HL Deb 04 February 2003 vol 644 cc23-4WA
Baroness Noakes

asked Her Majesty's Government:

Further to the statement by Lord Hunt of Kings Heath on 27 January that "the point … of the new funding flow system that we shall be introducing into the NHS … is that there will not be financial incentives for health … authorities to cause real difficulties for the patients involved" (HL Deb, col. 967), whether they will set out in detail how the new funding flow system will provide incentives in respect of the older patients who are the subject of delayed discharge from National Health Service acute or geriatric care; and when the new system will affect such patients. [HL1337]

Lord Hunt of Kings Heath

The new financial flows system for the National Health Service, which introduces a national price tariff, will be phased in from 2003–04. From 2005–06 when over 90 per cent of NHS activity will be covered by the national tariff, we will introduce the rule that a readmission within a specified time period will count as part of the same hospital episode and will not attract additional funding. This will act as a disincentive upon the NHS to do anything that might lead to a patient's readmission.