Lord Patel of Blackburn

To win the global race we need the best civil servants regardless of their background so we must recruit, retain and promote on the basis of merit. We want to see more talented people, whatever their background, reach the very top roles.

As at 1 October 2013, the proportion of senior civil servants who declared that they are from an ethnic minority background is 3.8%.

We believe that for too long talent management in the Civil Service has been weak and the Government plans to address this as part of its ongoing programme of Civil Service reform.

All of the recommendations put forward by the hon Member for South West Wiltshire Dr Andrew Murrison in his report on Armed Forces and veterans' mental health – ‘Fighting Fit' - in 2010 have been implemented by the Department and the National Health Service in England in relation to services for veterans and by the Ministry of Defence for serving personnel.

Funding of £7.2 million is providing 10 veteran mental health teams across England. Each team provides mental health services that are specifically tailored to meet their local veteran population's needs and requirements. A National Veteran Mental Health Network has been established to identify and disseminate good practice across England and a national 24-hour veteran mental health helpline has been put in place.

An online, mental health well-being and counselling service for Armed Forces, their families and veterans – the Big White Wall - has also been developed. Working with the Royal College of General Practitioners we have put in place an e-learning training package for general practitioners (GPs). Health Education England has been mandated to provide training that will be available from summer 2015 to ensure that there will be a specialist GP in every local area trained in both the physical and mental health needs of veterans.

NHS England has commissioned Combat Stress to provide an acute Post Traumatic Stress Disorder services for veterans.

Everyone Counts: Planning for patients 2013-14 committed the National Health Service to move towards routine services being available seven days a week. The NHS Services, Seven Days a Week Forum was established to provide evidence and insight to support commissioners and providers to make this happen – which is essential to delivering a much more patient focused service, and one which offers the opportunity to improve clinical outcomes.

The Forum's Summary of Initial Findings concluded the NHS should adopt 10 evidence-based clinical standards to end current variations in outcomes. It was recognised the presence of consultants and the supervision they provide to doctors in training is integral to the delivery of the clinical standards, and should be available seven days a week.

To achieve this NHS England will use the range of commissioning tools and levers at its disposal, including the NHS Contract.

A seven day service does not mean individual doctors or nurses having to work every day of the week. Instead they will require hospitals to adjust their staffing rotas, making full use of the 76% increase in consultants since 2000.

The Prime Minister, my Rt. Hon. Friend the Member for Witney (Mr Cameron), the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, my Rt. Hon. Friend the Member for Richmond (Yorks) (Mr Hague), and the Minister for Africa, my Hon. Friend the Member for Boston and Skegness (Mr Simmonds), have all spoken to their Nigerian counterparts since news of the abduction broke on 18 April. In May the Minister for Africa travelled to Nigeria to discuss the situation with President Jonathan and Defence Minister Gusau and to agree the range of British assistance now being provided. Our High Commission in Abuja are in regular contact with the Government of Nigeria about this abduction, which is an abhorrent crime.

The Foreign Secretary hosted the London Ministerial on Security in North East Nigeria on 12 June, in the margins of the Global Summit on Ending Sexual Violence in Conflict. Representatives from Nigeria and its neighbours, as well as the US, France, Canada, United Nations, African Union and European Union agreed further concrete measures to tackle the terrorism threat in Nigeria and the region.

The Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) is committed to promoting diversity and inclusion for all its employees. The FCO's management information system shows that, out of the 246 Senior Management positions overseas, 80 members of staff have declared their religion. Of these, three are Muslim, which corresponds to 3.75% of those who declared and 1.22% of the overall total.

All FCO UK based staff are asked to provide diversity information about their ethnicity, disability status, sexual orientation and religion or belief. Supplying this data is voluntary. The FCO is working to improve diversity declaration rates by staff, including for religion and belief, and as part of this effort a three month campaign titled “Why Should I Tell You” was run between November 2013 and January 2014 to encourage staff to provide their diversity information. Over this period declaration rates for religion and belief increased from 31 to 35%.

The FCO launched the Black and Ethnic Minority (BME) Campaign in Summer 2013 aimed at the recruitment, progression and development of BME staff. The campaign aims to improve young people's understanding of the organisation and to encourage more applications to our fast stream, particularly from BME communities. It also includes a leadership programme for high performing BME staff to prepare them for senior management and other targeted career development courses, mentoring and coaching. The initial results have been very encouraging.

The FCO publishes an annual Equality Report which provides information about the diversity and makeup of our staff, as required by the Equality Act 2010. The 2014 report can be accessed at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/diversity-and-equality-report-2014.