Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what progress her Department has made implementing the recommendations of the Kark Review into the Fit and Proper Person Test.

The Kark Review was published in 2019 and made seven recommendations for the Government, Care Quality Commission (CQC), NHS England and other relevant organisations. The Government accepted five of those recommendations and the Department is working with NHS England to implement them.

In August 2023, NHS England published the Fit and Proper Persons Framework, which relates to the first four recommendations. This introduces a standardised reference system and a means of retaining information regarding background checks for individual directors. The new Framework came into effect on 30 September 2023 and all boards are now expected to have started work on implementing the Framework. By 31 March 2024, organisations will need to have fully implemented the Framework, incorporating a Leadership Competence Framework and updating the Electronic Staff Record database.

Recommendation six (to remove the words ‘privy to’ from relevant regulations) has not yet been implemented.