Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask His Majesty's Government, with reference to the Department for Health and Social Care’s publication of the updated Notification of Child Death Form, whether the new questions on gender identity are voluntary for (1) NHS staff to ask, and (2) parents to answer.

Following the death of a child, it may not always be a healthcare professional making the notification and therefore these questions may be answered by a range of different professionals, for instance those in healthcare, police, or social care. The questions will be answered based on what the professional knows at the time when they are making the notification of death. Therefore, if they do not hold any information on the gender identity of the child, this question will not be answered.

Parents would not be completing these forms. The purpose of the notification form is to give the basic information on what is known about the child by the professional at the time of death.