Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment he has made of the adequacy of funding formulas for (a) all NHS regions and (b) the North East; and whether he has made an assessment of the potential merits of including factors such as deprivation and disadvantage in those formulas.

NHS England is responsible for funding allocations to integrated care boards. The Department and NHS England determine the objectives of the funding formulae, which currently support equal opportunity of access for equal need and contribute to the reduction in avoidable health inequalities. The method of achieving these objectives is independent of the Government and NHS England takes advice on the underlying formula from the independent Advisory Committee on Resource Allocation. The formula, which produces a target allocation or ‘fair share’ for each area, is based on an assessment of factors such as demography, morbidity, deprivation and the unavoidable cost of providing services in different areas.