Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent steps he has taken to help reduce NHS waiting times in Cumbria.

Tackling the waiting-list is a top priority for the Government. We have exceeded our pledge to deliver over two million more elective care appointments. More than double that number, 5.2 million more appointments, have now been delivered in England.

On 6 January 2025, NHS England published the new Elective Reform Plan, which sets out a whole system approach to delivering on the commitment that 92% of patients will wait no longer than 18 weeks from referral to consultant-led treatment, in line with the NHS constitutional standard, by March 2029. This includes a focus on:

• empowering patients by giving them more choice and control, and by establishing the standards they can expect from National Health Service planned care;
• reforming delivery by working more productively, consistently, and in many cases differently, to deliver more elective care. This includes a commitment to rolling out additional diagnostic tests and scans through a network of community diagnostic centres (CDCs); and
• aligning funding, performance oversight, and delivery standards, with clear responsibilities and incentives for reform.

Cumbria is covered by two integrated care boards (ICBs). As of August 2025, 18-week referral to treatment performance for the NHS Lancashire And South Cumbria ICB was 60.7%, and was 70.2% for the NHS North East And North Cumbria ICB. As of October 2025, there are now two CDCs in Cumbria, the Workington CDC and the Crossland Day Hospital. These community diagnostic centres will support access to earlier diagnostic tests, benefiting millions of patients.