Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, what steps her Department is taking with international partners to help tackle organised immigration crime.

Answered by Seema Malhotra - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)

Immigration crime is an international problem, and it can only be solved through international cooperation.

That is why we have worked to develop agreements with France, Germany and Italy and others to break the business model of the criminal gangs, and why we are working upstream in Iraq, the Balkans, Ethiopia and elsewhere to disrupt smuggling supply chains, and reduce the drivers of illegal migration.

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to ensure that patients with known medical intolerances are able to be dispensed medication that is appropriate for their allergy.

Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

Pharmacists are highly trained and skilled healthcare professionals. As part of dispensing medicines, pharmacists have a professional responsibility to inform patients about the medicines they are taking, and this may include mentioning any ingredients in the medicines based on any allergies or intolerances that the patient reports. Where a potential issue is identified, pharmacists can contact the prescriber to request an alternative medicine or recommend a different formulation or brand of medicine where appropriate.

NHS England has made changes to enable pharmacists to access patient records when delivering clinical services such as Pharmacy First. This means pharmacists can view any known allergies or intolerances that are included in a patient’s record and use their professional and clinical judgement to supply medicines appropriate for the patient’s allergy or intolerance.

Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what recent assessment she has had made of the potential merits of extending tax relief for pension contributions for people aged 75 and over.

Answered by Torsten Bell - Parliamentary Secretary (HM Treasury)

The Government wishes to encourage pension saving, to help ensure that people have an income, or funds on which they can draw, throughout retirement. This is why, for the majority of savers, pension contributions are tax-free. This makes pensions tax relief one of the most expensive reliefs in the personal tax system. In 2023/24 Income Tax relief on total contributions and investment income of pension funds and National Insurance relief on employer contributions for pension savings cost the Exchequer £78.2 billion, with around 68 per cent of Income Tax relieved at the Higher and Additional rates.

Ending the provision of tax relief on pension contributions at the age of 75 is a longstanding feature of the pensions tax system. It is the age at which at which most people will bring or will have brought their pension into payment.

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment his Department has made of trends in the level of (a) respiratory disease and (b) the number of emergency hospital admissions for respiratory conditions in (a) Ashford constituency, (b) Kent and (c) the UK; and what steps he is taking to help improve respiratory health.

Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

Data is available for emergency finished admission episodes (FAEs) where there was a primary diagnosis of 'respiratory conditions’. The following table shows the number of FAEs where there was a primary diagnosis of 'respiratory conditions’ for Ashford and England, for activity in English National Health Service hospitals and English NHS-commissioned activity in the independent sector, for 2024/25 and provisionally for 2025/26:

Source: Hospital Episode Statistics, NHS England.

Available data on trends in respiratory conditions can be found on the Department’s Fingertips dataset. Data is not available by parliamentary constituency. Data is available at regional, county, unitary authority, and integrated care board level. Information for Kent is available at the following link:

https://fingertips.phe.org.uk/search/Respiratory#page/1/gid/1/pat/15/ati/502/are/E10000016/iid/40701/age/163/sex/4/cat/-1/ctp/-1/yrr/1/cid/4/tbm/1

Found: Conservative; Bognor Regis and Littlehampton) Chris Hinchliff (Labour; North East Hertfordshire) Sojan Joseph

Found: Perkins (Chair); Julia Buckley; Jonathan Davies; Carla Denyer; Barry Gardiner; Chris Hinchliff; Sojan Joseph

Found: Perkins (Chair); Julia Buckley; Jonathan Davies; Carla Denyer; Barry Gardiner; Chris Hinchliff; Sojan Joseph

Found: Conservative; Bognor Regis and Littlehampton) Chris Hinchliff (Labour; North East Hertfordshire) Sojan Joseph