§ Mr. Barry FieldTo ask the Secretary of State for Social Services (1) when he will publish the statistics comparing efficiency and performance between hospitals and health authorities;
(2) if he will list the top 10 health districts in the United Kingdom for efficiency in ear, nose and throat surgery.
§ Mr. Newton[holding answer 14 January 1988]:The Department will publish the annual set of performance indicators based on 1986–87 data in February 1988. This set, like those for earlier years, will be available in the Library. Performance indicators address some but not all aspects of efficiency. Since there is no one measure of the efficiency of a service, it is not therefore possible to publish a ranking list. Efficiency can be characterised only by analysis of a range of local data such as cost per case; manpower, capital and bed utilisation; percentage of day cases. Of these data only a few, for example bed utilisation and day cases, are available nationally at the ear, nose and throat specialty level, and these form part of the performance indicator set.