Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to reduce elective care waiting times for (a) joint replacement surgery and (b) other surgeries.

Reducing elective waiting times across all specialties is a key part of the Government’s Health Mission, and this includes waiting times for trauma and orthopaedics. We exceeded our pledge to deliver an extra two million appointments, tests, and operations in our first year of Government, delivering 5.2 million additional appointments between July 2024 and June 2025. This marked a vital First Step to delivering on our commitment to return to the National Health Service constitutional standard that 92% of patients wait no longer than 18 weeks from referral to consultant-led treatment by March 2029.

As of the end of November 2025, the number of trauma and orthopaedic pathways within 18 weeks stood at 59.2%, an improvement of 3.1% since the start of July 2024.

However, we know there is more to do, and have confirmed over £6 billion of additional capital investment to expand capacity across diagnostics, electives, and urgent care. This includes increasing the number of surgical hubs, which provide protected surgical capacity across elective specialities, including trauma and orthopaedics.

By separating elective services from urgent and emergency care, hubs improve patient outcomes and reduce hospital pressures. Almost three quarters of the 124 operational elective surgical hubs in England currently provide trauma and orthopaedics services.