Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what plans they have to ensure that providers of NHS specialised services comply with the terms of the service specifications published by NHS England.

The service specification compliance process has two core components:

- Each service specification will contain a set of quality indicators. The indicators will include clinical outcome metrics (these will also become the specialised service quality dashboard for that service), structure and function metrics and patient experience metrics. The indicators are being developed as a phased approach and in conjunction with the six programmes of care; and

- Submission of data to Quality Dashboards. 35% of the services are currently covered by a quality dashboard with an agreed development programme to extend this to 80% between 2017 - 2019.

Providers are required to submit data against the quality indicators on an annual basis and the quality dashboards on a quarterly basis via the Quality Surveillance Information System portal.