Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask His Majesty's Government what governance arrangements will oversee the development and implementation of the NHS single patient record; and what independent scrutiny will be applied.

The development and implementation of the Single Patient Record (SPR) will be overseen through the governance arrangements for the Transforming and Connecting Care (TCC) Programme. These provide accountability for design and delivery, with oversight from the Senior Responsible Officer, Programme Director and Programme Design Director. The Programme Board will provide overall governance, strategic leadership and decision-making authority.

Delivery will be overseen by the TCC Programme Delivery Group, which will focus on how and when programme outcomes are delivered. Design will be overseen by the TCC Programme Design Authority, which will assure what the programme is delivering, including coherence across products, architecture, clinical safety, cyber security, information governance, policy and transformation. SPR project-level governance will report into these.

Independent scrutiny will be provided through advisory and assurance routes, including the Clinical Advisory Group and the Data Transformation Check and Challenge Group. The programme also engages with external organisations and expert bodies as part of its governance and assurance arrangements, including participation by the National Cyber Security Centre in relevant design authority discussions to provide specialist cyber security expertise and challenge.

These advisory, assurance and external challenge mechanisms will support robust scrutiny throughout the design and implementation of the SPR, complemented by additional independent assurance commissioned at key points in the programme.