To ask the Secretary of State for Health if she will publish the anticipated trajectory on which the percentage of (a) admitted and (b) non-admitted patients waiting 18 weeks or less for treatment will migrate towards 100 per cent. by 2008. (118168)

We have published milestones for March 2008 for both admitted and non-admitted patients of 85 per cent. and 90 per cent. respectively, as a step towards 100 per cent. for December 2008. It is for local organisations to agree their trajectory between these points. Strategic health authorities are currently agreeing these plans for 2007-08 and 2008-09.

There will always be patients for whom the 18 weeks schedule is inconvenient or clinically inappropriate. The Department intends to set a nationally agreed tolerance for the 18-week target later in 2007 to take account of this. Primary care trusts and providers will need to be able to demonstrate that cases that take longer than 18 weeks to reach the start of first definitive treatment are legitimate exceptions.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health pursuant to the answer of 15 January 2007, Official Report, column 919W, on inpatient waiting times, what percentage of people were removed from the NHS waiting list in each year since 1989-90. (118219)

The figures are shown in the table.