Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what scope the joint committees of NHS England and clinical commissioning groups will have to deviate from national service specifications for specialised services in (a) 2015-16 and (b) future years.

Whilst NHS England remains the accountable commissioner for a specialised service, national service specifications and policies will still apply in their entirety. This position applies even when there are services which are collaboratively commissioned with clinical commissioning groups (CCGs) through joint committee arrangements.

If a service is transferred to CCG commissioning responsibility there will need to be an agreed transition plan about the continued use of national service specifications and policies.