Written question WQ93302

Welsh Government is committed to working with hospices and the national programme board for palliative end of life care to find a sustainable financial funding settlement for Welsh hospices.

To aid our understanding, we have supported children’s hospices in Wales to commission a paediatric palliative care prevalence study to provide up to date information of paediatric palliative care needs in Wales.

As part of our Programme for Government commitment to review palliative and end of life care funding, we have also provided an additional £2.2m for hospices on a recurrent basis from April 2022, including an additional £900,000 for children’s hospices.

In addition, earlier this year we provided an additional £4m one-off hospice cost of living grant to help ensure hospices can continue to provide their vital services and keep on providing high-quality care across Wales. This included £775,000 for children’s hospices.

Looking forward, we have agreed to the development of a hospice commissioning framework for Wales. This work is being taken forward by the National Programme Board for Palliative and End- of- Life Care with support from new National NHS Wales Joint Commissiong Unit Committee (JCC). The framework will be developed in conjunction with Welsh hospices, and it is intended that it will support both adult and children’s hospices.