Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps his Department is taking to ensure that NHS patients are not missing (a) appointments and (b) operations due to Royal Mail delivery delays (i) in the Stourbridge constituency and (ii) elsewhere.

No assessment has been made of the potential impact of postal delays on the timely delivery of referral letters between primary and secondary care. The monitoring of National Health Service patient correspondence, including appointment letters, is the responsibility of individual NHS providers.

We are streamlining information and communication processes, shifting from analogue to digital, including by improving the NHS App. This will make it easier and quicker for patients to access information about their appointments, to cancel and reschedule appointments, and to receive correspondence on NHS test results.

All acute trusts in England now allow patients to view appointment information via the NHS App if they wish, reducing reliance on physical letters. This saves staff time to focus on providing high quality, non-digital communication for those who want and need it. NHS App usage has increased, with over 41.6 million all-time NHS App account registrations up to the end of May 2026, 10% more than at May 2025.