Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment he has made of the potential merits of giving same sex couples the same rights as heterosexual couples to access IVF treatment.

In England, decisions about local fertility services are determined by clinical commissioning groups, taking account of the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence’s (NICE) fertility guidelines.

The NICE guidelines were updated in 2013 to include provision for same sex female couples, who have demonstrated their clinical infertility. The criteria in the guidelines were developed as a way of achieving equivalence between opposite-sex and same-sex couples in establishing clinical infertility and accessing National Health Service fertility treatment services. The guidelines are now due for review and the Department has started discussions with NICE about plans for such a review.