Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether his Department has made an assessment of the potential merits of giving the Care Quality Commission more freedom to scrutinise the level of patient involvement of (a) Integrated Care Systems and (b) Integrated Care Boards.

The Care Quality Commission (CQC) has a new duty to review and assess integrated care systems (ICSs), in which integrated care boards (ICBs) are in scope, as a statutory body within an ICS. As part of these assessments, my Rt hon. Friend, the Secretary of State, has asked the CQC to consider whether each ICS is adequately considering the voices of people who use health and care services and their families, carers and representatives.

The CQC’s approach is driven by people’s needs and their experiences of health and care services. It will focus on what matters to the public and to local communities when they access, use and move between services.

It is the role of NHS England to assess an ICB’s performance against its statutory duties (such as the duty to promote the involvement of each patient).