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 mother and baby respite homes in helping to prevent escalation of (a) maternal and (b) perinatal mental health conditions.

We have no current plans to make a specific assessment. However, specialist community perinatal mental health services are now operational in England. The NHS Long Term Plan committed to implementing new measures to improve safety, quality and continuity of care which will allow an additional 24,000 women to access specialist perinatal mental health care by 2023/24. This will also be available from preconception to 24 months after birth.

Within specialist perinatal mental health services, 33 new maternal mental health services will provide psychological therapy, maternity services and reproductive health for women with mental health needs following trauma or loss related to their maternity experience. These will be available across England by March 2024. We are also investing £100 million in perinatal mental health and parent-infant relationship support by 2024/25, as part of the Start for Life and Family Hub programme for 75 upper tier local authorities in England.