Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether he plans to investigate the reasons for the annual increase in the number of abortions performed in private clinics.

The Department has no specific plans to investigate the reasons for the number of abortions performed in private clinics. However, the Department has commissioned the King’s Fund to undertake a piece of work to provide insights into factors contributing to changing patterns of abortion uptake in England.

Clinical commissioning groups are responsible for commissioning termination of pregnancy services and are increasingly commissioning from the independent sector abortion providers. All independent sector clinics wishing to perform abortions must be approved by the Secretary of State under section 1(3) of the Abortion Act 1967 and registered with the Care Quality Commission.