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NHS: Databases

Asked by Mark SewardsLabourDepartment of Health and Social CareTabled Answered 9 June 2026UIN 5021

The question

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether he plans to publish (a) criteria and (b) performance metrics that will inform a decision on exercising the break clause in the Federated Data Platform contract before that decision is taken.

Answered by Preet Kaur Gill

The NHS Federated Data Platform (NHS FDP) safely connects information from different systems across the National Health Service into a single, secure environment. This allows staff to co-ordinate care to improve outcomes for patients.

The NHS FDP is delivering for the NHS, helping people get the care they need quicker and more efficiently. Since March 2024, more than a 100,000 additional patients have been supported to undergo procedures in theatres partly by increasing theatre utilisation, nearly 94,000 people have been supported on their cancer journey, with 7% seeing a reduction in the time it took to diagnose their cancer, and there has been a 14% decrease in delays discharging patients staying in hospital for more than seven days, freeing up beds for those who need.

To date, 24 integrated care board clusters and 168 NHS trusts have signed up to the NHS FDP, including the Leeds and York Partnership NHS Foundation Trust, the Leeds Community Healthcare NHS Trust, and the Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust.

We will be reviewing the NHS FDP contract in line with standard contract management processes and will make a decision this year on its extension. Further information will be provided in due course.

NHS England continually assesses performance against the contract, and performance of the programme as a whole, and publishes data on uptake and benefits each quarter at the following link:

https://www.england.nhs.uk/digitaltechnology/nhs-federated-data-platform/impact/fdp-uptake-and-benefits/

The programme is also subject to extensive internal management, and supplier performance against the contract’s key performance indicators is assessed regularly in line with the contract terms.

Progress and performance of the NHS FDP programme is assessed regularly by the Government’s National Infrastructure and Service Transformation Authority, on behalf of HM Treasury. The NHS FDP is one of only 14% of Government major programmes to receive a ‘Green’ rating in July 2025, indicating that the NHS FDP is on track.

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