Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether he has made an assessment of the adequacy of his Department's response times to correspondence from hon. Members.

The Government attaches great importance to the effective and timely handling of correspondence from MPs, Peers, and members of the public. The Department receives some of the highest, and most sensitive, volumes of correspondence. This year, we are forecast to receive over 65,000 queries, with over 15,000 of those from Hon. Members.

The Department is committed to responding to 80% of Hon. Members’ correspondence within 20 working days where possible. Ministerial correspondence performance data is published annually by the Cabinet Office.