Asked by: Ben Bradshaw (Labour - Exeter)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what assessment his Department have made of trends in the levels of homelessness amongst (a) lesbian, (b) gay, (c) bisexual and (d) transgender people in the last 24 months.
Answered by Felicity Buchan - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities)
It has been mandatory for local authorities to collate declared information on sexual orientation for Homelessness Case Level Information Collection since April 2023 and we will publish relevant data in due course. This will further improve the Government's ability to measure and understand the outcomes for LGBT individuals who are at a risk of homelessness or are homeless.
Our approach is locally led. We expect councils to commission services based on an assessment of the needs of their local community and to make sure that needs of all groups are considered, such as in programmes like the £500 million Rough Sleeping Initiative (RSI).
Local authorities are responsible for ensuring their staff are trained to respond to the needs of all households experiencing homelessness. In May 2023, I chaired a round table raising awareness of the challenges faced by young LGBT people, and this was attended by colleagues from local authorities.
Asked by: Lloyd Russell-Moyle (Labour (Co-op) - Brighton, Kemptown)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will provide an assessment of progress against each of the individual UNAIDS targets (a) by age, (b) by ethnicity and (c) for (i) gay, bisexual and other men who have sex with men, (ii) heterosexual women, (iii) heterosexual men, (iv) people who acquired HIV through injecting drug use and (v) people who acquired HIV through vertical transmission.
Answered by Neil O'Brien
UK Health Security Agency undertakes the monitoring of progress against the UNAIDS targets and publishes these as part of the HIV Action Plan monitoring and evaluation framework. Information is not currently presented with breakdowns by demographic characteristics or probable route of HIV exposure. Some of this data will be available and published in future reports for the HIV Action Plan monitoring and evaluation framework.
Asked by: Lord Black of Brentwood (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government further to the Written Statement by Lord Markham on 8 June (HLWS826), what assessment they have made of the incidence of HIV in (1) women, and (2) heterosexual men, between 2019 and 2021; and what steps they are taking to improve this.
Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The UK Health Security Agency is currently developing a methodology to estimate incidence among heterosexual men and women based on the methodology currently used to produce estimates of incidence for gay, bisexual and other men who have sex with men. As estimates of incidence are not available for heterosexual men and women, new diagnoses first made in the United Kingdom are used as a proxy and interpreted in context of levels of HIV testing amongst those populations.
Between 2019 and 2021, there was a slight increase in HIV diagnoses and late HIV diagnoses among heterosexuals, whilst HIV testing coverage remained substantially lower in 2021 than in 2019. In addition, the estimated number of undiagnosed people among heterosexual men and women did not decline over the same period. These figures suggest that there was no fall in incidence in this population.
The HIV Action Plan published in 2020 aims to reduce new HIV infections by 80% between 2019 and 2025 and details a range of actions committed to in order to help achieve this ambition.
Asked by: Dave Doogan (Scottish National Party - Angus)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, if he will make an assessment of the implications for his policies of the report entitled Lost and Found: The LGBT+ Veteran Community and the Impacts of the Gay Ban published by Northumbria University on 2 June 2023; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Andrew Murrison - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Defence)
We are proud of our LGBT+ veterans and grateful for their service in defence of our nation. The Government is committed to listening to veterans and improving our services to them.
The experiences detailed in the Northumbria University and Fighting with Pride report do not represent what Defence stands for, and it will always be deeply regrettable that any of our personnel were subjected to such treatment.
Whilst the research report from Northumbria University and Fighting With Pride provides helpful context to the lived experience of LGBT Veterans, the government is committed to considering the findings and recommendations in Lord Etherton’s LGBT Veterans Independent Review. The government will publish Lord Etherton’s review shortly and respond to its recommendations as soon as it can.
Asked by: Siobhain McDonagh (Labour - Mitcham and Morden)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many LGBTQI+ people are in immigration detention in the UK.
Answered by Robert Jenrick
The management of and support for detained individuals that identify as LGBTQI+ is set out in published guidance. Detention Services Order 2/2016 ‘Lesbian, gay and bisexual detainees in the detention estate’, and Detention Services Order 11/2012 ‘Care and Management of Transsexual Detainees’. Each set out how individuals with these particular protected characteristics should be safeguarded and treated in detention.
The Home Office does not hold central data on the number of LGBTQI+ residents in immigration detention. It is not incumbent upon a detained individual to declare their sexuality. Consequently, even a manual trawl of cases will not necessarily be representative of the true number of LGBTQI individuals detained during any period.
The Home Office does however publish statistics on people in immigration detention in the ‘Immigration Statistics Quarterly Release(opens in a new tab)’. The number of people in detention at the end of each quarter are in table Det_D02 of the ‘Detention detailed datasets(opens in a new tab)’, where the data can be broken down by current place of detention. The latest data relate to as at the end of December 2022.
Data as at the end of March 2023 is scheduled to be published in late May 2023.
Asked by: Baroness Lister of Burtersett (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of (1) the report by Women for Refugee Women See Us, Believe Us, Stand with Us, published on 2 March, and (2) the implications of their Illegal Migration Bill on the experiences of lesbian and bisexual women seeking asylum in the UK.
Answered by Lord Murray of Blidworth
An equalities impact assessment will be published for the Illegal Migration Bill in due course.
Asked by: Daisy Cooper (Liberal Democrat - St Albans)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment she has made of the implications for her Department's immigration policies of the report entitled LGBTQI+ people’s experiences of immigration detention: A pilot study, published in February 2023.
Answered by Robert Jenrick
Published Detention Services Orders (DSOs) 2/2016 and 11/2012 set out how individuals who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual or transsexual should be safeguarded and treated in detention.
We are unable to publish data on LGBTQI detained individuals. The identification of an LGBTQI individual detained under immigration powers, is entirely at the discretion of the individual. Consequently, even a manual trawl of cases of individuals detained will not necessarily be representative of the true number of LGBTQI individuals detained during any period. The fact that an individual detained under immigration powers within an IRC or prison is transsexual will always be recorded in a manner sensitive to the needs of that individual, not for statistical purposes. As it is rare for the detention of a trans or intersex person to occur, any reporting would risk the identification of individuals.
Asked by: Daisy Cooper (Liberal Democrat - St Albans)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, if she will make it her policy to collect data on the number of LGBTQI people held in immigration detention.
Answered by Robert Jenrick
Published Detention Services Orders (DSOs) 2/2016 and 11/2012 set out how individuals who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual or transsexual should be safeguarded and treated in detention.
We are unable to publish data on LGBTQI detained individuals. The identification of an LGBTQI individual detained under immigration powers, is entirely at the discretion of the individual. Consequently, even a manual trawl of cases of individuals detained will not necessarily be representative of the true number of LGBTQI individuals detained during any period. The fact that an individual detained under immigration powers within an IRC or prison is transsexual will always be recorded in a manner sensitive to the needs of that individual, not for statistical purposes. As it is rare for the detention of a trans or intersex person to occur, any reporting would risk the identification of individuals.
Asked by: Rupa Huq (Labour - Ealing Central and Acton)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps her Department is taking to protect LGBT+ people from experiencing homophobic abuse whilst in detention in the UK.
Answered by Robert Jenrick
The rights of all detained individuals are safeguarded by the Detention Centre Rules 2001, published operating standards for immigration removal centres (IRCs) and Detention Services Orders (DSO).
Any discrimination against those who are detained in our immigration removal estate is unacceptable, and we take robust action against anyone who is found not to have behaved appropriately. Published guidance sets out the standards of treatment for transexual, lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people in detention, to ensure that all staff working in the Home Office removal estate are aware of the actions to identify and appropriately meet their needs.
Detainee Custody Officers in IRCs receive diversity training as part of their initial training, covering the treatment of LGBT detained persons and others with protected characteristics. In addition, supplier staff provide opportunities for detained individuals to safely disclose their sexual orientation and ensure that those who choose to disclose can access support and assistance. This information is treated sensitively in line with data protection legislation.
Asked by: Crispin Blunt (Independent - Reigate)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, pursuant to the Answer of 25 January 2023 to Question 125224 on Armed Forces: Homosexuality, whether his Department is aware of earlier destruction of relevant records.
Answered by Andrew Murrison - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Defence)
Almost all police investigative records concerning gay and lesbian personnel before 2000 have been destroyed. Service Police investigative records are routinely and lawfully destroyed, in line with data protection legislation and Ministry of Defence (MOD) policy prescribing retention periods based on category of offence. Once records no longer have an investigative value there is no basis for retaining them, particularly as they contain sensitive personal information.
Our research into this topic indicates that relevant records were generally managed and retained in the same way as records of other offences, in line with data protection legislation and MOD policy at the time. Archived communications suggest the exceptions to this are: