NHS Trusts: Translation Services
The question
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how much was spent on (a) translation and (b) interpretation by (i) NHS Trusts, (ii) James Paget University Hospitals Trust and (iii) the Norfolk and Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust in 2024.
Answered by Karin Smyth
The information requested on spend on translation and interpretation services by National Health Service trusts is not held centrally, as data is held at integrated care board level.
Across 2024, the Telephone Appointments Line team used third party translation services for 425 calls, or 0.04% of all answered calls. We are unable to provide a specific cost for this as it is delivered as part of the overall service specification for the provider. 101,431 letters, or 9.03% of all letters, were sent in a language other than English. There was no net cost for this as the translation had been paid for in previous years and the patients would have been sent a letter in English in the absence of a translated letter. The following table shows the total number of calls in a language other than English, what that language was, and the percentage it represents of all calls:
| Total | Percentage of total calls using language support in specified language |
Albanian | 3 | 0.71% |
Amharic | 1 | 0.24% |
Arabic | 69 | 16.24% |
Bengali | 34 | 8.00% |
Bulgarian | 9 | 2.12% |
Cantonese | 5 | 1.18% |
Czech | 2 | 0.47% |
Dari | 3 | 0.71% |
Farsi | 20 | 4.71% |
French | 3 | 0.71% |
Gujarati | 2 | 0.47% |
Greek | 2 | 0.47% |
Hungarian | 6 | 1.41% |
Hindi | 8 | 1.88% |
Italian | 4 | 0.94% |
Kurmanji | 1 | 0.24% |
Lithuanian | 2 | 0.47% |
Mandarin | 5 | 1.18% |
Pashto | 10 | 2.35% |
Polish | 20 | 4.71% |
Portuguese | 15 | 3.53% |
Punjabi | 21 | 4.94% |
Portuguese Br. | 1 | 0.24% |
Romanian | 60 | 14.12% |
Russian | 5 | 1.18% |
Somali | 5 | 1.18% |
Sorani | 26 | 6.12% |
Slovak | 5 | 1.18% |
Spanish | 11 | 2.59% |
Sylheti | 9 | 2.12% |
Tigrigna | 2 | 0.47% |
Turkish | 21 | 4.94% |
Ukrainian | 7 | 1.65% |
Urdu | 28 | 6.59% |
Total | 425 |
|
Total calls | 105,4942 | 0.04% of total calls used language support |
In addition, the following table shows the total number of letters in a language other than English, what that language was, and the percentage it represents of all letters:
| Total | Percentage of total letters sent in specified language |
Albanian | 1,700 | 1.68% |
Arabian | 7,189 | 7.09% |
Bengali | 9,069 | 8.94% |
Chinese | 652 | 0.64% |
French | 1,917 | 1.89% |
Greek | 935 | 0.92% |
Gujarati | 3,207 | 3.16% |
Hindi | 1,943 | 1.92% |
Hungarian | 979 | 0.97% |
Italian | 1,961 | 1.93% |
Kurdish | 2,218 | 2.19% |
Lithuanian | 1,347 | 1.33% |
Persian | 2,380 | 2.35% |
Polish | 8,413 | 8.29% |
Portuguese | 3,538 | 3.49% |
Punjabi | 5,760 | 5.68% |
Romanian | 5,427 | 5.35% |
Russian | 1,779 | 1.75% |
Slovak | 1,680 | 1.66% |
Somali | 2,787 | 2.75% |
Spanish | 3,481 | 3.43% |
Tamil | 2,543 | 2.51% |
Turkish | 3,944 | 3.89% |
Urdu | 14,876 | 14.67% |
Wolof | 26 | 0.03% |
Other languages | 11,680 | 11.52% |
Total translated | 101,431 |
|
Total letters | 1,123,829 | 9.03% of total letters sent were translated |
Source: NHS England
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