Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what steps the Government takes to establish whether a woman is pregnant while in detention at an immigration removal centre.

NHS England advise that disclosure of pregnancy of women in held in immigration removal centres (IRCs) in England is at the behest of the individual concerned. The health assessment carried out at reception screening would ask if pregnancy was a possibility and a subsequent pregnancy test would confirm this, provided that consent was given.

The Home Office is currently consulting on mandatory new guidelines for its operational staff, “Care and Management of Pregnant women in Detention”. This will apply to staff operating in IRCs and other parts of the detention estate in England and is expected to be published this year.