Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what (a) support and (b) resources the Government plans to make available to tackle the backlog in cancer diagnosis and treatment.

We are committed to recovering cancer services by the end of March 2022, returning to February 2020 levels for waiting times between a general practitioner appointment and referral and the number of people waiting for over 62 days for treatment.

Diagnostic capacity is being increased, particularly in endoscopy, computerised tomography and targeted lung health checks. Rapid diagnostic centres are bringing together diagnostic equipment and expertise and increasing capacity. The National Health Service is maximising innovative treatments adopted during the pandemic, including new radiotherapy methods to deliver targeted treatment in fewer hospital visits.

At the Spending Review 2021, we announced an extra £5.9 billion to support elective recovery, diagnostics and technology over the next three years. This includes £2.3 billion to increase the volume of diagnostic activity and launching community diagnostic centres to address backlogs of clinical tests.