Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, pursuant to the Answer of 6 December 2021 to Question 85192 on Hospitals: Waiting Lists, and in the context of the additional funding for the NHS on tackling hospital waiting times announced by the Prime Minister, what recent assessment he has made of the adequacy of additional elective surgical procedures by speciality that the NHS will have the capacity to carry out in each of the next three years.

No formal assessment has been made. It is not yet known what the demand for specialties will be over the next three years. The additional funding provided to the National Health Service for elective recovery for the next three years aims to increase activity to 30% above pre-pandemic levels.