Written Statements

Thursday 26th February 2026 Written Statements

Thursday 26 February 2026

British Steel

Thursday 26th February 2026 Written Statements

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Business and Trade (Chris McDonald)]

The Government committed to updating Parliament on British Steel every four sitting weeks for the duration of the period of special measures being applied under the Steel Industry (Special Measures) Act 2025.

The Government’s priority remains to maintain the safe operation of the blast furnaces at British Steel. Government officials are continuing to provide on-site support in Scunthorpe, ensuring uninterrupted domestic steel production and monitoring the use of taxpayer funds.

On funding, the position remains that all Government funding for British Steel will be drawn from existing budgets, within the spending envelope set out at spring statement 2025. To date, we have provided approximately £370 million for working capital, covering items such as raw materials and salaries. This will be reflected in the Department for Business and Trade’s accounts for 2025-26.

We continue to work with Jingye to find a pragmatic, realistic solution for the future of the site. Once a solution is found, we will terminate the directions issued to British Steel under the Act and make a statement on the need to retain, or repeal, the legislation. As we have stated previously, our long-term aspiration for the UK steel sector will require co-investment with the private sector. Across the steel sector, private sector involvement enables modernisation and decarbonisation and safeguards taxpayers money.

Impact assessment relating to the Steel Industry (Special Measures) Act 2025

The impact assessment relating to the Steel Industry (Special Measures) Act 2025 published on 22 January focuses on the rationale and impacts of the Act, namely providing optionality to address the risk that financially distressed owners could trigger unmanaged closures of major UK steel assets leading to irreversible loss of domestic steelmaking capability.

The IA can be accessed here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/steel-industry-special-measures-bill-2025-final-impact-assessment

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Implementing the Employment Rights Act: Further Consultation

Thursday 26th February 2026 Written Statements

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Business and Trade (Kate Dearden)]

Our plan to make work pay will modernise our employment rights legislation, extending the employment protections already given by the best British companies to millions more workers across the country. Strengthening this underlying framework will help build an economy based on fair competition between businesses, greater productivity in the workplace, job security for workers, and fair reward for hard work.

We are taking a phased approach to engagement and consultation on these reforms. This will ensure all stakeholders have the time and space to work through the detail of each measure and to help us implement each in the interests of all.

Following the launch of consultations on trade union recognition, fire and rehire, agency work, tipping, and flexible working earlier this month, we are today launching consultations on trade union detriments and collective redundancy. Alongside a programme of direct stakeholder engagement, these consultations will support us in determining how best to put our plans into practice.

Consultation 1: trade union detriments

The Employment Rights Act 2025 establishes stronger protections from detriments for workers taking industrial action, in order to ensure they are treated fairly and respectfully. It prohibits the use of “detriments of a prescribed description” for the sole or main purpose of penalising, deterring or preventing a worker from taking part in official industrial action.

The power in the Act enables the Government to make regulations to either prohibit all detriments, or to prescribe the detriments that are prohibited. The consultation will seek stakeholder views on the benefits and challenges of these two options. It will run for eight weeks and close on 23 April 2026. Following consultation, the Government will develop their final policy position, with the intention to make regulations and deliver the resulting policy by October 2026.

Consultation 2: collective redundancy

The Government are consulting on the threshold number that will trigger collective redundancy consultation where employers propose to make a large number of redundancies across their entire organisation. We wish to set this number at a level that offers protections for working people, while avoiding scenarios where larger employers find themselves left in a constant state of consultation.

The consultation will seek views on the methods that may be used to set the threshold, and on the level at which the organisation-wide threshold could be set. Specifically, it will seek views on the proposed options, including their impact on employers, the extent to which they protect employees, and whether there are any other options for the threshold or method.

This consultation will run for 12 weeks and will close on 21 May 2026. Following the consultation, the Government will consider the responses carefully before developing a final policy position. Any changes will be delivered through secondary legislation, with regulations expected to enter into force in 2027.

Next steps for consultation

This package of consultations sets out the next steps in delivering our plans. They are critical to shaping the practical implementation of the legislation, helping the Government to deliver reforms that are both effective and inclusive. It is in everyone’s interest to get the relationship between employer and worker right. These consultations will help us make work pay for both.

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Public Service Pension Scheme: Indexation and Revaluation 2026

Thursday 26th February 2026 Written Statements

[The Chief Secretary to the Treasury (James Murray)]

Public service pensions are a cornerstone of the remuneration package for hard-working people across our public services. Ensuring that they maintain their value over time is essential to delivering dignity in retirement for current and former public service workers.

Legislation governing public service pensions in payment requires them to be increased annually by the same percentage as additional pensions (state earnings-related pension and state second pension). Public service pensions will therefore be increased from 6 April 2026 by 3.8%, in line with the annual increase in the consumer prices index up to September 2025, except for those public service pensions that have been in payment for less than a year, which will receive a pro-rata increase. This will ensure that public service pensions take account of increases in the cost of living and their purchasing power is maintained.

Separately, in the career average revalued earnings public service pension schemes introduced in 2014 and 2015, pensions in accrual are revalued annually in relation to either prices or earnings depending on the terms specified in their scheme regulations. The Public Service Pensions Act 2013 requires His Majesty’s Treasury to specify a measure of prices and of earnings to be used for revaluation by these schemes.

The prices measure is the consumer prices index up to September 2025. Public service schemes that rely on a measure of prices, therefore, will use the figure of 3.8% for the prices element of revaluation.

The earnings measure is the whole economy year-on-year change in average weekly earnings (non-seasonally adjusted and including bonuses and arrears) up to September 2025. Public service schemes that rely on a measure of earnings, therefore, will use the figure of 4.8% for the earnings element of revaluation.

The effective date of revaluation listed in the order is 1 April 2026, but some schemes have chosen to move their effective revaluation date to 6 April 2026 in order to manage interactions with the annual tax allowance.

Revaluation is one part of the amount of pension that members earn in a year and needs to be considered in conjunction with the amount of in-year accrual. Typically, schemes with lower revaluation will have faster accrual and therefore members will earn more pension per year. The following list shows how the main public service schemes will be affected by revaluation:

NPT Review Cycle: United Kingdom National Report

Thursday 26th February 2026 Written Statements

[The Minister of State, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (Stephen Doughty)]

Today the Government are publishing the United Kingdom’s updated national report under the treaty on the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons. The report reviews the UK’s progress against the treaty’s three mutually reinforcing pillars—disarmament, non-proliferation and the peaceful uses of nuclear energy—and demonstrates our commitment to fulfil our obligations under the treaty.

The UK’s enduring commitment to the NPT

The UK was an original signatory of, and remains committed to, the NPT. We reaffirm our obligations under the treaty, including our undertaking—shared by the other NPT nuclear weapon states—to pursue negotiations in good faith on effective measures relating to nuclear disarmament, consistent with the maintenance of international peace and security, always guided by the UK’s national interests and defence and security.

A more contested and volatile world

Russia’s aggression, strategic competition among major powers, advances in disruptive technologies, and challenges to the multilateral system have sharpened nuclear risks and made deterrence, defence and resilience ever more important for our national security. The 2025 strategic defence review and the national security strategy provided a comprehensive review of the strategic environment and the adaptations the UK must make to safeguard our national security.

Disarmament, transparency and risk reduction

The UK remains committed to the ultimate, long-term goal of multilateral disarmament, which we believe can best be achieved by a step-by-step, verifiable approach to disarmament consistent with the global security environment. This includes practical work on nuclear disarmament verification, risk reduction and transparency where it supports stability. Nuclear deterrence will remain the bedrock of our national security as we are confronted by more serious and less predictable threats.

Non-proliferation and safeguards

The International Atomic Energy Agency has a more important role than ever to ensure states can take advantage of the benefits of the peaceful uses of nuclear technology and prevent its misuse. This balance is delivered by adherence to the IAEA’s system of comprehensive safeguards agreements and the additional protocol, strengthened export controls and assistance to enhance the security of nuclear materials worldwide.

Peaceful uses and nuclear responsibility

The UK will continue to advance the peaceful applications of nuclear science and technology—in medicine, agriculture, food security, climate change mitigation, adaptation and civil nuclear power—consistent with the NPT and in close co-operation with the IAEA and international partners. Access to the peaceful uses of nuclear technologies is a benefit that should be afforded sufficient importance, attention and resource.

Conclusion

The Government will work constructively with all NPT states parties ahead of the next NPT review conference to ensure the treaty endures as the irreplaceable foundation of the global nuclear order—reinforcing non-proliferation, enabling the responsible, peaceful uses of nuclear technology for the benefit of all and supporting disarmament progress where conditions allow. The UK national report is available on gov.uk, and a copy will be placed in the Libraries of both Houses.

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Gender Recognition: Data Linkage Study

Thursday 26th February 2026 Written Statements

[The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Wes Streeting)]

Today, I have laid the Gender Recognition (Disclosure of Information) (England) Order 2026 in Parliament. The order will come into force on 20 March 2026.

This Government have always made it clear that anyone accessing gender services deserves high-quality, evidence-based care and support. Laying this order will facilitate delivery of the data linkage study and is another step to achieving our manifesto commitment to implement recommendations of the independent Cass review.

The study was planned to take place during the lifespan of the Cass review, and a statutory instrument was brought forward in 2022 to protect those disclosing protected information for the study. However, it is well documented that some clinics did not share data to allow the study to commence and the study was therefore not completed as planned. Further to this, it is the Government’s view that the 2022 order now needs to be updated to sufficiently protect those who will now be sharing information for the purposes of the study.

This order will revoke the 2022 order and will ensure that information that may otherwise be protected under the Gender Recognition Act 2004 can be lawfully disclosed for the specific purpose of the data linkage study. This order makes technical changes to reflect that NHS England is now delivering the study, that the study is being completed as a recommendation (rather than during the lifetime) of the Cass review, and to update the list of organisations contributing to the study.

The data linkage study is a retrospective study based on an analysis of routine data collected for a cohort of adults who, as children, were referred into a former model of NHS gender care, the Gender Identity Development Service. The study requires no active patient participation and instead relies on an analysis of information already held within health records and other nationally held databases. The study aims to learn more about the needs of individuals referred to GIDS, their healthcare experience, and associations identifiable in the data which may tell us more about the intermediate outcomes for this cohort.

Since assuming responsibility for the data linkage study, NHS England has taken time to undertake due diligence work on the data sources critical to the study, and to work with organisations to refine the planned approach to data sharing. Some small but important improvements have been proposed in the study design that will better support the collaboration of organisations on whom the study team will be reliant for data, including adult gender clinics. It is my clear expectation that all relevant organisations will now provide the data required to complete this study.

Alongside the laying of this order, updated data linkage study research approvals are also in progress. As with usual research practice, the finalised data linkage study protocol will be made public once independent research and ethical approvals have been appropriately secured, at which point the study can begin.

We are determined to continue our work to improve the lives and healthcare of transgender people in this country. We will continue to implement the recommendations of the Cass review.

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