Recommendation 9

We asked NHSE about its optimism at the time it agreed the recovery targets. It told us that its assumption about low levels of COVID-19 had turned out to be “completely wrong”. It added that this had resulted in both a higher than anticipated demand for hospital beds for patients with COVID-19 and higher staff sickness absence.18 The National Audit Office report states that the NHS is also managing other major pressures, 7 C&AG’s Report, paras 16, 3.12, 3.13, Figure 11, Figure 12 8 C&AG’s Report, paras 16, 1.8, 3.12, 3.13. 9 Quarterly data available at: https://www.england.nhs.uk/statistics/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/12/Cancer- Waiting-Times-National-Time-Series-Oct-2009-Oct-2022-with-Revisions.xlsx 10 C&AG’s Report, Figure 5. 11 Q 44 12 C&AG’s Report, para 16, 2.14 13 Available at: https://www.england.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/B1881_Next-steps-in-the-recovery-of- elective-services_July-2022.pdf 14 Q 44 15 Committee of Public Accounts, NHS backlogs and waiting times in England, Forty-Fourth Report of Session 2021–22, HC 747, 16 March 2022 16 C&AG’s Report, para 3.2 17 C&AG’s Report, paras 14, 3.3 18 Q 11 10 Managing NHS backlogs and waiting times in England including other ongoing effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, access to primary care, the performance of urgent and emergency care, workforce gaps, and problems with the supply of adult social care.19