Independent Commission on Adult Social Care

Baroness Barker Excerpts

Monday 9th March 2026 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

That is key in the mind of the noble Baroness, Lady Casey. We need to better join up the NHS and social care workforces. We will have a workforce plan for the NHS in spring this year and we are also investing in developing our social care workforce to professionalise and respect it.

[Baroness Barker (LD)]

My Lords, last summer, local authorities came under pressure from the Department of Health to make people and their families go through assessments for continuing healthcare. From the speech by the noble Baroness, Lady Casey, on 4 March, we now know that ICBs were at the same time employing private companies to make sure that their CHC payments went down. Will the Minister undertake to review all the applications for continuing healthcare to each ICB throughout this financial year and publish the results, showing how many were accepted, how many were accepted on appeal and how many families were sent on a runaround between the different agencies?

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

What the noble Baroness describes—people getting the runaround—is, of course, unacceptable, and we have discussed this a number of times. I would be pleased to take back her suggestion to the Minister for Care, Stephen Kinnock.

Puberty Suppressants Trial

Baroness Barker Excerpts

Thursday 18th December 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

I can confirm to my noble friend that the transparency will continue and I am grateful for the comments that she made about my right honourable friend the Health Secretary, who I believe has not just been transparent but extremely honest. I very much welcome that.

[Baroness Barker (LD)]

My Lords, the backdrop to this research is an extensive international religious nationalist campaign against women’s rights and LGBT rights. Since this research has been designed according to standard research protocols, has been approved by the NHS ethics committees and will be carried out by professionals who are bound by professional regulation, does the Minister agree with me that those professionals should be enabled to get on with their job free from ideological interference?

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

I do agree with that point. We are seeking to protect the safety and interests of children and young people through evidence, and it is right and proper that we get on with that. As the noble Baroness has said, this is a trial; it is being led by King’s College London and the South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust. It has been carefully checked by independent scientists who advise the NIHR and by the MHRA and it has also received approval from a research ethics committee. I would say that we are treading cautiously and correctly in this area, because all that matters is the safety of children.

Telemedical Abortions

Baroness Barker Excerpts

Wednesday 12th November 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

I certainly can confirm that the changes voted into that Bill involve no change to the provision of telemedicine. To the noble Baroness’s other point, we would need to review the data, including the available data in respect of her question about health and well-being, on which I would be pleased to write to her further.

[Baroness Barker (LD)]

We on these Benches would like to note that the dedication of the noble Baroness, Lady Newlove, to sticking up for victims applied no matter who was in government at the time, and that was a very laudable thing to witness in this House.

Does the Minister agree that all the peer-reviewed evidence suggests that women who are in vulnerable situations find it easier and safer to access abortion services on the phone, and that study after study has shown that professionals employed in those services are very well attuned to finding out what, if anything, is happening to the person on the end of the phone, particularly if they are under duress?

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

I most certainly can agree with the points the noble Baroness has rightly made. There is a very clear pathway to providing safe care. The provision of telemedicine in this regard came in in 2022, and it has given safe abortions further ballast, so it is nothing other than a safe procedure, as I mentioned earlier.

Care Workers: Foreign Worker Visas

Baroness Barker Excerpts

Wednesday 18th June 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

There are a number of ways that we are promoting opportunities to develop skills and knowledge, which will improve morale but also the attractiveness of working in adult social care. To that point, I am particularly pleased that apprenticeships are available for young people, so that they may see the benefits of working in the social care service.

The three main areas are an expanded care workforce pathway; the launch of the adult social care learning and development support scheme in September, which will allow funding for eligible care staff to complete courses and qualifications; and the new level 2 adult social care certificate scheme, which has been backed up by some £12 million this financial year. In all of this, we are seeking to professionalise and recruit—as well as retain—valued social care staff.

[Baroness Barker (LD)]

My Lords, the spending review promised £4 billion for social care, but not until 2028-29, and it is being carved out of the NHS. Until then, there is nothing in the spending review, so all that is going to happen is that social care employers will have bits and bobs of sporadic announcements of limited pots of funding. How on earth can they build a skilled workforce which is adequate and up to the demands that are going to be placed on it?

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

Perhaps I could assist by clarifying that the spending review, which allows for an increase of over £4 billion of funding available for social care, is by 2028-29; it is not a matter of waiting for that long. That is in comparison with 2025-26. I hope I was helpful to your Lordships’ House in identifying a number of actions we have already taken to professionalise, upskill and allow people to build careers in the social care workforce. That is absolutely crucial. That, aligned with stopping international recruitment in this area—with a period of time for transition of some years—will shift to improve and increase the adult social care workforce in this country.

Adult Social Care

Baroness Barker Excerpts

Monday 16th June 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

Yes, indeed. I pay tribute to the adult social care workforce who work hard, day in, day out, to provide the standards that the noble Lord refers to for those in our communities who are often the most vulnerable. I could give a range of examples but will refer in particular to the learning and development support scheme, which was launched in September 2024. It provides funding for eligible care staff to complete courses and qualifications, including a new level 2 adult social care certificate, and has been backed by £12 million this financial year. I give that as just one example; I am sure the noble Lord will be welcoming of the other actions that the Government are taking.

[Baroness Barker (LD)]

My Lords, the spending review announced £4 billion for social care, but that £4 billion will come from the NHS and not until 2028. Can the Minister confirm that there was nothing in the spending review about the two intervening years, in which local authorities are supposed to implement the fair pay award?

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

Your Lordships’ House will be aware of the financial situation that we inherited and seek to put right. The Government have made available up to £3.7 billion in additional funding for social care authorities in 2025-26, and the noble Baroness is right that just last week the spending review allowed for a further increase of over £4 billion to be made available for adult social care in 2028-29. We are taking a whole range of actions. The Employment Rights Bill, which we will come back to later today, seeks, for the first time ever, to bring in fair pay and professionalisation for those in the adult social care workforce. So it is not that nothing is happening in the meantime. We are making progress and ensuring that the funding will be available so that we have not just a decent adult social care workforce but a way of tackling what no Government have managed to tackle before.

Complications from Abortions (Annual Report) Bill [HL]

Baroness Barker Excerpts

Committee stage
Friday 6th June 2025 Lords Chamber

The facts in this case are that all medical opinion, from the BMA and the Royal College of Midwives to obstetricians, gynaecologists, nurses and GPs, is behind the decriminalisation of abortion and none sees the data issue as critical, whereas decriminalisation is critical because it is a healthcare matter adversely affecting women. The general population agree. Numerous polls since 2020 show that, whether it is 76% or 82%, the vast majority of people agree that abortion is a woman’s right to choose. By debating this in in your Lordships’ House even further, I fear we are getting more and more out of touch when we talk about data and not about the fundamental issues that the other place has been debating. I am very pleased to support the clause not standing part today, and I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, may, on reflection, decide not to continue with this Bill.

[Baroness Barker (LD)]

My Lords, I, too, spoke at Second Reading and I welcome the opportunity to speak again to set in context what the Bill is part of and is all about. I, too, have to disagree fundamentally with the noble Lord, Lord Weir of Ballyholme, though not on the necessity for accurate data and statistics. You cannot separate the Bill from the wider context of what is going on in the politics of reproduction, reproductive health and gender identity.

I spoke last time about the international campaign being organised largely by religious nationalists across the USA, Europe and Russia, which has a specific aim to destroy human rights, reproductive rights and the international organisations responsible for upholding them. If people wish to doubt me, I suggest they read any number of reports, but the one that sets out the fundamental basis of the campaign is from 2018 by the European Parliamentary Forum on Population and Development, Restoring the Natural Order, which sets out how a small group of people have set out to overturn the human rights framework that we developed following the horrors of World War Two and over the past 50 years in order to “restore the national order”. They have a number of specific objectives within that. Key among them are making sure that the definition of marriage and family pertains only to heterosexual people, and definitely overturning access to abortion and contraception. Overturning divorce laws is part of what they want to do as well as rejecting compulsory sex, reproductive and health education and, perhaps most interestingly of all, making sure that the first and primary educators of children must always be the family, even if that is to the exclusion of public education. It is a clear agenda.

The noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, was right. If you want to see how it is unfolding, just look at what is happening in states in America and in Hungary and Poland, because what is happening in the USA is not stopping there. It is funded by billions upon billions of dollars in Europe, mostly emanating from America but also from Russia, and in Africa. This is part of that.

It is important and relevant that we look at that today because the data you get relies entirely on the questions you ask, and the questions you ask are determined by the outcomes you want to achieve. As some of us watch this campaign unfolding in its different manifestations, one thing we have noticed is that it is moving on. The people behind it—the Alliance Defending Freedom, the Heritage Foundation and all those massive Christian nationalist organisations and Catholic and other religious institutions in Europe—have realised that, to make to make their campaign more widely palatable, they have to move away from being largely a bunch of male-led organisations. They have removed themselves through a number of different front organisations and changed the language they use to talk about rights and so on.

From those of us who have fought for human rights for 50 years, they have learned the importance of having your messages framed in terms of rights—the rights of people to resist a liberal elite that argues for things such as equality and equality laws, which are inevitably disproportionately affecting some people, particularly poorer people. They say, “Rather than relying on what we’ve done so far, we actually need to go further. We need to create the information that will back up our campaign”. Interestingly, in some cases they have set up private universities which produce research that appears to be proper academic research but is in fact grey research, always leading inevitably to the conclusions that support their back-up. They produce books and reports. This is not new. Noble Lords in this House have for years seen the dodgy dossiers that come from the Christian Institute—all that kind of stuff. That is what is happening and that is why it is important that we make sure that the statistics that we get on abortion—and, incidentally, access to contraception—are timely and accurate.

Noble Lords have mentioned this, and they are absolutely right: the politicisation of data in this area is really important. The increase in the number of women being prosecuted because they have had a miscarriage comes as a direct result of this campaign. I do not think that those of us on our side of the argument have anything to fear. We kept statistics when we introduced telemedicine and medical abortion. In advance of it, those on the other side of the argument were full of dire warnings that all sorts of crimes would be committed. They were not; the statistics and the data have shown that.

I have nothing against the improvement of the collection of data in the health service, but my plea to the noble Baroness, Lady Merron, is that, when the Government look at this issue—and I believe that we should—I ask her to ensure that the statisticians are able to resist the political pressure being exercised across all the different parts of government and organisations because of this campaign, which is being waged on a number of different fronts. Ultimately, it is a pernicious campaign that will damage all sorts of people, including minorities, but will be particularly harmful to women and girls.

[Baroness Boycott (CB)]

My Lords, I join this debate to follow up the powerful speech by the noble Baroness, Lady Barker. I have been involved in women’s rights for a very long time; I started a magazine called Spare Rib in 1972 and within that we campaigned all our lives for things such as abortions. I can honestly say that I think the life facing a young woman today is more frightening than the life that faced me as a young woman.

I look at what is happening online, where you can download a very simple app. I had a lunch for Laura Bates the other day, which many noble Lords came to. She explained that I could download an app, take a photograph of the noble Baroness, Lady Freeman, right beside me, press a button and have a photograph of the noble Baroness naked—not with Kate Moss’s body, but with the noble Baroness’s body. You can do this at 11 or 12. It is really threatening being a young woman today. There are many things that are out of our control. We, as older women who have had successful lives, have to fight fantastically hard to protect this next generation from a lot of the stuff that is coming down the pipe.

I very much listen to and know about the conspiracies and the power happening in America to try to alter fundamental rights such as abortion. I find it extremely distressing that measures such as this should come to the House of Lords and even be debated seriously, and that there should be a politicisation of women who face abortion. Frankly, nobody wants an abortion; I cannot think why people ever thought that. Nobody wants one. There are several things you do not say when you ask yourself, “What do I want to do in my life?” No one says, “I want to be an alcoholic”, or, “I want to have an abortion”, or, “I want to be a druggie”. You do not put those on your wish list. They happen and we should protect women and support them all the way through, as the noble Lord, Lord Patel, spoke about in his fantastic debate earlier. These are people who need our protection and our love. I really support the noble Baroness, Lady Thornton, in bringing this forward. I will take part in any further debate because this is vital, and we are vital to this. Our voices really matter here.

Healthy Life Expectancy

Baroness Barker Excerpts

Tuesday 20th May 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

The right reverend Prelate is quite right to draw attention to mental health impacts and the inequality of their incidence. As I mentioned, there has to be a cross-government approach because if we address it through health alone, we will not succeed. Factors such as poor housing, low income, worklessness and disability, as well as ill health and many other factors, affect healthy life expectancy. That is why we are approaching it not by a separate strategy, but by a mission-led approach.

[Baroness Barker (LD)]

Through the work of people such as Professor Michael Marmot, the Government know about the different incidences of ill health across the country. Retailers, particularly food retailers and high street pharmacies, know about the incidence of ill health way in advance of that because they have the data on consumption and purchasing behaviours. Will the Government work with them, particularly the large supermarkets, to increase the availability of data in advance, so that we can prevent some of the incidence of ill health rather than getting the NHS to pay for it when it has happened?

Mental Health Bill [HL]

Baroness Barker Excerpts

Report stage
Wednesday 2nd April 2025 Lords Chamber

I am grateful to my noble friend the Minister for meeting me and the noble Baroness, Lady Barker, before Report and discussing these issues of the gaps in human rights protection after the Sammut case and how those gaps are to be dealt with. As I mentioned in our meetings with the Minister, there are other areas of outsourced health and social care affected by the Sammut ruling, including children’s social care. I have written to my noble friend Lady Smith of Malvern about the possibility of incorporating an amendment similar to Amendment 54 for outsourced social care and education in the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill. There is also a gap for other areas of outsourced health and social care funded from the NHS, including NHS continuing healthcare and any healthcare for physical illnesses commissioned by the NHS. If there is to be—and I think it is likely—an NHS Bill in this Parliament, that could provide a vehicle to close any remaining gaps in human rights protection for outsourced health and social care. For now, I commend what is a simple but important amendment, and I hope it can be supported.

[Baroness Barker (LD)]

My Lords, at this late hour I do not intend to speak at great length, but I do not want anybody to misinterpret that as in any way diminishing the support for the amendment of the noble Baroness, Lady Keeley. I believe that this is very important.

It is important for two main reasons. The first is that we all know that the Human Rights Act is under attack on many different fronts for many different reasons. I happen to be—it is perhaps fair to say or apt to describe as—a human rights absolutist: I do not believe that human rights can be picked or that you can pick and choose whose human rights you support. Human rights are universal. You cannot call yourself a human rights supporter unless you are prepared to stand up for the human rights of people you do not like and you do not care for. I suggest that among the people whose human rights are most at risk are those who are stuck away in care homes without anybody paying any attention to them—perhaps without relatives —and about whom, frankly, nobody cares. They are the people who are at the mercy of, particularly, providers who have a commercial interest in maintaining them in the positions where they are rather than seeking to address their care in more fundamental ways. If nothing else, I want us to acknowledge that.

Secondly, I want to pay tribute to all those health professionals and to people such as solicitors who choose to work in this most unglamorous part of the legal system. There is no great financial reward in putting yourself out to stand up for these people, but they do. It is their dedication that has brought this back to the attention of people in this House.

The noble Baroness, Lady Keeley, and I were to a certain extent, as we all have been throughout the passage of the Bill, assuaged by the noble Baroness, Lady Merron, and the very personable way in which she has listened to all of our concerns, but we were not yet convinced that the Government, who are uniquely placed to stick up for the rights of these people, are doing so to the extent that they should. That is why we have taken the time and troubled your Lordships this evening. I hope that all of the provisions of this amendment are taken up by the Government.

[Baroness Chakrabarti (Lab)]

My Lords, I declare an interest as a member of that persecuted minority of activist human rights lawyers. Crucially, it is a privilege to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Barker, and my noble friend Lady Keeley, who have done so much wonderful work on this. I also commend the brains trust of mental health professionals and lawyers who sat behind them.

On 24 February, we had a lengthy discussion on this in Committee, and it was one of the best debates in which I have had the privilege of participating in your Lordships’ House, and not just because everybody agreed. But they did. I do not remember a single person speaking against my noble friend’s amendment in Committee. We disagree well in your Lordships’ House, but it says something that not a single person disagreed. In particular, I commend the eloquent speeches on that day by the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler- Sloss, and by the noble Earl, Lord Howe, on the Opposition Front Bench.

I have been very excited to hear that my noble friend the Minister has been in such constructive meetings with my noble friend Lady Keeley. Whatever debates there are about contracting out vital public services, nobody on any side of this House wants people to be treated less decently and with fewer human rights because of a service being provided directly by the state or a decent contractor. With that, I look forward expectantly, with hope in my heart, to the response of my noble friend, who is very experienced, decent and wily.

Mental Health Bill [HL]

Baroness Barker Excerpts

Report stage
Monday 31st March 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Davies of Brixton (Lab)]

I am extremely pleased that the noble Lord, Lord Kamall, has moved his amendment for the Opposition. I will not be voting for it, but I am pleased that it has been moved because in Committee I moved amendments along the same lines.

I know that my noble friend the Minister agrees with the suggestion that there is a challenge here for the Government—she told me so. This issue is not going to go away, and it would be a constructive way forward for there to be a meeting—I would ask to be included in any such meeting. We are clear about where we want to get to, and that the appropriate phrase is “right care, right person”. I do not think that that is currently being delivered, so something needs to be done. I hope that we can move to a better system, in a constructive way.

[Baroness Barker (LD)]

My Lords, like the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Brixton, I find myself in exactly the same place. We all know why the police have said that they are not the appropriate people to be first responders when somebody is having a mental health crisis and presenting a danger either to other people or to themselves. We also know that not putting anything in place, or not putting the right people in place, means that somebody having a crisis will not necessarily be seen by an appropriate person.

A number of us have looked at this and talked to people in the field, and we think that what will happen is that there will be a response from somebody on the front line in the National Health Service, either in an A&E department—because that is where a lot of people will go—or, more likely, from an ambulance. That will put the ambulance service under even greater strain and pressure than it is under now.

It is the hope of those of us who have been involved in the discussions so far—and the intent, I think, of the noble Baroness, Lady May, who is the prime mover behind this—that we do not do that. We should not wait until there is a terrible incident in which somebody is badly harmed; we must try to foresee that situation.

I suspect that, around the country, since the police have taken the decision that they have, front-line health services have had to come up with new ways of responding. The issue has not gone away; people are still going to have mental health crises in which they are a danger to themselves or seem to present a danger to others.

I propose that we follow the suggestion from the noble Lord, Lord Kamall, that there be further discussion on this—preferably with people from mental health organisations and from different parts of the NHS, as well as the police force—to see whether we can come up with something that will plug a very obvious gap.

As I have said before during the passage of this Bill, this is the last chance for the next 10 to 15 years to pass legislation on this subject. We need to behave diligently, take appropriate action now and not wait to rue the day in the future.

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Kamall, for tabling these amendments. They seek to amend Section 2 of the Mental Health Act, which relates to admission for assessment, and Section 3, which relates to admission for treatment, as well as Section 5(4), which relates to detention for six hours pending application admission.

I emphasise that the police do not currently have the ability to detain under Sections 2, 3 and 5 of the Act. These amendments, as the noble Lord has referred to and as we discussed earlier, would give police additional powers, where they currently do not have powers to intervene. The noble Lord will be aware, and he mentioned the fact, that we do not support extending police powers in this way, and we understand that the police do not support an extension either.

I am very happy to continue discussion with the office of the noble Baroness, Lady May, as I have done previously. I know that my noble friend Lord Davies would also welcome a discussion, which I am very happy to commit to.

The noble Lord asked for amendments on Third Reading, but such amendments are to clarify any remaining uncertainties, to improve drafting and to enable the Government to fulfil undertakings given at earlier stages of the Bill. I am sure the noble Lord will understand that amendments are therefore restricted to technical points. For all those reasons, I cannot give the agreement that he sought on an amendment at Third Reading, as it is not within scope to do so.

With regards to the ambition to reduce police attendance at mental health incidents, we recognise the pressures that police are facing, which noble Lords have highlighted, and agree that, in many cases, it is far preferable for those in mental health crisis to be responded to by health and care professionals. However, action is already under way to address this. Almost all police forces in England and Wales are implementing the “right care, right person” approach—a police-led initiative to reduce inappropriate police involvement in cases where people have health or social care needs. There has already been a 10% decrease in Section 136 detentions last year. We are taking steps to improve mental health services to avoid people reaching a crisis where police involvement may be required in the first place, which is a far more preferable position to be in. That includes through the Government’s commitment of £26 million of capital investment to open new mental health crisis centres, which are far more suitable environments for those in mental health crisis to receive care and treatment.

Therefore, extending these legal powers currently held by the police to other professionals would represent a major shift in roles and responsibilities for health and care professionals. It would place significant additional pressures on the NHS and potentially lead to staff, patient and public safety issues which mental health and urgent and emergency care leads have already raised significant concerns about. It is for all these reasons that I ask the noble Lord, Lord Kamall, to withdraw his amendment.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Barker (LD)]

My Lords, at this stage I do not wish to detain the House for very long. I will simply reflect on the fact that, when we debate mental health legislation, we are always trying to do three things: one is to update current thinking in legislative circles on what patients want and need; the second is to try to gently confront the sometimes conservative disposition of practitioners, by pushing for progress; and the third is that we try to avoid the situation where the biggest imperative for legal change is scandal and crisis when something goes wrong.

The amendments put forward by the noble Baroness, Lady Watkins, along with others proposed by noble Lords in this group, do that. They have reflected on what has been seen over the last 10 to 15 years in the patient experience and the most progressive aspects of professional development, in particular the growing acceptance that patients can have informed insight into their condition, even if they are at times very ill.

That is why a number of practitioners—admittedly in the face of some professional resistance in other quarters—have gone down the route of advance choice documents. The key thing I will say to the Minister is this: it is always difficult in mental health practice to come across evidence which is up to the same standards that we have in physical health—namely, randomised controlled trials. However, there have been randomised controlled trials of advance choice documents in a number of different places around the world, and in the United Kingdom. They may not always have been called advance choice documents—they may have had other names—but the findings from those trials say that these are cost-effective interventions.

However, we know that there will not be widespread uptake, that attention will not be paid to what people have put in those documents, and that they will not become standard practice unless they are in law. That is why the noble Baroness, Lady Watkins, was right to come back to try to put this in the Bill.

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank noble Lords for their contributions. I will take each amendment in turn.

The points on trauma were made extremely well and sensitively. Amendments 12 and 13 recognise the impact that childhood trauma can have on psychological well-being. This is indeed so. However, it does not apply to all patients, and that is why we do not wish to restrict decision-making by giving particular reference to this in legislation. I can point to Clause 8, which already requires decision-makers to consider the nature and degree of the disorder and all other circumstances, which could include childhood trauma. The definition of medical treatment under the Act is broad, as noble Lords have seen. Therefore, we expect it to cover interventions aimed at minimising distress and promoting psychological well-being. Additionally, NHS England’s care standards require that in-patient care be trauma informed.

Apricity Fertility Closure

Baroness Barker Excerpts

Wednesday 12th March 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

My noble friend raises an extremely important point, which I will of course cover in my meeting tomorrow. It may be of interest to know that the Advertising Standards Authority and the HFEA issued a joint enforcement notice in 2021 to ensure that fertility clinics and others were aware of the advertising rules and were treating consumers fairly. That remains in place. The ASA periodically reviews compliance with its rules. Its recent review in the fertility sector found far fewer absolute claims than it had found previously and that the level of compliance is good. That is not to say that it is good in all cases, and I agree with my noble friend’s point.

[Baroness Barker (LD)]

My Lords, the law governing human fertilisation and embryology in this country built on the outstanding work of Baroness Warnock. It was carefully crafted so that it rests on principles that endure, but it was designed in such a way that it could be regularly updated to deal with advances in scientific knowledge and changes in society. Does the Minister agree that this is an indication that we have come to a point where that legislation needs to be reviewed? In order to do that, will the Government commit to beginning the process of consultation that must take place before any legislative review comes to this Chamber?

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

I agree with the noble Baroness’s observations. The legislation goes back to 1990. We are in 2025, and there has been an advent of many new technologies, techniques and business models—for example, the noble Baroness, Lady Owen, referred to Apricity—that were never imagined just a few years ago, let alone in 1990.

The majority of clinics are privately owned. Many are part of large groups with external finance. Elements of fertility care and associated treatments are increasingly offered online or outside HFEA regulation. There is a huge challenge here. That is why we are in discussion with the HFEA, and we will be in discussion tomorrow.