Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to Dr Ruth Watkinson and Dr Alex Turner’s research from the University of Manchester, whether routine monitoring of ethnic disparities in healthcare and potential causing factors have been included as part of performance measurement of local health systems.

The Health and Care Act 2022 provides for statutory arrangements for integrated care systems, comprising an integrated care board (ICB) and an integrated care partnership.

ICBs have a range of new duties on health inequalities under the Act and must have due regard to the need to reduce inequalities in access to and outcomes from health services. NHS England is required to conduct an annual performance assessment of how well each ICB has discharged its functions, including a regard to the duties on health inequalities. NHS England’s ‘2022/23 priorities and operational planning guidance’ sets the expectation that ICB and trust board performance packs are disaggregated by deprivation and ethnicity and NHS England and NHS Improvement are using this approach in performance reporting to its own boards. In addition, using data and analytics to redesign care pathways and measure outcomes to improve equity of access for underserved communities was a specific priority in the guidance.