Gill Furniss

The House of Commons leads on the recruitment of the Parliamentary Commissioner for Administration and Health Service Commissioner. We expect that the formal appointment will be made shortly.

Future standards this year will set new homes and buildings on a path that moves away from relying on volatile fossil fuel markets and ensures they are fit for a net zero future.

As part of the Warm Homes Plan, the Government is considering the role that finance may play in supporting homeowners with the upfront costs of energy efficiency improvements, solar panels, and installing low carbon heating.

Further details about how the Government will increase the deployment of domestic solar panels will be set out in the forthcoming Solar Roadmap.

In England we are committed to nature protection and recovery. This includes delivering our legally binding biodiversity target to restore or create more than 500,000 hectares of wildlife-rich habitat by 2042.

We will create, restore and connect wildlife-rich habitat, reduce pressures on species including from pollution and climate change, and take targeted action to recover specific species.

The Environmental Improvement Plan is being reviewed and we have confirmed the commitment to restoring 75% of Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSIs) to favourable condition by 2042. SSSIs continue to be one of the most effective tools for protecting and enhancing biodiversity and deliver a wide range of health and socio-economic benefits.

A priority for this Government is to support building the homes and infrastructure we desperately need while protecting the environment.

Mandatory biodiversity net gain, which became a requirement for most developments in February 2024, is an important means of enabling this.

Officials are working closely with the construction, environmental, and local authority sectors to monitor the delivery of biodiversity net gain to ensure its success.

Under the Animal Welfare (Licensing of Activities Involving Animals) (England) Regulations 2018, anyone in the business of breeding and selling cats as pets needs to have a valid licence issued by their local authority. Licensees must meet strict statutory minimum welfare standards which are enforced by local authorities who have powers to issue, refuse, vary or revoke licences. Anyone carrying on a licensable activity without a licence faces up to 6 months’ imprisonment, an unlimited fine, or both.

Defra has been working on a post-implementation review of the Regulations. This review considers whether the Regulations have met their objectives, and where there could be scope to further improve the protections they provide.

There has not been a recent assessment of the adequacy of regulations on towing of trailers by motorcycles, and there are no plans to review or amend the Road Vehicles (Construction and Use) Regulations in relation to these matters. Nothing has been identified to the Department to indicate that there is a need to amend Regulations at this time.

The Government recognises the importance of women and girls being able to access adequate information and care for menstrual health conditions and reproductive health.

The women’s health area on the National Health Service website brings together over 100 health topics including pages on heavy periods, endometriosis, adenomyosis, and contraception. This provides women with information on hormonal and non-hormonal treatment options for menstrual health conditions, and information on the different types of hormonal and non-hormonal contraception methods, including where to get them and how well they work at preventing pregnancy.

NHS England has also developed a shared decision tool to help women and general practitioners make decisions about the best treatments for heavy menstrual bleeding. This is available at the following link:

https://www.england.nhs.uk/publication/decision-support-tool-making-a-decision-about-managing-heavy-periods/

Clinical guidelines also support healthcare professionals to provide evidence-based care. The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence has published guidelines on a range of women’s health topics, including heavy menstrual bleeding, endometriosis, and contraception, and has also published a guideline on shared decision making.

The Department funds health and care research primarily through the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR). The NIHR has made research inclusion a condition of its funding. Applicants to domestic research programmes are required to demonstrate how inclusion is being built into all stages of the research lifecycle, with significant emphasis on how participant selection is considered. Before the end of March 2026, this will also be required for global health research and infrastructure awards.

The NIHR is developing a sex and gender policy to be implemented subsequently in 2025, to ensure that NIHR research accounts for sex and gender across every stage of the research cycle, allowing for a greater understanding of how men and women might be impacted differently by the same health condition, treatment, or intervention.

The Department is also developing a new research and development innovation strategy to accelerate the development of equitable, transformational medical technology solutions. Part of the aims of this work are to eliminate sex bias in medical technology research and development, ensuring that innovations are effective and accessible for all.

NHS England runs Help Us Help You campaigns to increase knowledge of cancer symptoms and address barriers to acting on them, to encourage people to come forward as soon as possible to see their general practitioner. The campaigns focus on a range of symptoms, encouraging body awareness to help people spot symptoms across a wide range of cancers at an early point.

Department of Health and Social Care officials work closely with colleagues in the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office and with Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, to raise awareness of cervical cancer in lower and middle income countries. For example, the Government has committed £1.65 billion to Gavi from 2021 to 2025, which provides the human papillomavirus vaccine to help protect the most vulnerable girls from the leading cause of cervical cancer.

NHS England Specialised Commissioning has a Clinical Reference Group (CRG) for specialised women’s services that provides clinical advice and leadership for complex obstetrics and maternity, and complex gynaecology and fertility preservation services. Specialist gynaecological services are commissioned in line with the service specification published by the CRG.

Furthermore, there is a CRG for rehabilitation and complex disability and spinal cord injury services. Specialist services for spinal cord injuries are commissioned in line with the service specification published by the CRG. The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence also has guidance on the assessment and early management of spinal cord injuries, which is available at the following link:

https://www.nice.org.uk/guidance/ng41.

Spinal cord injury centres provide life-long services and support, providing ongoing advice and management for those under their care. The service provides advice to general maternity services in managing pregnancy in line with individual need.

We recognise that having a spinal cord injury can create additional challenges for women and girls when it comes to managing their period. Women with spinal cord injuries are provided with menstruation and contraception information and advice during their first inpatient episode of care, and details are included in their discharge plan, which is shared with their general practitioner (GP) or primary care team. Through the spinal cord injury centres and voluntary sector, women have access to female discussion forums.

Both the Multidisciplinary Association of Spinal Cord Injury Professionals and the Spinal Injuries Association have provided free webinars for staff and those with spinal cord injuries, called Menstruation to Menopause.

The Royal College of General Practitioners (RCGP) has published a Women’s Health Library, which brings together educational resources and guidelines on women’s health from the RCGP, the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, and the Faculty of Sexual and Reproductive Healthcare. This resource is continually updated to ensure GPs and other primary healthcare professionals have the most up-to-date advice, to provide the best care for their patients.

The Government will continue to work with the NHS as it delivers its three-year maternity and neonatal plan to grow our maternity workforce, develop a culture of safety, and ensure women and babies receive safe, compassionate care. In the three-year delivery plan for maternity and neonatal services, NHS England set out their ambition that all women should receive personalised, joined-up, high-quality care during pregnancy, birth, and the postnatal period, including access to specialist care when required. Providers should ensure that women with spinal cord injuries have a personalised care and support plan that is tailored to their specific needs and choices and made in conjunction with appropriate specialist input.

The Government will prioritise women’s health, placing women’s equality at the heart of our agenda and ensuring women’s health is never again neglected. Spinal cord injury centres provide life-long services and support, providing ongoing advice and management for those under their care. They provide advice to general maternity services in managing pregnancy in line with individual need, as well as information, advice, and support to women regarding the practical elements of breast feeding, as required.

The Three-Year Delivery plan for Maternity and Neonatal services sets out the vision for women to experience personalised, joined-up, high-quality care right through to the postnatal period with handover to health visiting services and general practices (GPs). According to NHS England guidance, all women who have given birth should be offered a check-up with their GP six to eight weeks after giving birth. The check-up will cover a range of topics such as mental health, physical recovery, breastfeeding, and support with family planning. Women should be provided with practical support and information that reflects how they choose to feed their babies. Providers should ensure that, for women with spinal cord injuries, care is tailored to their individual needs.

NHS England is also rolling out perinatal pelvic health services to reduce rates of perineal tears, and maternal mental health services to provide additional mental health support and improve outcomes for women.

The Department is working closely with 75 local authorities across England, including Sheffield, to improve their infant feeding services, including breastfeeding support, through the Family Hubs and Start for Life programme. These services are helping families to access face-to-face and virtual infant feeding support whenever they need it, and in a location that suits them. This could be at home, in their family hub, or in a hospital setting.

At a national level, families across the United Kingdom can access round-the-clock support and advice on breastfeeding through the National Breastfeeding Helpline.

Unitaid are a leading funder of innovative tools to find and treat cervical cancer in low- and middle-income countries, with HPV tests the most accurate way to identify if a woman is at higher risk of developing cervical cancer. Together with partners, Unitaid's interventions lowered the cost of HPV testing by nearly 40 per cent and reduced the price of portable thermal ablation devices for treating precancerous lesions by more than 45 per cent. Unitaid's work is laying the groundwork for national cervical cancer elimination programs worldwide. We highly value our Unitaid partnership and have contributed more than half a billion pounds in funding.

Section 80AA of the Nationality, Immigration and Asylum Act 2002 (as amended and inserted by section 59 of the Illegal Migration Act 2023) provides for a list of generally safe states for whom asylum and human rights claims would be declared inadmissible; Georgia was added to that list by regulations.

Our current assessment of the situation in Georgia is set out in the relevant Country Policy and Information Notes, which are available on the gov.uk website.

We will continue to monitor the situation, working closely with the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office. Should we consider that Georgia – or any other designated state – no longer meets the relevant criteria, we would ask Parliament to make the necessary amendments to the list.

All asylum and human rights claims admitted to the UK system, including those based on sexual orientation and gender identity, are considered in accordance with our obligations under the Refugee Convention and European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR).

With specific respect to LGBT+ asylum seekers, whilst they are registering their claim, the Home Office ensures that these claimants are signposted to relevant NGOs specialising in the support of LGBT+ individuals. This is done through an information leaflet given to all asylum claimants at the point of claim which includes sections on legal advice, additional help and assistance with links to relevant legal bodies and support organisations.

The Home Office remains committed to delivering an asylum system that is responsive to all forms of persecution including those based on sexuality or gender identity and which supports claimants in providing all information relevant to their claim to facilitate fair and sustainable asylum decisions.