Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent assessment he has made of the equity of (a) the risk of mental health problems, (b) access to mental health services and (c) patient outcomes for Black Britons.

No specific assessment has been made. However, the reforms to the Mental Health Act 1983 aim to address the disparity in detention rates. NHS England and NHS Improvement launched the Advancing Mental Health Equalities Strategy in October 2020 to reduce mental health inequalities in access, experience and outcomes within mental health services.

The Strategy also aims to improve the quality of data collected and to establish metrics of equality across mental health, such as variation by ethnicity.