Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps his Department is taking to help ensure that patients seeking fertility treatment are protected from unregulated concierge IVF clinics that fall outside the remit of the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority.

Digital clinics do not currently fall within the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act and therefore are out outside of the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority’s (HFEA) remit at present.

The HFEA published Modernising Fertility Law in November 2023, which made a number of recommendations for legislative change, including around its regulatory powers.

Ministers have met with the HFEA Chair and discussed the emerging regulatory challenges. The Government is considering the HFEA’s priorities for changing the law and will decide how to take this forward at the earliest opportunity.