Overview
- Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee says recovery progress has stalled and warns the 92% within-18-weeks target for 2029 is at serious risk.
- In July about 192,000 people had waited more than a year for treatment and 22% waited over six weeks for diagnostic tests, far above the 5% target.
- The committee notes NHS England has spent roughly £3.24bn on community diagnostic centres and surgical hubs without achieving the intended reductions in waits.
- MPs criticise plans to fold NHS England into the health department and halve management headcount, saying changes lack funding and impact assessments and echo HS2 governance failures.
- The government says waiting lists are now falling, citing a reduction of more than 230,000, over five million extra appointments and higher productivity, and confirms thousands of redundancies will proceed after Treasury funding for costs estimated at about £1bn.