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 NHS waiting times; and if he will make a statement.

The National Health Service will increase bed capacity by the equivalent of at least 7,000 general and acute beds to improve patient flows through hospitals and reduce waiting times. A £500 million Adult Social Care Discharge Fund has been established to reduce delayed discharge and we have allocated an additional £150 million to ambulance services to increase response times and £20 million to upgrade the ambulance fleet.

The target to eliminate waiting times of two years or more for elective procedures was met in July 2022 and we aim to eliminate waiting time of eighteen months or more by April 2023. This will be achieved through increasing capacity, seeking alternate capacity in other trusts or the independent sector and engaging with patients to understand choices made regarding their care.

We have set an expectation that patients who need an appointment with a general practitioner practice within two weeks should receive one and patients with urgent needs should be seen on the same day. ‘Our plan for patients’ includes measures to assist patients to book general practice appointments and diversify general practice teams to deliver over a million additional appointments. The NHS Long Term Plan commits a further £2.3 billion a year to expand mental health services by 2023/24 and enable an additional two million people to be treated by NHS mental health services. We also provided £500 million in 2021/22 to accelerate these plans and address waiting times for mental health services.