Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask Her Majesty's Government what progress they have made on establishing an Accelerated Access Collaborative (AAC) to manage the new Accelerated Access Pathway; and who are, or will be, the members of the AAC.

The Accelerated Access Collaborative (AAC) has now been established, with the first meeting held in January 2018. The AAC is led by an independent chair and made up of senior representation from NHS England, the National Institute for Health Research, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence, NHS Improvement, the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency, Government, industry and patients.

Sir Andrew Witty was appointed the first independent chair, but has recently stepped down to avoid a perception of conflict of interest following his appointment as Chief Executive Officer of Optum. We will announce the new chair of the AAC shortly. The AAC has made strong progress under Sir Andrew Witty’s Chairmanship and we want to thank him for the excellent progress he made in establishing the AAC during his short time as the chair. We are confident that the Accelerated Access Pathway remains on track to launch in April 2018, as previously announced.