Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask His Majesty's Government, in regard to page 219 of the Paterson Inquiry report, published on 4 February 2020, what assessment the Care Quality Commission has made of compliance by hospital providers in the NHS and independent sector with national guidance on multidisciplinary team meetings, including in breast cancer care.

Under the Care Quality Commission’s (CQC) assessment framework, the CQC assesses providers for multidisciplinary teams (MDT) working under the quality statement, How staff, teams and services work together. Where this quality statement is assessed for individual services, an assessment report with the CQC’s findings is published on the CQC website.

The CQC is currently consulting on sector-specific assessment frameworks following reviews into their operational effectiveness by Dr Penny Dash, Sir Professor Mike Richards, and the Care Provider Alliance. MDT working would be assessed in future under the hospitals framework, both secondary and specialist care, via the Safe systems, pathways and transitions key line of enquiry and via the Delivering evidence-based care and treatment key line of enquiry.