Recommendation 21

We asked NHS England what progress it had made in addressing the approvals and ensuring that payments being made without being approved did not happen again. NHS England recognised that “every case that is 31 Report by the Comptroller and Auditor General, Consolidated NHS Provider Accounts 2023–24, HC 399, 26 November 2024, page 47; Department of Health and Social Care Annual Report and Accounts 2023–24, pages 164, 189 32 Committee of Public Accounts, Sixth Report of Session 2022–23, Department of Health and Social Care 2020–21 Annual Report and Accounts, HC 253, 10 June 2022 33 HM Treasury, Treasury Minutes: Government Response to the Committee of Public Accounts on the Second, and the Fourth to the Eighth reports from Session 2022–23, CP 708, August 2022 34 HM Treasury, Managing Public Money, May 2023, page 142 35 Report by the Comptroller and Auditor General, Consolidated NHS Provider Accounts 2023–24, HC 399, 26 November 2024, page 47; Department of Health and Social Care Annual Report and Accounts 2023–24, HC 476, 17 December 2024, page 164 17 not properly approved is wrong”. It told us that it continued to work with providers and ICBs to “remind them of their duties” including through regular training sessions. NHS England told us that it considered its current approach of reminding NHS providers of the requirements to be proportionate, but was unable to guarantee that there will not be future examples where NHS bodies fail to follow the process and obtain the required approvals.36