Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, when Ministers in his Department were first informed about NHS England's decision to change the data collected in the 2015-16 Winter Daily Situation Reports; when that decision was taken; and who was responsible for making that decision.

NHS England worked closely with NHS Trust Development Authority (TDA), Monitor (now NHS Improvement) and the Department over the summer to design the approach to winter monitoring. The approach this year is proportionate and risk based whereby trusts who have previously encountered heightened operational pressure are given the most support and are subject to the closest monitoring locally. Less challenged trusts are subject to a lighter touch approach and are required to submit a smaller selection of data items in the daily return. The overall approach was agreed in September by the respective chief executives of NHS England, TDA and Monitor with the Secretary of State for Health.