Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps his Department is taking to reduce waiting times for cancer treatment.

To support elective recovery and reduce waiting times, including for cancer treatment, the Government has taken steps by working with NHS England to publish the 'Delivery plan for tackling the COVID-19 backlogs in elective care' in February 2022. To deliver this plan, the Government plans to spend more than £8 billion from 2022/23 to 2024/25 to help drive up and protect elective activity, including cancer diagnosis and treatment activity.  This will further be supported by the additional £3.3 billion of funding in each of the next two years announced at the Autumn Statement to support the National Health Service.