Parliament Questions

UK Parliament Written Questions

Official UK Parliament API for written questions tabled by MPs to government departments. No authentication required.

Data Model

• Written Question — A formal question tabled by an MP to a government minister. Must receive a written answer.
• id — Unique integer identifier.
• uin — Unique identification number assigned by Parliament (string, e.g. "121892").
• questionText — Full text of the question.
• heading — Short topic heading (e.g. "Special Educational Needs: Reform").
• answeringBodyName — Government department that answers (e.g. "Department for Education").
• dateTabled — Date the question was tabled.
• dateForAnswer — Date by which an answer is due.
• dateAnswered — Date the answer was given (null if unanswered).
• answerText — HTML-formatted ministerial answer.
• isNamedDay — Whether the MP specified a day for the answer.

Search and fetch

• Discovery — search with text, date windows, department, or asking member filters; results paginate with skip/take (default take=10).
• Single question — fetch by numeric question id after search or when the user supplies one.
• Date filters — tabled window (takenFrom/takenTo) and answered window (answeredFrom/answeredTo) use ISO dates.
• Department filter — answeringBodies is the integer body id for the answering department.
• Member filter — askingMemberId is the integer MP id who tabled the question.
• Text search — searchTerm matches question text and headings.
• Sort — default is newest tabled first (DateTabledDesc); ascending tabled date and newest answered date are also available.

Gotchas

• HTML answers: answerText contains HTML markup — strip tags for plain text.
• Unanswered questions: dateAnswered is null and answerText is empty.
• Grouped questions: Multiple questions answered together share groupedQuestions.
• Holding answers: answerIsHolding=true means a temporary response pending full answer.
• Corrections: answerIsCorrection=true and dateAnswerCorrected indicate revised answers.