Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will publish the criteria for accrediting suppliers to the Health Systems Support Framework.

The Health System Support Framework (HSSF) comprises a number of service categories of accredited suppliers which integrated care systems can use to source subject matter expertise. There are currently over 29 service lines on the HSSF with each having different criteria of access based on policy need, maturity of the market and application national standards or technical capabilities. The assessment criteria for each of the different service lines is routinely published alongside the relevant Official Journal of the European Union (OJEU) advertisement when the service is put out to competitive tender.

For each of these categories, suppliers have been tested against a rigorous set of criteria to test organisational capability, track record of delivery, specialist skills and customer responsiveness. These are published through OJEU advertisements at the time of inviting suppliers to respond. The national contract with suppliers ensures they adhere to the latest standards around interoperability, information governance and cyber security.