Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what full compliance with the standards and conditional on demonstrating convincing progress along the way means in relation to the continued provision of level 1 services by the Royal Brompton Hospital as announced by his Department on 30 November 2017.

The commissioning of Congenital Heart Disease (CHD) services in England is a matter for NHS England. The Government will continue to hold NHS England to account as it takes forward the recommendations of its Review.

At its Board meeting on 30 November 2017, NHS England agreed to note the outline proposal presented by the Royal Brompton and Harefield NHS Foundation Trust for how full compliance against the standards might be achieved. NHS England also confirmed that NHS England would work with the Royal Brompton and Harefield NHS Foundation Trust and other potential partners on the full range of options for delivering a solution that could deliver full compliance with the standards and ensure the sustainability of other connected services; and stated they would continue to commission level 1 CHD services from the Trust, conditional on the Trust demonstrating sufficient progress within required timescales.

Full details of NHS England’s recommendations, including its implementation proposals, are available on its public website.