The Government is fully committed to attracting, training, and recruiting the National Health Service workforce of the future, including paediatric pathologists.

NHS England established a national programme in late 2022 to address paediatric and perinatal pathologist workforce challenges and has undertaken significant work in relation to workforce funding, training, and incentives. This has included making additional funding available to support training posts in areas where there have been interested candidates but no training post available.

NHS England has also appointed a new National Training Programme Director, who has been working with the Lead Postgraduate Dean to influence positive changes to the examination structures in collaboration with the Royal College of Pathologists and the General Medical Council.

Specialist paediatric neurorehabilitation services are commissioned in line with the service specification published by the NHS England’s Clinical Reference Group for Paediatric Neurosciences. The service specification is available at the following link:

https://www.england.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Paediatric-Neurorehabilitation.pdf

The service specification sets out a national, multidisciplinary model for delivering intensive rehabilitation tailored to the needs of children with acquired brain injury (ABI), including those with brain tumours, as well as children with other neurological conditions. The service specification provides a framework for integrated, specialist paediatric neurorehabilitation, centred on early and intensive intervention, coordinated care across acute, specialist, and community settings, and sustained support throughout childhood, including transition to adult services.

As part of NHS England’s service specification review programme, the Paediatric Neurosciences Clinical Reference Group is currently reviewing the service specification. This work includes engagement with individual paediatric neurorehabilitation services to inform an updated model of care and to assess current provision and access. This review will support improvements in access to high-quality, intensive rehabilitation and ensure services are responsive to the needs of children and young people across England.

In October 2025, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) published new guidance on rehabilitation for chronic neurological disorders, including ABI. The guideline covers children and young people as well as adults. NICE guidelines are informed by clinical expertise, are evidence-based, and represent best practice. The Government expects commissioners and service providers to take NICE guidance fully into account in designing services that meet the needs of their local population and to work towards their implementation over time.

It is the responsibility of integrated care boards (ICBs) in England to make available appropriate provision to meet the health and care needs of their local population, including providing access to attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and autism services and support, in line with relevant National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) guidelines.

NHS England established an ADHD taskforce which brought together those with lived experience with experts from the NHS, education, charity, and justice sectors to get a better understanding of the challenges affecting those with ADHD, including in accessing services and support. The final report was published on 6 November 2025. The work of the independent ADHD Taskforce highlighted the need for coordinated action across health, education and public services to reform ADHD services and support.

On 4 December 2025, my Rt. Hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, announced the launch of an Independent Review into Prevalence and Support for Mental Health Conditions, ADHD and Autism. This will build on the work of the Independent ADHD Taskforce.

NHS England established a national programme in late 2022 to address paediatric and perinatal pathologist workforce challenges and has undertaken significant work in relation to workforce funding, training, and incentives. This has included making additional funding available to support training posts in areas where there have been interested candidates but no training post available and changes to the national training course and examination structure. The number of training posts has increased across several recruitment rounds and the perinatal and paediatric training pathway will be at a full complement of 16 training posts from February 2026.

It is the responsibility of integrated care boards (ICBs) in England to make available appropriate provision to meet the health and care needs of their local population, including providing access to attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) assessment and support, in line with relevant National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) guidelines.

NICE guidelines recommend that all medication for ADHD should only be initiated by a healthcare professional with training and expertise in diagnosing and managing ADHD and after titration and dose stabilisation. Prescribing and monitoring of ADHD medication should be carried out under shared care protocol arrangements with primary care.

NHS England established an ADHD taskforce which brought together those with lived experience with experts from the National Health Service, education, charity, and justice sectors to get a better understanding of the challenges affecting those with ADHD, including in accessing services and support. The final report was published on 6 November 2025. The work of the independent ADHD taskforce highlighted the need for coordinated action across health, education and public services to reform ADHD services and support.

On 4 December, my Rt. Hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, announced the launch of an Independent Review into Prevalence and Support for Mental Health Conditions, ADHD and Autism. The independent review will build directly on the evidence and recommendations of the ADHD taskforce. The taskforce’s report provides a strong, evidence‑based foundation, and the review will consider its findings in full to ensure conclusions are aligned and complementary. In the meantime, we are working with NHS England to deliver some of the taskforce’s recommendations such as on data improvement, enhancing mental health support teams in schools, improved commissioning and better collaboration between mental health and primary care services.

The Government is committed to tackling child poverty and to raising the healthiest generation of children ever. Our Children, Our Future: Tackling Child Poverty was published on 5 December 2025 and set out a goal to reduce and alleviate the impact of child poverty, with urgent action to improve the lives of children in deepest poverty.

We recognise the significant financial and practical pressures faced by low-income families when a child with a long-term condition requires hospital care. To support eligible low-income families with the costs associated with repeated or prolonged hospital stays, the NHS Healthcare Travel Costs Scheme provides support with the cost of travelling to hospital appointments.

In addition, many hospitals work with charitable partners, such as Ronald McDonald House Charities, to provide free or low-cost accommodation close to specialist children’s hospitals, helping parents stay near their child during treatment.

In the 10-Year Health Plan for England, published in July 2025, we set out that over the next three years we will create 1,000 new specialty training posts with a focus on specialties where there is greatest need. We will set out next steps in due course.

The Government is committed to raising the healthiest generation of children ever. This includes ensuring that children receive the appropriate care and support whenever they need it.

The 10-Year Health Plan sets out how the Government aims to support children and young people as they navigate the National Health Service, ensuring they feel comfortable and confident in managing their own health and care from 16 years old where appropriate. This includes supporting young people as they move from child to adolescent and adult services, making sure that care is developmentally appropriate throughout.

NHS England has developed guidance for integrated care boards and healthcare providers to aid the design of transition pathways that improve health outcomes for all young people. This guidance will be published in due course.

Decisions about recruitment are a matter for individual National Health Service employers, who manage this at a local level to ensure they have the staff they need to deliver effective care.

The Government is committed to publishing a 10 Year Workforce Plan to set out action to create a workforce ready to deliver the transformed service set out in the 10-Year Health Plan. The 10 Year Workforce Plan will ensure the NHS has the right people in the right places, with the right skills when needed.

Decisions about recruitment are a matter for individual National Health Service employers, who manage this at a local level to ensure they have the staff they need to deliver effective care.

The Government is committed to publishing a 10 Year Workforce Plan to set out action to create a workforce ready to deliver the transformed service set out in the 10-Year Health Plan.

The 10 Year Workforce Plan will ensure the NHS has the right people in the right places, with the right skills when needed.

We are engaging with partners throughout this process. As we continue the open and wide-ranging conversations we’ve been having with staff, patients, and organisations, including royal colleges across the country, we will ensure that the engagement is robust and representative of different stakeholder groups.

The Department recognises the importance of supporting and maintaining children’s right to play in healthcare settings.

The NHS England and Starlight Play Well Toolkit, published in June 2025, includes the first national guidelines and standards for commissioning and delivering health play services in England. It aims to improve access to child-friendly care and specialised health play services across paediatric healthcare.

To support adoption of Play Well standards, NHS England is promoting the toolkit to managers of health play services across a wide range of settings, including community clinics, emergency departments, children’s hospices, and acute paediatric wards. The toolkit provides clear guidance on supporting practical training and mentorship in healthcare settings.

A range of communication channels have been used to raise awareness, including engagement with services via professional bodies, messaging via the Chief Nursing Officer, a blog posts and ongoing promotion of the toolkit across the National Health Service through operational delivery networks, directly to trusts and directly with professional groups.

We will deliver a Neighbourhood Health Service that serves everybody, everywhere across the country, including children and young people.

An important feature of our new Neighbourhood Health Service will be the rollout of Neighbourhood Health Centres in every community, including multidisciplinary neighbourhood teams who will work together around the needs of children and families.

The make-up of neighbourhood multi-disciplinary teams for children and young people is locally determined by integrated care boards. Local commissioners determine the role for each practitioner within neighbourhood multidisciplinary teams based upon the clinical interventions being undertaken.

Play specialists could be involved as part of a neighbourhood multi-disciplinary teams for children and young people but this is likely only appropriate for multi-disciplinary teams who provide face to face patient care. For example, when a general practitioner and paediatrician hold a joint clinic in the practice or local setting.

Patients in England have a right to request their local integrated care board (ICB) find an alternative provider when they have been waiting, or expect to wait, over 18 weeks to begin treatment for consultant-led care.

ICBs are required to take all reasonable steps to ensure the patient is offered an appointment with a clinically appropriate alternative provider with whom an ICB or NHS England has an NHS Standard Contract for the relevant service, who can start their treatment more quickly. Further information is available on the NHS Choice Framework at the following link:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/the-nhs-choice-framework/

The Government’s ambition is to restore performance against the NHS Constitutional standard, which requires 92% of patients to start consultant-led treatment within 18 weeks.

All waiting lists are subject to clinical prioritisation at a local level. The National Health Service triages patients waiting for elective care, including surgeries, ensuring the order in which patients are seen reflects clinical judgement on need as well as taking into account overall wait time.

The Spending Review 2025 has prioritised health, with record investment in the health and social care system, including investment in elective services. Through the Spending Review, the Government announced that NHS day to day spending will increase by £29 billion in real terms by 2028/29 compared to 2023/24.

The Department recognises the impact of long waits on children and young people and is committed to reducing paediatric waiting times.

Through the Elective Recovery Plan, we have invested in additional capacity, including surgical hubs, community diagnostic centres, and increased use of the independent sector to support challenged trusts.

Targeted support is provided via Getting It Right First Time and specialty-specific improvement programmes, including paediatric ear, nose, and throat, and ophthalmology. National planning guidance sets expectations for systems to prioritise clinically urgent cases and those at risk of deterioration.

The Government is committed to ensuring that patient outcomes will be at the heart of building a National Health Service that is fit for the future.

National planning guidance sets expectations for systems to prioritise clinically urgent cases and those at risk of deterioration. The NHS triages patients waiting for elective care at a local level, ensuring the order in which patients are seen reflects clinical judgement on need as well as taking into account overall wait time.

We have committed to ensuring that integrated care boards and providers have interventions in place to reduce disparities for groups who face additional waiting list challenges, and primary and secondary care clinicians are to improve e-RS functionality, a national digital platform for referring patients into elective care, by including data to enable better prioritisation of children and young people.

The clinically led Getting It Right First Time children and young people programme continue to work with providers to ensure they are implementing best practice to improve children’s outcomes and waiting times across all medical and surgical specialities.

We do not hold data on how many children have waited more than 26 and 40 weeks for an initial paediatric referral triage in the most recent 12-month period.

Published referral to treatment data covers the period on waiting time from referral to first definitive treatment.

The median average waiting time for paediatric referrals for those that are currently on the referral to treatment waiting list is:

- 8.7 weeks for the East and North Hertfordshire NHS Trust;

- 8.7 weeks for the Hertfordshire and West Essex Integrated Care Board (ICB); and

- 9.9 weeks for England.

Our Elective Reform Plan (ERP), published in January 2025, sets out how the National Health Service will reform elective care services and meet the 18-week referral to treatment standard for all patients, including children and young people, by March 2029. As a first step to achieving this, we exceeded our pledge to deliver an extra two million operations, scans, and appointments in our first year of Government, delivering 5.2 million more appointments.

We have made it easier to monitor elective waiting times for children and young people by publishing new demographic data as part of monthly inequalities statistical releases. This is a big step forward in improving the transparency of waiting times and will provide accountability for children’s elective waiting lists.

The ERP outlined several commitments specifically in relation to children and young people including that ICBs and providers should ensure interventions are in place to reduce disparities for groups who face additional waiting list challenges, and that primary and secondary care clinicians are encouraged to improve digital referral functionality by including data that enables better prioritisation.

In addition, the clinically led Getting It Right First Time Children and Young people programme continues to work with providers to ensure they are implementing best practice to improve children’s outcomes and waiting times across all medical and surgical specialities.

Lastly, dedicated paediatric surgery days are being introduced across England, using existing NHS estate in day surgery or hub settings, to boost surgical activity for children and young people. We are also making the most of surgical hubs to deliver better outcomes for children, through promoting greater paediatric ear, nose, and throat access. Surgical hubs will play a key role in delivering this increased activity and ensuring timely access to planned care.

Integrated care boards are responsible for ensuring that appropriate specialist support is available for paediatric medical emergencies in their areas. In Surrey Heath, this responsibility sits with the Frimley Integrated Care System.

Children who require specialist support for medical emergencies in the Surrey Heath constituency are served by their local hospital at Frimley Park which has a dedicated Paediatric Emergency Department. The Paediatric Emergency Department is a separate facility within the main department and is open 24 hours a day.

Children who require treatment for sudden medical emergencies can also access the South East Coast Ambulance Service via 999. Following support from the ambulance service, children may be taken to the Paediatric Emergency Department at Frimley Park Hospital or another suitable facility.

In our Urgent and Emergency Care Plan for 2025/26, we commit to increasing the number of children seen within four hours in accident and emergency. This means thousands of children every month receiving more timely care than before.

The Department continues to work with NHS England and local systems to monitor capacity so that children receive timely, specialist care in emergencies.

The steps taken include the production of the Paediatric and child health advanced practice area specific capability and curriculum framework, which was co-produced by NHS England and the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health. The framework is available at the following link:

https://advanced-practice.hee.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/sites/28/2025/01/Paediatric-and-child-Health-advanced-practice-area-specific-capability-and-curriculum-framework-NHSE.pdf

The framework outlines area specific capabilities and a curriculum addressing the full spectrum of paediatric health needs, including recognising and managing cardiac and respiratory conditions.