Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to page 10 of the Liaison and Diversion Standard Service Specification 2019, published on 20th November 2019, what steps he is taking to monitor adherence with the commitments for all services to (a) develop a gender specific female pathway to holistically address the specific needs of women in the criminal justice system, (b) nominate a dedicated female practitioner and (c) offer all females who come into custody a choice of gender for their practitioner or support time recovery worker who will provide a gender sensitive approach to screening and support effective onward referrals to gender specific services.

Dedicated female practitioner leads were nominated for each Liaison and Diversion Service in 2018. In 2019 self-report questionnaires were issued to all Liaison and Diversion Female Pathway Leads to assess progress made against developing effective female pathways. Having analysed the returns, bespoke advice was offered to providers.

In November 2020 NHS England delivered a virtual Maternal and Perinatal Pathway Workshop to commissioners and providers of Liaison and Diversion services. NHS England regional Health and Justice commissioning teams monitor Liaison and Diversion providers performance against the service specification requirements to ensure that they are delivering a gender specific approach within Liaison and Diversion Services and that they have effective pathways in place for onward referrals to gender specific community based services.