Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what plans he has to tackle (a) mental health and (b) suicide rates among mothers in the twelve months postpartum.

Specialist community perinatal mental health services are established in all parts of England, but we recognise more is needed. Too many people with mental health issues, including mothers in the 12 months postpartum, are not getting the support or care they need, which is why we will fix the broken system to ensure that people can be confident in accessing high quality mental health support when they need it.

As set out in NHS England’s 2024/25 Priorities and Operational Planning Guidance, the National Health Service is working to increase the number of people accessing perinatal mental health services to 66,000. ​In 2023/24, 58,200 ​women ​accessed these services, compared to 30,600 in 2019/20.

The Suicide Prevention Strategy for England was published in September 2023. The strategy highlights pregnant women and new mothers as a priority group who could benefit from targeted support.