Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment her Department has made of the number of publicly available defibrillators that are unavailable outside the opening hours of the buildings in which they are located.

The Circuit national defibrillator network is independently operated by The British Heart Foundation (BHF). Information on the BHF website states that there are currently 123,804 registered defibrillators, of which 58% are accessible to the public on a 24/7 basis. Many of these defibrillators have been installed as a result of local community led action. Further information is available at the following link:

https://www.bhf.org.uk