---

Social Care Recruitment Campaign

Mr. Burstow: To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many of the calls to the help line and visits to the website resulted in job applications in respect of the first phase of the social care recruitment campaign announced on 19 October 2001. [32660]

Jacqui Smith [holding answer 6 February 2002]: The main aim of the social care recruitment campaign is to raise the number of people applying for social

8 Feb 2002 : Column 1236W

work training by 5000 by 2004. As the current social work training takes two years, and the earliest that someone reacting to the campaign could join a course is autumn 2002, we would not expect the campaign to cause an increase in job applications until summer 2004 at the earliest.

Mr. Burstow: To ask the Secretary of State for Health what outcome measures have been set for each phase of the social care recruitment campaign announced on 19 October. [32672]

Jacqui Smith: [holding answer 6 February 2002]: The overall aim of the social care recruitment campaign is to raise the number of people applying for social work training by 5,000 by 2004. We will monitor numbers applying for training through the figures provided by the Social Work Admissions Service. The figures for autumn 2002 (the first year to be affected by the campaign) will be publicly available in December 2002.

The target for the first phase of the campaign (19 October 2001 to 30 November 2001) was to generate at least 9,000 calls to the help line. This target was exceeded by over 60 per cent., with over 14,000 calls to the help line as well as over 11,000 visitors to the campaign website.

Medicines Control

Mr. Burstow: To ask the Secretary of State for Health what statistical information is collected by the Medicines Control Agency to enable it to monitor the adverse effects associated with inappropriate use and overuse of medication. [32661]

Ms Blears [holding answer 6 February 2002]: Reports of adverse effects to medicines are collated by the Medicines Control Agency (MCA) and the Committee on Safety of Medicines (CSM) through the spontaneous reporting scheme, the Yellow Card Scheme. Although the main focus of this scheme is the early detection of previously unrecognised adverse reactions to medicines in normal clinical use, the Yellow Card Scheme does collect reports of adverse events arising from overdose or maladministration. A number of articles have been published in the regular bulletin "Current Problems in Pharmacovigilance" to alert health professionals to concerns in relation to specific medicines.

Guidance on the use and side effects of medicines is provided to patients in the "Patient Information Leaflet" which accompanies the medicine. The MCA and the CSM continually monitor the safety of all medicines to ensure that the product information contains appropriate and up-to-date guidance on safe, correct use at the recommended dose and warnings about side effects.

Expenditure (Somerset and Dorset)

Mr. Laws: To ask the Secretary of State for Health what his estimate is of the expenditure by weighted head, in real terms using 2000–01 prices, by health authorities and primary care trusts in (a) Somerset and (b) Dorset for each year from 1985–86 to 2000–01; and if he will make a statement. [32559]

8 Feb 2002 : Column 1237W

Ms Blears [holding answer 8 February 2002]: For the reasons set out in the notes to the table, expenditure per head cannot be reliably compared between health authorities.

The expenditure per weighted head of population in for 1996–97 to 2000–01 in real terms is shown in the table. Data prior to 1996–97 are not comparable owing to the reorganisation of the national health service on 1 April 1996.

Expenditure per weighted head in cash terms£

	Health authority
	Dorset	Somerset
1996–97	662.77	670.89
1997–98	619.23	654.16
1998–99	661.42	680.07
1999–2000	758.69	734.63
2000–01	1,023.69	825.30

Notes:

1. In many health authorities there are factors which distort the expenditure per head. These include:

the health authority acting in a lead capacity to commission health care or fund training on behalf of other health bodies;

asset revaluations in national health service trusts being funded through health authorities; and

some double counting of expenditure between health authorities and primary care trust within the health authority area.

Allocations per weighted head of population provide a much more reliable measures to identify differences between funding of health authorities.

2. Expenditure is taken from health authority and primary care trust summarisation forms which are prepared on a resource basis and therefore differ from allocations in the year. The expenditure is the total spent by the health authority and by the primary care trusts within each health authority area. The majority of General Dental Services expenditure is not included in the health authority or primary care trust accounts and is separately accounted for by the Dental Practice Board.

3. Health authorities and primary care trusts should account for their expenditure on a gross basis. This results in an element of double counting where one body acts as the main commissioner and is then reimbursed by other bodies. The effect of this double counting within the answer for 2000–01 cannot be identified.

Sources:

Health authority accounts 1996–97 to 1998–99

Health authority summarisation forms 1999–2000 and 2000–01

Primary Care Trust summarisation schedules 2000–01

Weighted population estimates 1996–97 to 2000–01

Correspondence

Mr. Laws: To ask the Secretary of State for Health for what reasons he has not replied to the letter from

8 Feb 2002 : Column 1238W

Somerset county council, dated 29 November 2001, to his Department on social services funding; and if he will make a statement. [32875]

Ms Blears [holding answer 6 February 2002]: The Department has no record of receiving the original letter from Chris Davies, corporate director of Somerset county council. A duplicate copy of this letter was received on 1 February 2002. A reply will be sent as soon as possible.

Hospital Waiting Times (Somerset and Dorset)

Mr. Laws: To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many people have been waiting for more than (a) three months, (b) six months, (c) nine months, (d) 12 months, (e) 15 months and (f) 18 months for (i) in-patient and (b) out patient treatment in (A) Somerset and (B) Dorset health authorities; and if he will make a statement. [32562]

Ms Blears [holding answer 6 February 2002]: The latest published information on waiting times in Somerset and Dorset health authorities is shown in the tables.

Patients waiting for ordinary and day case admissions at 30 September 2001

	Somerset HA	Dorset HA
0–5 months	8,558	8,684
6–11 months	2,659	73
12–17 months	406	1
18 months plus	0	0

Source:

Hospital in-patient waiting list statistics, England, population based: The "Yellow Book".

Patients waiting for a first out-patient appointment at 30 September 2001

	Somerset HA	Dorset HA
13–25 weeks	2,370	604
26 weeks plus	818	35

Source:

Waiting times for first out-patient appointment, England, population based: The "Purple Book".

NHS Appointments

Mr. Burstow: To ask the Secretary of State for Health, pursuant to his answer of 29 January 2002, Official Report, column 269–70W, on NHS appointments, how many people in each year since 1996 who have been appointed to a position within the NHS have declared a political interest, broken down by political parties; and what proportion of the total number of appointees this represents for each political party. [34156]

Ms Blears [holding answer 7 February 2002]: The information requested is shown in the table.

	1996		1997		1998		1999		2000		2001
	Number	%	Number	%	Number	%	Number	%	Number	%	Number	%
Conservative	90	7.15	18	3.14	49	3.90	30	3.51	57	4.61	71	4.14
Labour	103	8.19	139	24.30	247	19.67	145	16.98	229	18.53	358	20.86
Liberal Democrat	16	1.27	22	3.85	27	2.15	9	1.05	39	3.16	69	4.02
Independent	5	0.40	2	0.35	7	0.56	7	0.82	9	0.73	18	1.05
Other	9	0.72	2	0.35	6	0.48	3	0.35	5	0.40	8	0.47
None	1,035	82.87	389	68.01	290	73.25	660	77.28	897	72.57	1,192	69.47
Total	1,258	100.00	572	100.00	1,256	100.00	854	100.00	1,236	100.00	1,716	100.00

8 Feb 2002 : Column 1239W

---