South-West Health Authorities (Funding)

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To ask the Secretary of State for Health what changes have been made to the way money is allocated to health authorities and NHS trusts in Devon and Cornwall; and on what basis changes were calculated. [74431]

[holding answer 8 March 1999): A weighted capitation formula is used to calculate fair share targets of available resources.Three changes were made to the hospital and community health services formula for 1998–99:

(a) the additional need weightings were applied to 100 per cent. of expenditure;

(b) the number of staff market forces factor payzones was reduced from 61 to 51;

(c) an adjustment was introduced to take the geographical cost variation of providing emergency ambulance services into account.

These changes were carried out under the auspices of the Resource Allocation Group (RAG). RAG published their 1997 report in February 1998.

From 1999–2000, health authorities received unified allocations covering:

(a) hospital and community health services;

(b) general practice infrastructure; and

(c) prescribing.

Three changes were made to the formula for 1999–2000:

(a) the adjustment for age in the hospital and community health services component was updated;

(b) a new additional need adjustment for prescribing was introduced;

(c) a monetary adjustment was introduced for the extra costs of interpretation, advocacy and translation services for ethnic minority populations.

These changes were based on research conducted under the auspices of the Advisory Committee on Resource Allocation, the successor body to RAG. The committee will publish their 1998 annual report shortly.

We do not make revenue allocations direct to National Health Service trusts. NHS trusts receive most of their income through agreements with health authorities and their primary care groups.

Volume 329: debated on Tuesday 20 April 1999