Patient Rights

Mr. Lansley
To ask the Secretary of State for Health pursuant to the answer of 12 February 2009, Official Report, column 2186W, on patient rights, what the financial levers will be in the standard contracts from April 2010; and what the measures of and definitions for overriding clinical justification are.

Ann Keen
Progress is being made to develop the levers that would fit into the current structure of the contracts. The options will be tested prior to final decisions being taken later in the year for implementation in April 2010.

The local national health service, rather than the Department, is best placed to make final decisions about what constitutes a clinical justification of mixed sex accommodation for an individual patient. To assist with such local determination, the Department will shortly be issuing definitional guidance relating to emergency admissions, day treatment, critical care environments, children and young people, as well as services used by transsexual people and gender variant children.