§ Brian CotterTo ask the Secretary of State for Health if he will list for(a) England and (b) the Avon health authority the expenditure on health per head of the population, expressed in real terms, for each year since 1999. [40491]
§ Mr. HuttonThe expenditure on health by weighted head of population in real terms for Avon health authority area and England for each year since 1999 is shown in the table.
Expenditure by health authorities and primary care trusts £ 1999–2000 2000–01 Avon health authority 747.51 810.53 England 734.19 770.91 Notes:
1. Expenditure is taken from health authority and primary care trust summarisation forms which are prepared on a resource basis and therefore differ from cash allocations in the year.
2. Allocations per weighted head of population provide a much more reliable measure to identify differences between funding of health authorities.
3. The expenditure is the total spent on commissioning healthcare by the health authority and by the primary care trusts within each health authority area. The majority of General Dental Services expenditure is not included in the health authority or primary care trust accounts and is separately accounted for by the Dental Practice Board. An element of drugs expenditure in 1999–2000 and 2000–01 is accounted for by the Prescription Pricing Authority and not by health authorities.
551W4. Health authorities and primary care trusts should account for their expenditure on a gross basis. This results in an element of double counting in 2000–01 where one body acts as the main commissioner and is then reimbursed by other bodies. The effect of this double counting within the answer cannot be identified.
5. Some health authorities act as lead commissioners for particular specialties which inflates their figures when compared with others and also causes differences between years. Other factors may also distort the figures so the results are therefore not all directly comparable with each other and with answers to similar questions for previous years.
Source:
Health authority audited summarisation forms 1999–2000 and 2000–01
Primary care trust audited summarisation schedules 2000–01
Weighted population estimates for 1999–2000 and 2000–01
GDP deflator at market prices with 2000–01 as the base year