Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to the Final report of the Independent Review of the Mental Health Act 1983, published on December 2018, what steps the Government plans to take to seek greater representation of people from ethnic minority backgrounds, especially those of black African and Caribbean heritage in key health and care professions.

We welcome the final report of the independent review of the Mental Health Act 1983.

We will consider the report and its recommendations in detail and respond in due course. We remain committed to reforming mental health law and will develop and bring forward legislation when Parliamentary time allows.

The Government recently set a goal for the National Health Service to ensure that representation of black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) individuals at very senior management levels will match that across the rest of the NHS workforce within 10 years. As part of this, ongoing implementation of the NHS Workforce Race Quality Standard is taking steps towards ensuring employees from BAME backgrounds have equal access to career opportunities and receive fair treatment in the workplace.