Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what the terms of reference are for her Department's review of the vaccine damage compensation scheme; which body is responsible for undertaking the review; and what estimate she has made of when the review will be completed.

All routine policy, including the Vaccine Damage Payment Scheme (VDPS), is reviewed on a regular basis. My Rt hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care is currently looking into aspects of the scheme, following recent meetings with interested stakeholders.

Separately, work is underway with the scheme’s administrator, the NHS Business Service Authority, to review processes and make administrative changes, to improve the scheme within the current legislative framework. Formal consideration of whether any reforms to the VDPS are necessary will form part of Module 4 of the COVID-19 Inquiry, chaired by the Rt Hon Baroness Heather Carol Hallett DBE.