Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps his Department is taking to help ensure the processes on (a) NHS England specialised services and (b) the development of new commissioning policies are transparent and inclusive of relevant stakeholders.

The processes for NHS England specialised services and the development of new commissioning policies are published online. NHS England makes decisions on which new specialised treatments should be routinely commissioned. The decisions are taken by NHS England’s Board based on advice from the Clinical Priorities Advisory Group, which consists of doctors, health experts and patient representatives. The October 2022 prioritisation decisions are available at the following link:

https://www.england.nhs.uk/commissioning/spec-services/october-2022-prioritisation-decisions/