Asked by: Rebecca Paul (Conservative - Reigate)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether his Department has identified service gaps in the provision of primary care, mental health, dentistry and substance misuse services at HMP/YOI Downview.
Answered by Zubir Ahmed - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Department of Health and Social Care has indicated that it will not be possible to answer this question within the usual time period. An answer is being prepared and will be provided as soon as it is available.
Asked by: Rebecca Paul (Conservative - Reigate)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what the average waiting time is for routine mental health appointments across the prison estate in England.
Answered by Zubir Ahmed - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The information requested is not held centrally. As part of the formal prisoner induction process, all prisoners undergo health screening that incorporates a mental health assessment. The secondary care mental health assessment is carried out by a mental health professional. Routine assessments are carried out within five working days. Where an individual is in a state of mental health crisis, presents with rapidly escalating needs, or is at risk of immediate harm to themselves or others, an urgent assessment should be undertaken within 48 hours.
Asked by: Rebecca Paul (Conservative - Reigate)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent steps his Department has taken to ensure (a) equality of access to and (b) quality of healthcare provision across the (i) women’s and (ii) Children and Young People's estate.
Answered by Zubir Ahmed - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
To improve health and social care outcomes for all women in prison and upon their release, NHS England and His Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service commissioned the National Women’s Prisons Health and Social Care Review. The review’s report identified a number of recommendations to improve equity and quality of care to meet the specific needs of women in prison.
A wide range of actions to implement these recommendations are taking place at establishment, regional, and national levels, backed by £21 million across three years, and overseen by the Joint Women's Prison Health and Social Care Review Implementation Programme Board.
The health issues facing those detained in the children and young people secure estate are systematically kept under review through regular health and wellbeing needs assessments and the Healthcare Standards for Children and Young People in Secure Settings.
The Framework for Integrated Care operates in the children and young people secure estate as a coherent structure for a comprehensive, trauma-informed system of care that focuses on individualised care rather than on separate labels, diagnoses, or interventions.
NHS England has also commissioned the three-year Benchmarking Project, aimed at assessing and supporting the implementation of the Healthcare Standards for Children and Young People in Secure Settings.
Further work is underway to identify where the existing pathway in the children and young people secure estate requires enhancement to better support the placement, management, and care of all girls in secure settings. This work will be informed by evidence and best practice and will be developed with experts to test the most appropriate model of care.
Asked by: Rebecca Paul (Conservative - Reigate)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what recent assessment her Department has made of the potential merit of allowing nannies to offer funded hours under the Free Childcare for Working Parents programme.
Answered by Olivia Bailey - Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Department for Education) (Equalities)
It is the government’s ambition that all families have access to high-quality, affordable and flexible early education and care, giving every child the best start in life and delivering on our Plan for Change.
Nannies are an unregulated part of the sector because they are employed by parents to provide care to children in their home. Parents alone are responsible for deciding the services that a nanny provides, which may or may not include early education. Parents also arrange the payment of income tax and National Insurance contributions and organise security checks for those that they employ. For this reason, successive governments have not engaged in private arrangements between the two parties.
Officials remain in touch with the National Nanny Association and we keep all such policies under review.
Asked by: Rebecca Paul (Conservative - Reigate)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many transgender young people are currently held in mixed gender settings within the Children and Young People Estate at HMP & YOI Downview.
Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip
HMP & YOI Downview is not part of the Children and Young People Estate. No children or young people are accommodated there.
Asked by: Rebecca Paul (Conservative - Reigate)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many sexual assaults of female prisoners by biologically male prisoners took place in HMP Downview in (a) 2016, (b) 2017, (c) 2018 and (d) 2019.
Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip
There were no recorded sexual assaults of female prisoners by biologically male prisoners at HMP & YOI Downview, during the specified periods.
Asked by: Rebecca Paul (Conservative - Reigate)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what decisions his Department has made on the (a) scope and (b) timeline of the review of transgender prisoner policy following the Supreme Court judgment in For Women Scotland Ltd v The Scottish Ministers.
Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip
We are reviewing transgender prisoner policy following the For Women Scotland Supreme Court ruling. Alongside this, the Office for Equality and Opportunity is currently reviewing the Equality and Human Rights Commission’s draft updated Code of Practice on single sex spaces.
If the Code is approved, it will be laid before Parliament in due course. We are working closely with the Office for Equality and Opportunity on this, and will come forward with our updated policy on transgender prisoners once this process has concluded.
Asked by: Rebecca Paul (Conservative - Reigate)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what criteria his Department uses to determine placement of transgender young people within the Children and Young People's Estate.
Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip
I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave on 4 November 2025 to Question 85613.
Asked by: Rebecca Paul (Conservative - Reigate)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, with reference to page 8 of the Independent Monitoring Board's report entitled Annual report of the Independent Monitoring Board at HMP/YOI Downview, published on 3 September 2025, when he plans to respond to the questions on the main areas for development.
Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip
My noble friend Lord Timpson wrote to the Chair of the IMB on 27 October 2025, setting out the Ministry of Justice’s response to the report. It can be accessed at: Downview 2024-25 annual report - ministerial response - Independent Monitoring Boards.
Asked by: Rebecca Paul (Conservative - Reigate)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to the Independent Monitoring Board's report entitled Annual report of the Independent Monitoring Board at HMP/YOI Downview, published on 3 September 2025, what steps he is taking to ensure acutely mentally unwell prisoners are swiftly (a) identified and (b) given care in an appropriate facility at (a) HMP/YOI Downview, (b) other prisons and (c) other young offenders institutions.
Answered by Zubir Ahmed - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
NHS England commissions prison health care services for HMP/YOI Downview and every other prison and young offenders institution in England. Every prison has onsite health care services including primary care, mental health, dentistry, and substance misuse teams.
The National Service Specification for integrated mental health sets out how patients within secure settings, who require support for their mental wellbeing, should receive the same level of healthcare as people in the community, both in terms of the range of interventions available to them, in order to meet their needs, and the quality and standards of those interventions.
This includes access to crisis intervention and crisis prevention for those at high risk of self-harm and suicide, where such behaviours relate to poor emotional wellbeing and/or minor psychiatric morbidity.
Access to mental health provision is available to every person in prison at any stage of their sentence, beginning at the point of entry. NHS England commissions first night reception screening to have a registered nurse/practitioner review patients’ medical history to address any immediate health needs and risks and to ensure medication is made available as soon as possible and that onward referrals to onsite healthcare teams, including mental health services, for both urgent face to face appointments, within 24 hours, and routine face to face appointments, within five working days, are made.
Outside of reception screening, people in prison can be referred or can self-refer to mental health services, within those timeframes.
When someone is acutely unwell, they can be transferred from prisons and other places of detention to hospital for treatment, under the Mental Health Act, within the target transfer period of 28 days. The Mental Health Bill, currently going through Parliament, introduces a statutory 28-day time limit within which agencies must seek to ensure individuals who meet the criteria for detention under the act are transferred to hospital for treatment. NHS England’s South East Health and Justice team is funding a transfer and remissions co-ordinator from January 2025, to improve, where possible, safe, effective, and efficient transfers to hospital level treatment and interventions.
NHS England is reviewing the National Integrated Prison Service Specification to ensure it continues to meet the needs of the prison population.