Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether he has a policy on unconscious bias training in the NHS.

In June 2023, NHS England published an Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Improvement Plan that sets out targeted actions to address prejudice and discrimination in the National Health Service workforce. It is right that the NHS takes proactive steps to addresses prejudice and discrimination where it exists across the NHS workforce.

There is no national NHS-wide policy on unconscious bias training in the NHS. Individual NHS organisations have responsibility for training their own staff and provide relevant training where appropriate.

Some elements of unconscious bias training are available to NHS staff at both a national and local level and includes access to e-learning resources. NHS Employers has published a good practice framework for the delivery of equality and diversity training in the NHS and which includes unconscious bias training. This is available at the following link:

https://www.nhsemployers.org/system/files/2021-10/NHS%20good%20practice%20guidance_Final.pdf