Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent progress his Department has made on developing surgical hubs across England.

Following successful pilots in London, the National Health Service is launching surgical hubs across the country. There are currently 44 stand-alone hubs operating in England.

We are providing a further £1.5 billion for elective recovery and reconfiguration, which includes funding for developing surgical hubs. This is in addition to £500 million provided in September 2021. Surgical hubs will be developed in existing hospital settings and plan to provide 29 types of operations.

The Getting It Right First Time programme, in collaboration with NHS England and NHS Improvement, is providing guidance to systems and regions on how to use hubs effectively, to standardise pathways and adopt best surgical practice.