DHSC Answers to Written Questions Debate

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Department: Department of Health and Social Care
Wednesday 25th November 2020

(3 years, 11 months ago)

Lords Chamber
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Baroness Thornton Portrait Baroness Thornton (Lab) [V]
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My Lords, earlier this week, there were 149 outstanding Written Questions addressed to the Department of Health and Social Care on the Lords business paper. My first question, therefore, has to be: when will they be answered?

One has to wonder about the quality of the Answers. On 21 July, my noble friend Lord Bassam asked a perfectly reasonable Question about

“how many COVID-19 tests have been sent by post and subsequently returned to laboratories, for each day since the scheme began; and how many of the tests sent by post have been discounted because swabbed material was not collected correctly.”

The Answer arrived today—25 November. It says:

“The information is not collected in the format requested”.


You have to wonder why a non-answer took so long to arrive. Does the answer possibly lie partly in the existence of the Cabinet Office clearing house? Are Written Questions subject to a clearing house process—something that many regard as part of a wider obstructive approach to disclosing information? Can the Minister tell the House whether he and his department are involved in referring things to the clearing house at the Cabinet Office?