Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what plans his Department has to address the backlog in (a) CT and (b) MRI appointments.

The ‘Delivery plan for tackling the COVID-19 backlog of elective care’ sets out how the National Health Service will recover and expand elective services, including reducing the backlog of diagnostic services. By March 2025, 95% of patients needing a diagnostic test should receive it within six weeks.

We have allocated more than £8 billion from 2022/23 to 2024/25 to deliver over nine million additional treatments and diagnostic procedures over the next three years. We have also provided £2.3 billion to increase diagnostic activity and reduce patient waiting times through community diagnostic centres (CDCs), with up to 160 CDCs available by March 2025. CDCs will offer imaging services including computed tomography and magnetic resonance imaging scans.