Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps she is taking to ensure women have accessible provision to (a) drug and alcohol and (b) mental health services.

As part of the Government’s 10-year drug strategy, local authorities are receiving a record £532 million additional investment through to 2024/25 to improve drug and alcohol treatment and recovery services. This funding is in addition to the Public Health Grant and will improve the capacity and quality of drug and alcohol treatment, including improving women’s access to treatment, removing barriers they face and ensuring the care they receive is tailored to their needs.

As we move into the next phase of drug strategy delivery, the Department is increasingly focusing on supporting local areas, including better meeting the needs of women and vulnerable groups. Current work in relation to women and vulnerable groups includes providing targeted support to local areas; enhancing data tools to better inform local needs assessments; supporting workforce development; implementation of the commissioning quality standard and sharing good practice. Implementation support will adapt over the course of the 10-year strategy in response to need, to ensure we reach our goals.

The NHS Long Term Plan commits to investing £2.3 billion extra funding a year in expanding and transforming mental health services by March 2024, enabling an extra two million men and women to be treated by NHS mental health services. In addition, we are investing £25 million to expand women’s health hubs. We are expanding access to psychological and talking therapies within specialist perinatal mental health services. This expansion includes new Maternal Mental Health Services, which bring together psychological therapy, maternity services and reproductive health for women who have mental health needs following trauma or loss related to their maternity experience. These will be available across the whole of England by March 2024.