Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what the total cost to the public purse was of legal (a) support and (b) representation to Ministers in her Department in relation to their official conduct in each of the last three years.

The information is not held centrally or collated in the format requested. More generally, I would refer the hon. Member to the long-standing policies on legal expenditure, as set out recently by Cabinet Office Ministers on 12 March 2024, Official Report, Question 17709 and 12 March 2024, Official Report, House of Lords, Cols. 1901-1904.