Recommendation F140: Performance managers working constructively with regulators
From Report of the Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust Public Inquiry, published 6 February 2013.
Recommendation
Where concerns are raised that such standards are not being complied with, a performance management organisation should share, wherever possible, all relevant information with the relevant regulator, including information about its judgement as to the safety of patients of the healthcare provider.
In brief (written by this site)
In commentary from September 2024, published in February 2026, the Department of Health and Social Care and NHS England reported that the recommendation was implemented on an ongoing basis, pointing to information on the NHS Oversight Framework and System Quality Groups (DHSC and NHS England, Feb 2026). In May 2024, the Thirlwall Inquiry legal team found that the government had previously relied on Quality Surveillance Groups, risk summits, and bilateral agreements to provide the framework for sharing safety information with regulators (The Thirlwall Inquiry legal team, May 2024).
AI-generated summary of the record on this page, checked by a second model and automatic checks, 26 Sep 2026. The record below is the sources' own words.
Government response
Accepted.
The processes associated with Quality Surveillance Groups and risk summits provide the framework for this. NHS England is reviewing the effectiveness of these arrangements. Strong bilateral relationships should also be in place between the commissioners, regulators and NHS England’s area teams
Key organisations and regulators, including the NHS Trust Development Authority, Monitor, the Care Quality Commission and NHS England, have published agreements that set out the ways in which they are working together and sharing information outside of Quality Surveillance Group meetings so that there is a single common assessment of the quality and sustainability of any given provider.
How this response relates to the recommendation
Site note: This is volume two of "Hard Truths: The Journey to Putting Patients First" (Cm 8777-II), the government's response to the Inquiry's 290 recommendations, published by the Department of Health on GOV.UK on 19 November 2013 and dated to that day here. The PDF the row links to is the accessible edition, whose title page reads "January 2014". The Department of Health has been the Department of Health and Social Care since January 2018. The volume says it includes accounts from each of the national organisations the recommendations name, but it does not mark which passage each organisation wrote, so every row is filed under the Department that published it.
Blanket government agreement does not establish acceptance or delivery by each addressee. Some response passages cover groups of recommendations.
Scope of the government response
Government responded via "Hard Truths: The Journey to Putting Patients First" (2014), a single document covering all 290 recommendations with a blanket acceptance. Individual recommendation responses were not broken out.
Delivery
DHSC and NHS England say in progress (27 February 2026)
Please see response to recommendations 28, 132 and 138 above for information on the NHS Oversight Framework and System Quality Groups.
Site note: DHSC and NHS England's own account of progress, supplied to the Thirlwall Inquiry in September 2024 and printed in the Inquiry legal team's Review of Implementation of Recommendations from Previous Inquiries into Healthcare Issues (version dated April 2025, published 27 February 2026). It is not a finding of the Inquiry. Their reviewed extent of implementation reads “Implemented – Ongoing”. Table row: section 18.2 No. 140, PDF page 491.
Department of Health and Social Care says in progress (11 February 2015)
A review of the Quality Surveillance Group model has been undertaken by all of the organisations represented on the National Quality Board and on Quality Surveillance Groups, to understand how they are operating and identify where they could be supported to be more effective. As a result of this review the National Quality Board published a second edition of the ‘How To’ guide How to make your Quality Surveillance Group Effective in March 2014.
Site note: This is the supporting annex published on 11 February 2015 with "Culture change in the NHS: applying the lessons of the Francis Inquiries" (Cm 9009), attached to the GOV.UK page as "Culture change in the NHS supporting annex". The annex has no title page; that title is GOV.UK's and the PDF's own. Its table has four columns (No., Recommendation, Hard Truths Government response, Progress update), and the row carries the Progress update cell. No column says which organisation wrote an update, so the row is filed under the Department of Health (now the Department of Health and Social Care), which published it.
Site note: The Inquiry addressed this recommendation to NHS England, not to the Department of Health. The annex gives this update in the Department's publication and does not say who wrote it, so the row is the Department's report of the progress made on it.
What other bodies have found
In their own words. These do not change the delivery statement above.
Thirlwall Inquiry legal team (15 May 2024)
This recommendation was accepted by the Government.
In the January 2014 Hard Truths report, the Government referred to Quality Surveillance Groups and risk summits processes as providing the framework for this, as well as memoranda of understanding and operational protocols between specific organisations.
In the February 2015 Culture Change report, the Government said that a review of the Quality Surveillance Group model had been undertake by all of the organisations represented on the National Quality Board and on Quality Surveillance Groups.
Site note: The Thirlwall Inquiry legal team's own notes on implementation, from its Review of Implementation of Recommendations from Previous Inquiries into Healthcare Issues (version of 15 May 2024). The review does not colour its Extent of Implementation cell for this recommendation green; it leaves the cell uncoloured where a recommendation was rejected, where evidence of implementation was insufficient, or where steps had been taken but implementation was not yet complete. Table row: section 16.2 No. 140, PDF page 458.
Source
Responsible bodies
Themes and tags
Who has spoken
- Department of Health and Social Care
Response, delivery statement - DHSC and NHS England
Delivery statement - Thirlwall Inquiry legal team
Finding