Asked by: Andrew George (Liberal Democrat - St Ives)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what estimate she has made of the number of staff redundancies (a) announced and (b) implemented by higher education providers in England since 1 January 2025.
Answered by Josh MacAlister - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The Office for Students, the independent regulator of higher education (HE) in England, is responsible for monitoring the sector’s financial sustainability. Its most recent report on the sector’s financial health, published in May 2026, can be found here: https://www.officeforstudents.org.uk/publications/financial-sustainability-of-higher-education-providers-in-england-2026/.
The department greatly values the hard work of staff across the HE sector who continue to deliver for students and universities during a challenging period. We are aware that some providers are making difficult decisions around staffing to safeguard their financial sustainability.
Given universities are independent, the government does not have a role in intervening with specific providers in pay and staffing matters, nor does it collect specific data on redundancies within HE.
However, we encourage providers to work constructively with their staff to develop sustainable models that retain talent and expertise and provide stability for the workforce and the institution.
Asked by: Andrew George (Liberal Democrat - St Ives)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many and what proportion of higher education providers in England are expected to record an operating deficit in each of the next three financial years.
Answered by Josh MacAlister - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The Office for Students, the independent regulator of higher education (HE) in England, is responsible for monitoring the sector’s financial sustainability. Its most recent report on the sector’s financial health, published in May 2026, can be found here: https://www.officeforstudents.org.uk/publications/financial-sustainability-of-higher-education-providers-in-england-2026/.
The department greatly values the hard work of staff across the HE sector who continue to deliver for students and universities during a challenging period. We are aware that some providers are making difficult decisions around staffing to safeguard their financial sustainability.
Given universities are independent, the government does not have a role in intervening with specific providers in pay and staffing matters, nor does it collect specific data on redundancies within HE.
However, we encourage providers to work constructively with their staff to develop sustainable models that retain talent and expertise and provide stability for the workforce and the institution.
Asked by: Andrew George (Liberal Democrat - St Ives)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether mechanisms are in place to provide compensation to higher education providers in cases where regulatory penalties imposed by the Office for Students are overturned by the courts.
Answered by Josh MacAlister - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The Office for Students (OfS) is the independent regulator for higher education in England and operates within the legal framework set out in the Higher Education and Research Act 2017. Where the OfS takes regulatory action against a registered higher education (HE) provider, the provider has the right to make representations and to challenge that decision, including through the courts.
Where a court finds that a regulatory decision has been made unlawfully, the decision, including any associated monetary penalty, may be overturned.
There is no automatic mechanism operated by the department or the OfS to provide compensation to HE providers in such circumstances. As with other public law decisions, any matters relating to costs or damages would be determined by the courts.
Asked by: Andrew George (Liberal Democrat - St Ives)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether privacy notices issued to women undergoing abortion care have been updated to reflect the introduction of new analytical infrastructure and changes to the legal context following the Crime and Policing Act 2026.
Answered by Sharon Hodgson - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
All privacy notices will be reviewed and updated, if required, to reflect any changes to the technical infrastructure that supports the collection and processing of abortion data.
In line with the Department’s required standard operating procedures (RSOPs) for the approval of independent sector abortion clinics, abortion providers should make women aware of how the contents of the statutory HSA4 form sent to the Chief Medical Officer will be used and shared by the Department. The RSOPs include a suggested privacy notice to share with anyone undergoing abortion care which provides a clear understanding of what data is shared with the Department, the legal basis for collecting their data, and how the Department will manage their data.
The Crime and Policing Act 2026 disapplies the criminal offences related to abortion from women acting in relation to their own pregnancies. However, it does not change the Abortion Act 1967, statutory reporting of abortions to the Chief Medical Officer, or the provision of lawful abortion services.
Asked by: Andrew George (Liberal Democrat - St Ives)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment he has made of the risks associated with making identifiable abortion notification data available within a data-lake environment.
Answered by Sharon Hodgson - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The solution is being designed following UK Government guidance for building and managing digital services, including but not limited to Government Digital Service standards, the National Cyber Security Centre Cyber Assessment Framework, and Departmental data protection policies. By following this approach, the Department is identifying, recording, escalating, and/or mitigating risks to ensure identifiable data is being stored, accessed, and managed in-line with standards outlined above.
Asked by: Andrew George (Liberal Democrat - St Ives)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether the procurement specification for the Abortion Notification Service was reviewed between First Reading of the relevant legislative clause and the contract signature on 10 March 2026.
Answered by Sharon Hodgson - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Crime and Policing Act 2026 disapplies the criminal offences related to abortion from women acting in relation to their own pregnancies. However, it does not change the Abortion Act 1967 or the provision of lawful abortion services. Therefore, there was not a need to review the procurement specification for the Abortion Notification Service.
Asked by: Andrew George (Liberal Democrat - St Ives)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what public communications (a) have been issued and (b) are planned to inform women undergoing abortion care that identifiable data will be processed within a new system, including through new analytical infrastructure.
Answered by Sharon Hodgson - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Department is currently working on an engagement plan to support abortion care providers transition to the new abortion data collection service. In line with the Department’s required standard operating procedures (RSOPs) for the approval of independent sector abortion clinics, abortion providers should make women aware of how the contents of the statutory HSA4 form sent to the Chief Medical Officer will be used and shared by the Department. The RSOPs include a suggested privacy notice to share with anyone undergoing abortion care which provides a clear understanding of what data is shared with the Department, the legal basis for collecting their data, and how the Department will manage their data.
Asked by: Andrew George (Liberal Democrat - St Ives)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether identifiable data from HSA4 abortion notification forms will be stored in structured, searchable form within any Abortion Notification Service data-lake.
Answered by Sharon Hodgson - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Department requires that the new service being built to collect and process abortion data includes a secure location to store frozen data extracts, namely datasets that have been locked to prevent further modifications, that can be accessed by the Abortion Statistics Team to prepare statistical publications. The detailed technical approach is still being worked through.
The structure of the datasets is still to be finalised but will be stored in a structured format that supports the Statistics Team. Further information on data collection practices are available at the following link:
Any access to identifiable data given will be based on a ‘least privilege’ access model, which means data access is limited to the minimum necessary for someone to carry out their prescribed duties.
Asked by: Andrew George (Liberal Democrat - St Ives)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, which sub-processors (a) have been and (b) are expected to be approved for the processing of HSA4 data under the relevant contract; whether that list will be made publicly available; and whether third parties will be granted access for purposes including research, analytics and artificial intelligence model training.
Answered by Sharon Hodgson - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
There are no sub-processors on the relevant contract to deliver a new Abortion Notification Service. We are not currently expecting to approve any sub-processors under this contract.
Asked by: Andrew George (Liberal Democrat - St Ives)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps her Department is taking across procurement policy, food service, and manufacturing supply chains to ensure that improved domestic welfare standards are not undermined by the use of imported lower-welfare egg products.
Answered by Angela Eagle - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The National Procurement Policy Statement, published in February, underscores the Government's commitment to increasing the procurement of food that meets higher environmental standards, supporting local suppliers and upholding ethical sourcing practises across public sector contracts. This includes sourcing products from all farmed animals which have been raised to high UK welfare standards as defined in current animal welfare legislation.
As set out in the UK’s trade strategy, the Government will always consider whether overseas produce has an unfair advantage. Where necessary, the Government will be prepared to use the full range of powers at its disposal to protect UK’s most sensitive sectors.