To ask the Secretary of State for Health further to the publication of the Cancer Reform Strategy, what new funding he plans to make available for cancer services in each of the next five years. (184004)

Alongside the Cancer Reform Strategy, we have published an Impact Assessment (IA) that sets out our estimated costs of implementing the strategy in each year. A copy of the IA is available in the Library. The funding to meet these expected costs is mainly being provided through primary care trusts’ (PCT) general allocations, with some costs met centrally. PCT allocations are not broken down into funding streams for individual services, and it is for the national health service to decide locally how best to deliver the outcomes set out in the strategy, and the actual level of resources required to do so.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health further to the publication of the Cancer Reform Strategy, when he plans to ensure that expenditure which does not benefit patients is eliminated; and by what means. (184005)

The Cancer Reform Strategy provides advice, support and examples of best practice to local commissioners and providers on how to deliver high quality, cost-effective cancer services and how cancer expenditure should be prioritised.

Chapter 10 of the strategy highlights factors that local commissioners should consider when making decisions about cancer expenditure, to reduce inefficiencies and allow for reinvestment of expenditure in local cancer services.