Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, pursuant to the Answer of 21 November 2017 to Question 113604, what assessment his Department has made of the effectiveness of minimum waiting times on (a) patient safety (b) patient choice and (c) waiting times.

There has been no such assessment.

How trusts schedule patient appointments is for local determination but national guidance and support is available from NHS England and NHS Improvement to support trusts to meet maximum waiting times standards.

Clinical priority is the main determinant of when patients should be treated followed by the chronological order of when they were added to the waiting list. Clinicians should make decisions about patients’ treatment and patients should not experience undue delay at any stage of their referral, diagnosis or treatment.