Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, pursuant to the Answer of 24 July 2017 to Question 5811, how many areas were subject to the capped expenditure process plan to reduce the number of endoscopies undertaken.

This information is not held centrally.

The National Health Service and wider health system has examined how to sustain and improve care – which produced the NHS Five Year Forward View. The Government is committed to providing an additional £8 billion in real terms by 2020-21 to back the NHS’ plan, enabling it to deliver key priorities like seven day care, improved access to cancer treatments and better mental health services.

All public services, local NHS areas need to live within the budget agreed – otherwise they effectively take up resources that could be spent on general practitioners, mental health care, and cancer treatment. As part of their financial planning, NHS England and NHS Improvement have been running a process to look at how a small number of areas could do more to balance their financial plans, as many already have.

It is important that these plans are consistent with constitutional standards on waiting times and patient choice. The majority of patients should receive their diagnostic tests within six weeks from referral. However, it is right that the NHS should consider efficiency savings, such as reducing delayed transfers of care, or reducing running costs – because this improves patient care overall.