HC Deb 05 March 2003 vol 400 c1112W
Chris Grayling

To ask the Secretary of State for Health pursuant to his answer of 4 February 2003,Official Report, column 226W, on PHLS laboratories, whether he will instruct PCTs to maintain funding levels to NHS laboratories beyond one year after the laboratories are subsumed into local trusts. [99071]

Ms Blears

National health service trust boards are being encouraged to ensure that the level of funding available for routine diagnostic microbiology services from 1 April 2003 to 31 March 2005 is not less than contracted with the Public Health Laboratory Service during 2002–03.

For the same period, the proposed Health Protection Agency (HPA) will ensure that the level of funding to HPA laboratories for specialist services they provide and which they commission from transferred laboratories are at least at the same level as for 2002–03.