Asked by: Caroline Johnson (Conservative - Sleaford and North Hykeham)
Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, what (a) number and (b) proportion of staff in her Department that are posted overseas receive Continuity of Education Allowance.
Answered by Seema Malhotra - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
Under the long-standing arrangements for continuity of education, 237 officers received Continuity of Education Allowance (CEA) in academic year 2024-25. This figure represents approximately 11 per cent of officers posted overseas. Eligibility for CEA is based on a range of factors that vary over time, so the Department does not hold a centrally maintained figure for the total number of overseas staff who may be eligible for CEA at any given point.
Asked by: Caroline Johnson (Conservative - Sleaford and North Hykeham)
Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, how many staff in her Department are in receipt of Continuity of Education Allowance.
Answered by Seema Malhotra - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
Under the long-standing arrangements for continuity of education, 237 officers received Continuity of Education Allowance (CEA) in academic year 2024-25. This figure represents approximately 11 per cent of officers posted overseas. Eligibility for CEA is based on a range of factors that vary over time, so the Department does not hold a centrally maintained figure for the total number of overseas staff who may be eligible for CEA at any given point.
Asked by: Caroline Johnson (Conservative - Sleaford and North Hykeham)
Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, what (a) number and (b) proportion of staff in her Department are eligible to receive Continuity of Education Allowance.
Answered by Seema Malhotra - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
Under the long-standing arrangements for continuity of education, 237 officers received Continuity of Education Allowance (CEA) in academic year 2024-25. This figure represents approximately 11 per cent of officers posted overseas. Eligibility for CEA is based on a range of factors that vary over time, so the Department does not hold a centrally maintained figure for the total number of overseas staff who may be eligible for CEA at any given point.
Asked by: Caroline Johnson (Conservative - Sleaford and North Hykeham)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment he has made of the potential of (a) vaping and (b) passive vaping on the risk of invasive meningococcal disease.
Answered by Sharon Hodgson - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Department of Health and Social Care has indicated that it will not be possible to answer this question within the usual time period. An answer is being prepared and will be provided as soon as it is available.
Asked by: Caroline Johnson (Conservative - Sleaford and North Hykeham)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment he has made of the potential impact of (a) smoking and (b) passive smoking on the risk of invasive meningococcal disease.
Answered by Sharon Hodgson - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Department of Health and Social Care has indicated that it will not be possible to answer this question within the usual time period. An answer is being prepared and will be provided as soon as it is available.
Asked by: Caroline Johnson (Conservative - Sleaford and North Hykeham)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many deaths there have been of (a) women, (b) babies and (c) stillbirths where the termination of pregnancy through pills-by-post has been considered a contributory factor.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The information requested is not routinely collected centrally.
The Department collects information on abortions in England and Wales via the HSA4 abortion notification form. The HSA4 form includes a section for recording the death of a woman within 14 days of an abortion, where this is known to abortion providers. This is not routinely published because the 14-day time frame limits the data’s usefulness for counting the total number of deaths amongst women following abortion. Also, it does not record whether the method of abortion, including home use of early medical abortion pills, was a contributory factor in a death.
Since 2020, zero deaths of women following an abortion have been reported to the department via the HSA4 form, rounded to the nearest five. Following the 2023 abortion statistics publication, all data is rounded to the nearest five. As a result of this change, counts of zero can mean no or a small number of procedures in the given field.
Information on the deaths of women, babies following a live birth, and stillbirths are recorded by the Office for National Statistics using data derived from information collected in death registrations. However, it is unusual for wider contextual factors such whether the deceased had taken early medical abortion pills at home to be recorded on the death certificate.
Asked by: Caroline Johnson (Conservative - Sleaford and North Hykeham)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, pursuant to the written statement on 26 February 2026 titled Data Linkage Study, what the small but important improvements in study design are to which he refers in his statement.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
Small but important proposed improvements include refining the data sharing requirement of adult gender clinics, so that data is only requested that directly relates to the study cohort. Careful consideration has also been given to how best to run the study-specific data opt out so that it is simpler and more accessible to individuals in the study cohort, and can remain open longer. This will provide the parallel benefit of reducing the administrative burden on individual gender clinics.
Asked by: Caroline Johnson (Conservative - Sleaford and North Hykeham)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, on what date he plans to bring into force the provisions of the Medical Training (Prioritisation) Bill.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Medical Training (Prioritisation) Act 2026 received Royal Assent on 5 March 2026. The Medical Training (Prioritisation) Act 2026 (Commencement) Regulations 2026 were made on 5 March 2026, which brought into force all provisions of the Act on 6 March 2026.
Asked by: Caroline Johnson (Conservative - Sleaford and North Hykeham)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether the current Chair of the adult clinical reference group for adult gender dysphoria services refused to comply with requests for data for the date linkage study which was recommended by the Cass review.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
It is well documented that a number of adult gender clinics were unwilling to collaborate with data sharing requests made of them previously, in respect of the data linkage study, and that this meant that the data linkage study was unable to proceed at the time. Further engagement with a range of stakeholders has since led to small but important proposed improvements in study design. These have been subject to positive feedback from representatives of commissioned adult gender clinics and should support collaboration on data sharing once the necessary research approvals are in place to enable the study to begin. Given the importance of this study as part of the wider national gender research programme, the Department will continue to closely monitor progress in partnership with NHS England and consider whether any further support is required to enable study delivery.
Asked by: Caroline Johnson (Conservative - Sleaford and North Hykeham)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, pursuant to the written statement on 26 February 2026 titled Data Linkage Study, whether he plans to complete the data linkage study before the Pathways puberty blockers trial commences.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The data linkage study is an important commitment within a wider national gender research programme, which is being jointly delivered by NHS England and the National Institute for Health and Care Research.
The data linkage study is observational in nature, linking and analysing existing, routinely collected healthcare data for adults who, as children, were referred into the former Gender Identity Development Service, previously operated by the Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust. It is important to highlight that as the study is not designed as a comparative clinical trial, it will not provide direct evidence on the cause or effect of any individual treatment approach, nor provide evidence relating to any treatment’s safety or efficacy. Its findings will relate to a former, decommissioned model of NHS care and to a previous cohort of children and young people with gender incongruence.
The PATHWAYS suite of studies, including the currently paused clinical trial, and the data linkage study, have very different designs and will generate different types of new evidence. They remain separate elements of the wider national gender research programme, and their delivery timelines are not co-dependent.