To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to the report by the British Liver Trust entitled Liver Cancer – A Call to Action, published in October 2023, if she will make an assessment of the potential merits of implementing an optimal care pathway for liver cancer.

The care of and treatment for patients with cancers, including liver cancer, is a priority for the Government. National Health Service cancer standards have been reformed with the support of clinicians to speed up diagnosis for patients, which means people will receive a diagnosis or have cancer ruled out within 28 days of urgent cancer referral from their general practice. NHS England’s Early Diagnosis of Cancer Programme is contributing to the NHS Long Term Plan’s commitment to diagnose 75% of all cancers at stage one or two by 2028. Identifying those at risk and ensuring patients are tested and referred to a surveillance programme, where necessary, will lead to improved patient outcomes.

The Government is taking steps through NHS England to improve outcomes for cancer patients, including liver cancer. Diagnostic checks are a key part of cancer pathways and the 153 community diagnostic centres (CDCs) opened by the Government will give earlier diagnostic tests, benefitting millions of patients including those who are referred with suspected less survivable cancers. NHS systems have been asked to prioritise CDC capacity towards their most challenged cancer pathways, where this is clinically appropriate, and these centres have delivered over six million additional tests for all elective activity since July 2021.