Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask Her Majesty's Government what are the latest figures available to them on NHS productivity in each of the last five years; what proportion of any productivity gains in those figures they estimate arise from pay restraints; and what assumptions they have made on NHS productivity for the next five years in producing their recent announcement on NHS funding for that period.

The following table shows productivity growth for the National Health Service in England from 2011/12 to 2015/16.

Source: Office for National Statistics

Due to time taken to access patient level data sets, estimates of NHS productivity are produced with a time lag. This means that 2015/16 is the year that the most recent published statistics on NHS productivity are available.

Productivity growth compares the growth in volumes of all inputs, including staff, with growth in the volume of outputs, and not expenditure. It considers staff volumes rather than the staff expenditure so wage restraint will not affect productivity growth.

As part of the five-year funding agreement which will see the NHS budget grow by over £20 billion in real terms by 2023/24, the Government has set the NHS the following five financial tests to show how the NHS will do its part to put the service onto a more sustainable footing:

- improving productivity and efficiency;

- eliminating provider deficits;

- reducing unwarranted variation in the system so people get the consistently high standards of care wherever they live;

- getting much better at managing demand effectively; and

- making better use of capital investment.

The Government and NHS England have not yet agreed a final assumption on NHS productivity for the next five years; this figure will be agreed via the work on the long-term plan.