Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what discussions he is having with Roche Diagnostics on provision of blood tests in South East London; and what steps is he taking to increase the capacity of blood testing services in that area.

NHS England and NHS Improvement have been meeting with the senior management team at Roche regularly, including representatives of the Department and the devolved administrations. A daily review of every pathology network in England, including South East London, takes place, with urgent issues raised directly to Roche for prioritisation.

The National Health Service’s commercial relationship with Roche is between pathology networks or individual NHS trusts and foundation trusts and the supplier. Key Performance Indicators and contract penalties sit within those individual, local contracts. NHS England and NHS Improvement are providing support to pathology networks to ensure any local contractual terms and conditions are applied correctly in light of the current incident. NHS England and NHS Improvement, along with counterparts in the devolved administrations, are working closely with Roche on the implementation and delivery of a recovery plan to restore normal supply to the pathology networks.