bring Awaab’s Law into force for damp and mould in October 2025.

Awaab’s Law will empower social tenants to hold their landlords to account by law if they fail to investigate and fix hazards within their homes within set timescales. Tenants will be able to hold their social landlords to account by seeking redress through the Housing Ombudsman Service or taking legal action through the courts for a breach of contract.

The government is also committed to consulting on a new Decent Homes Standard and Minimum Energy Efficiency Standards this year which will enable upfront preventative measures on disrepair and deliver improvements to tackle damp and mould.

Halton Borough Council will receive £4.5 million from the Recovery Grant in 2025-26. The Recovery Grant is targeted towards areas with greater need and demand for services and less ability to raise income locally. This grant is the first meaningful step towards long overdue funding reform but the government is clear that this is not comprehensive reform. The metrics in this grant will not be as sophisticated as the fully updated assessment of need we are consulting on, and deprivation is the best available proxy.

This Government recognises that council funding has been under pressure since 2010. Detailed information on core spending power and settlement funding for Halton Borough Council from 2015/16 to 2020/21 can be viewed here.

Due to changes in the function and financing of local government, comparable data on Core Spending Power is not available prior to 2015/16.

Halton Borough Council will receive £4.5 million from the Recovery Grant in 2025-26. The Recovery Grant is targeted towards areas with greater need and demand for services and less ability to raise income locally. This grant is the first meaningful step towards long overdue funding reform but the government is clear that this is not comprehensive reform. The metrics in this grant will not be as sophisticated as the fully updated assessment of need we are consulting on, and deprivation is the best available proxy.

This Government recognises that council funding has been under pressure since 2010. Detailed information on core spending power and settlement funding for Halton Borough Council from 2015/16 to 2020/21 can be viewed here.

Due to changes in the function and financing of local government, comparable data on Core Spending Power is not available prior to 2015/16.

The standard method for calculating local housing need figures for each local authority, including Halton, and Chester West and Chester, is set out in the Government Response to the ‘Proposed reforms to the National Planning Policy Framework and other changes to the planning system’. This can be found on gov.uk here.

The standard method should be used to identify the total number of homes needed in a local area. However, within this context it is for local authorities to identify the size, type and tenure of housing needed for different groups in the community, including those who require affordable housing.

There is, at present, no single, established dataset that can be used to monitor waiting times for the assessment and diagnosis of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) nationally, or for individual organisations or geographies in England.  Although the data requested is not held centrally, it may be held locally by individual National Health Service trusts or commissioners.

We are supporting a taskforce that NHS England has established to look at ADHD service provision and its impact on patient experience. The taskforce is bringing together expertise from across a broad range of sectors, including the NHS, education, and justice, to better understand the challenges affecting people with ADHD, including timely access to services and support.

Alongside the work of the taskforce, NHS England will continue to develop a national ADHD data improvement plan, carry out more detailed work to understand the provider and commissioning landscape, and capture examples from local health systems which are trialling innovative ways of delivering ADHD services, to ensure best practice is captured and shared across the system.

This Government will work hand in hand with councils like Halton and ensure the sector gets back on its feet by moving towards multi-year funding settlements, ending competitive bidding processes and reforming the local audit system.

Future local authority funding decisions will be a matter for the next Spending Review and Local Government Finance Settlement in which we are engaged.

The department will work with local government leaders to ensure they are better able to fulfil their statutory duties.

This Government will work hand in hand with councils like Halton and ensure the sector gets back on its feet by moving towards multi-year funding settlements, ending competitive bidding processes and reforming the local audit system.

Future local authority funding decisions will be a matter for the next Spending Review and Local Government Finance Settlement in which we are engaged.

The department will work with local government leaders to ensure they are better able to fulfil their statutory duties.

The Government plans to tackle the challenges patients face when trying to access National Health Service dental care with a rescue plan to provide 700,000 more urgent dental appointments and recruit new dentists to the areas that need them most. To rebuild dentistry in the long term and increase access to NHS dental care, we will reform the dental contract, with a shift to focus on prevention and the retention of NHS dentists.

From 1 April 2023, the responsibility for commissioning primary care dentistry to meet the needs of the local population has been delegated to all integrated care boards (ICBs) across England. The NHS Cheshire and Merseyside ICB is responsible for having local processes in place to identify areas of need, and determine the priorities for investment across the ICB area. NHS Dental Statistics, published by NHS Digital, provides data on dental activity in England. The latest annual report is available at the following link:

https://digital.nhs.uk/data-and-information/publications/statistical/nhs-dental-statistics

The information is not held in the format requested. Data is collected on patients waiting over 52 weeks, 65 weeks and 78 weeks, with more information available at the following link:

https://www.england.nhs.uk/statistics/statistical-work-areas/rtt-waiting-times/rtt-data-2023-24/#Dec23

Data on the number of children on a waiting list for an assessment for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is not held centrally, but may be held locally by individual National Health Service trusts or commissioners. The Cheshire and Merseyside integrated care board (ICB) has provided data on the number of children awaiting an ADHD assessment, and state that at the end of January 2024, there were 230 children awaiting an assessment in Halton. The longest wait time for an ADHD assessment in Halton is 53 weeks, with an average wait time for assessment and outcome or diagnosis of 46 weeks.

The Department is exploring options for improving national data collection and reporting on waiting times for ADHD assessments, to help improve access to ADHD assessments in a timely way, and in line with the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence’s guideline on ADHD. The National Institute for Health and Care Research has commissioned a research project to provide initial insights into local ADHD assessment waiting time data collection.

With respect to autism, NHS England publishes data on how many people are waiting for an autism diagnosis and for how long, which provides useful information nationally and locally to support local areas in improving their performance and reducing assessment and diagnosis waiting times. Data is not available publicly for the Borough of Halton, but is available publicly for the Cheshire and Merseyside ICB, and therefore the ICB has provided data on numbers of children waiting for autism assessments in Halton. As of the end of January 2024, they state there were 848 children awaiting autism assessment in Halton. The longest wait time for an autism assessment panel and outcome or diagnosis in Halton is 107 weeks.

The NHS Cheshire and Merseyside ICB advises that it is working with providers to increase capacity, and has put waiting list initiatives in place to help reduce waiting times for autism assessments. The ICB also commissions pre and post diagnosis support for children and young people on autism and ADHD waiting lists, and is planning on commissioning a coordinator role to support families whilst they are waiting for neurodevelopmental assessments.

The Department has not had any direct discussions with NHS trusts or integrated care boards (ICBs) on the delegation of commissioning duties for radiotherapy treatment services from NHS England to ICBs across the Halton constituency.

NHS England’s National Moderation Panel will determine how many ICBs will take on responsibility for specialised commissioning in October 2023. Following this moderation process, recommendations will be taken to the NHS England Board for final decisions in December 2023, before new arrangements go live from April 2024.

This process will consider the delegation of radiotherapy commissioning for ICBs across England including across the Halton constituency.

The data requested is not held centrally.

National Health Service dental practice profiles at NHS.UK show whether practices are currently accepting new patients. This information is available at the following link:

https://www.nhs.uk/service-search/find-a-dentist

Alongside the announcement of successful bids to Round 2 of the Levelling Up Fund, we published an Explanatory Note detailing the Levelling Up Fund assessment, shortlisting and decision-making processes. Any further announcements will be made in the usual way. Meanwhile feedback for unsuccessful applicants is continuing.

This information is not collected in the format requested. Data on cancer patients who received an urgent referral and the time in which they received their first treatment is not collected at local authority level.

NHS England publish cancer waiting times data at trust level. Provisional data from NHS England for February 2023 shows Warrington and Halton Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust provided first treatment to 27 patients who received an urgent general practitioner referral for suspected cancer within 62 days of that referral. This equates to 57% of all cancer patients who received an urgent referral to Warrington and Halton Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust.