Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what the average length of time taken by clinical commissioning groups in each of the last three years to deal with individual funding requests is.

NHS England has advised that it does not collect information on the average length of time taken by clinical commissioning groups (CCGs) to deal with individual funding requests (IFRs).

IFRs are the responsibility of individual CCGs for the majority of NHS services.

NHS England is also responsible for some IFRs, for example, for specialised services. Further general information about NHS England’s policy on IFRs can be found at the following link:

https://www.england.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/comm-policy-indivdual-funding-requests.pdf

In relation to IFRs, the document states that, for NHS England directed IFRs:

“The standard period for providing a decision on a funding request is a maximum period of 30 working days from the date of the receipt of a fully completed IFR form to the date the requesting clinician is informed of the outcome (inclusive).”