Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what estimate he has made of the level of unpaid NHS charges in each year since 2010, broken down by NHS Trust.

Since the financial year 2014/15, the amounts written off as bad debt in relation to direct charges made to overseas visitors and migrants are part of National Health Service trusts’ and foundation trusts’ annual accounts and are published on Gov.uk broken down by NHS trust.

According to the published annual accounts, there have been £17 million in 2014/15, £16 million in 2015/16, and £17 million in 2016/17 written off as bad debt in relation to direct charges made to overseas visitors and migrants across England. At the same time, direct charges made to overseas visitors and migrants have increased from £47 million in 2014/15, through £69 million in 2015/16, to £81 million in 2016/17.