Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps the Department is taking with the devolved administrations to increase the number of patients able to participate in commercial clinical trials across the UK.

The Government is committed to ensuring that all patients across the UK have access to cutting-edge clinical trials and innovative, lifesaving treatments, and we are working with the devolved administrations, delivery partners across the health system, and key stakeholders from across the clinical research sector – all under the umbrella of the UK Clinical Research Delivery Programme (UKCRD) – to increase commercial research participation, and make the UK a world leader in clinical trials.

To increase participation by patients across all four nations, we are establishing 21 new Commercial Research Delivery Centres (CRDCs) across the UK, alongside a UK-wide CRDC Network, which will coordinate activity, provide strategic leadership, and support consistency across the centres. The CRDC Network complements established UK-wide infrastructure, including the Experimental Cancer Medicine Centres Network and the UK Clinical Research Facility Network, which support research delivery, strengthen capability, and enable patients across England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland to access innovative clinical trials.

The Hon Member may also be aware that the National Institute for Health and Care Research provides a UK-wide online service called Be Part of Research, which promotes participation in health and social care research by allowing users to search for relevant studies and register their interest. This makes it easier for people across the UK to find and take part in commercial clinical trials and other health and care research.

In addition to the activity set out above, the Government is taking specific action through the UK Rare Diseases Framework to improve the lives of people living with rare diseases, and last year extended the framework to continue until 2027. The framework sets out four shared priorities for addressing rare diseases across England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland: improving speed of diagnosis; raising awareness of rare conditions with healthcare professionals; coordinating care; and providing access to specialist care and treatments.

Genomic testing and analysis of genomic data is at the heart of the UK Rare Diseases Framework, and the agencies contributing to that activity are taking constant steps to increase interoperability between rare disease registries, genomic data systems, and clinical records held across the four nations, to assist in research, testing and analysis.