Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what requirements there are for NHS Trusts to provide (a) medication instructions and (b) patient information booklets in multiple languages.

NHS trusts are expected to adhere to statutory requirements under the Equality Act 2010, and to their responsibilities under the Public Sector Equality Duty. In 2018 NHS England published ‘Guidance for Commissioners: interpreting and translation services in primary care’, which outlines commissioners’ responsibilities for supporting primary care services to support patients who may need translation and interpretation support. This includes the requirement that health-related written documents in English (for example health information leaflets), which are usually made freely available to patients, should be translated where needed into other languages at no cost to the patient.