Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to section 6.26 of the guidance entitled 2024 Voluntary Scheme for Branded Medicines Pricing, Access and Growth, published on 20 November 2023, whether her Department has been allocated additional resources to consider exceptional circumstances.

In the vast majority of instances, payments required under the 2024 Voluntary Scheme for Branded Medicines Pricing, Access and Growth will be affordable for companies, or can be mitigated by standard price increase processes. In exceptional circumstances only, the scheme allows companies to apply to increase their National Health Service list price, and for older medicines to reduce their top-up payment percentage, even when their wider portfolio is otherwise profitable. To qualify, a product must be demonstrably uneconomic to supply, there must be clear evidence that supply disruption would otherwise occur, and this disruption must have a negative impact on patients or the NHS. The Department already has processes and committees to consider applications for exceptional circumstances, established under previous pricing schemes.