Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will make an assessment of the potential merits of introducing regulations requiring all public buildings to have access to a defibrillator.

The Government recognises that better provision of defibrillators and increasing the number of people trained in cardiopulmonary resuscitation could help save more lives of those who have a cardiac arrest outside a hospital setting. We therefore encourage organisations to consider purchasing a defibrillator as part of their first-aid equipment, particularly for places where there are high concentrations of people.

The Government does not believe that a regulatory approach is the best solution for this issue. In order to further support the National Health Service and local communities, the Government has provided £2 million to make public access defibrillators more widely available and to increase the numbers of people trained in cardiopulmonary resuscitation.