Asked by: Peter Dowd (Labour - Bootle)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent discussions she has had with Integrated Care Boards in England on replacement programmes for radiotherapy machinery (LINACS); and what mechanisms are in place to allow her Department to oversee the effectiveness of those replacement programmes.
Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
Since April 2022, the responsibility for investing in new radiotherapy machines has sat with local systems. This is supported by the 2021 Spending Review, which set aside £12 billion in operational capital for the National Health Service, from 2022 to 2025.
The Government and NHS England are already taking steps to ensure that cancer patients can receive high quality radiotherapy treatment across England. This includes supporting advances in radiotherapy, using cutting-edge imaging and technology to help target radiation doses at cancer cells more precisely.