§ Mr. MullinTo ask the Secretary of State for Health, pursuant to his answer of 2 July 2002,Official Report, column 306W, on performance targets, how many performance targets he has set for the NHS; and how many that were included last year have been dropped this year. [68313]
§ Mr. LammyIt has been the Government's policy to reduce the number of priorities facing national health service organisations in order to shift the balance of power away from the centre. A reduction was achieved in the 2002–03 planning and priorities framework in comparison to the previous year.
An on-going commitment to this approach has been made, with the Government's "Delivering the NHS Plan" document stating very clearly that our plans to modernise the NHS do not constitute a raft of extra targets.