FOI – 2025-000128 Inherited Metabolic Disorders Network (HTML)

Date received – 30 April 2025 | Date responded – 15 May 2025

Request

Regarding the Service Agreement between National Services Division and NHS Greater Glasgow & Clyde for delivering the nationally designated Inherited Metabolic Disorders service.

Governance & Compliance

• What actions does NSD take when the Provider does not notify NSD within the required timeframe when a serious concern (e.g., adverse event, information governance breach, or significant non-compliance) arises during audits against local/national standards or protocols?
• What would NSD do if the Provider did not demonstrate alignment with the Chief Medical Officer’s Realising Realistic Medicine principles, not put the patient at the centre of decision making, encourage a personalised approach to care, reduce harm and waste, or tackle unwarranted variation in care?
• What steps does NSD take if the Provider does not comply with the Duty of Candour, particularly regarding transparency with patients when adverse events occur that cause harm and distress?

Contingency Planning

• What contingency measures are in place for events or incidents that impact service delivery, including staffing shortages, bank/religious holidays, staff illness, and private provider failures?

Procurement & Agreements

• As NSS is responsible for procuring services via the established NHS tender process and negotiating/managing Service Level Agreements (SLAs), please provide the NHS framework agreement for the supply of goods and the provision of homecare medicines services between 2008 and 2025.
• I understand certain exemptions may apply under the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002. However, given the public interest in governance, patient safety, and service delivery, I kindly ask that any applicable redactions be clearly explained.

Response

We have now completed the search of our records and can provide you with the following information:

Governance & Compliance

What actions does NSD take when the Provider does not notify NSD within the required timeframe when a serious concern (e.g., adverse event, information governance breach, or significant non-compliance) arises during audits against local/national standards or protocols?

Please find attached Appendix 1 - Service Agreement 2022-25 v1 SIGNED_Redacted, specifically on page 11.

If a provider fails to notify National Services Division (NSD) of a serious concern or to take action to resolve such in a timely manner, this will then trigger the NSD escalation process and may result in specific Services being reviewed. Please note that the documentation being released includes personal data of third parties, specifically, signatures of individuals. Where this is the case, these details are redacted in line with exception Section 38 (1)(b) of the Freedom of Information Scotland Act, 2002 (FOISA) – Personal information. Also, under Section 33 (1)(b) of FOISA, an organisation does not require to provide information if its disclosure under this Act would, or would be likely to, prejudice substantially the commercial interests of any person (including, without prejudice to that generality, a Scottish public authority). As such, any information relating to pricing or funding is being withheld as it is commercially sensitive.

• What would NSD do if the Provider did not demonstrate alignment with the Chief Medical Officer’s Realising Realistic Medicine principles, not put the patient at the centre of decision making, encourage a personalised approach to care, reduce harm and waste, or tackle unwarranted variation in care?

NSD have no direct role in the monitoring of how these principles are applied in individual services and Health Boards. The governance of services is the responsibility of the provider. Information on the terms of the service agreement is detailed in page 11 and 12 of the attached Appendix 1 - Service Agreement 2022-25 v1 SIGNED_Redacted.

• What steps does NSD take if the Provider does not comply with the Duty of Candour, particularly regarding transparency with patients when adverse events occur that cause harm and distress?

Duty of Candour is a statutory responsibility of individual clinicians and Health Boards who have mechanisms in place to report incidents or events where this is relevant. NSD have no role in the scrutiny of compliance nor enforcement of this national policy. Information on the terms of the service agreement is detailed on page 11 of the attached Appendix 1 - Service Agreement 2022-25 v1 SIGNED_Redacted.

Contingency Planning

• What contingency measures are in place for events or incidents that impact service delivery, including staffing shortages, bank/religious holidays, staff illness, and private provider failures?

Under Section 17 of FOISA an organisation does not have to provide that information if it does not hold it. NSD does not hold any details of the contingency arrangements that are in place for individual services. These are the responsibility of the provider. This information is detailed on page 11 and 14 of the attached Appendix 1 - Service Agreement 2022-25 v1 SIGNED_Redacted.

Procurement & Agreements

• As NSS is responsible for procuring services via the established NHS tender process and negotiating/managing Service Level Agreements (SLAs), please provide the NHS framework agreement for the supply of goods and the provision of homecare medicines services between 2008 and 2025.

Under section 17 of the Freedom of Information Scotland Act, 2002 (FOISA) an organisation does not have to provide that information if it does not hold it. NHS National Services Scotland (NSS) does not hold the requested information. The contracting process for homecare medicines services is led on a UK wide basis by the Commercial Medicines Unit. Any enquiries in relation to these contracts should be directed to them as we are not the owners of the process nor documents which you are asking for.

I trust you will find the information of assistance and if you require any further information, please do not hesitate to contact us.

If you are unhappy with any aspect of how we have dealt with your request, you can make representations to us asking us to review the handling of your request.

If you require any further information, please contact the Associate Director Governance and Board Services (Board Secretary) within 40 working days of the date of this correspondence.

Contact

Address

If after a review you are still unhappy, you also have the right to apply to the Scottish Information Commissioner, who can be contacted at Kinburn Castle, St Andrews, Fife, KY16 9DS, or via their application form.

National Services Scotland (NSS) is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. You can view all FOI responses within our FOI Publications repository.