Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, what steps her Department is taking to ensure that requests from the families of British nationals for the return of retained organs from overseas are progressed as quickly as possible through the relevant legal processes.

In any given year, the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office provides information and assistance in around 6,000 cases where a British person has died overseas. Every death is a personal tragedy, and our consular staff aim to provide practical, compassionate and timely support to those affected. We publish detailed country-specific guidance for Spain covering registering a death, the process of post-mortems and navigating local procedures. We work closely with Spanish authorities to help families navigate those processes. Where concerns are raised about systemic issues or significant delays affecting British families, we raise these with the relevant authorities and press them for improvements, including in Spain.