Cabinet Office

This information was published by the government on the new Direct Ministerial Appointments Announcements Portal.

The Civil Service has seconded staff in from private, public and voluntary sector organisations and has also seconded staff out. Secondments remain a key route to utilising essential skills and experience into the right roles and teams, enabling talented individuals from within and outside the Civil Service to share critical capabilities and innovative thinking for a set period of time.

The secondments data commission provides insight on inward and outward secondments taking place across government. The Cabinet Office has worked closely with departments to improve the amount, detail and quality of the data available including names of organisations individuals have been seconded from or to, where this information is available. The limited number of records/ data sets can impact third party organisations and makes the data personally identifiable information, and therefore it will not be possible to publish this data.

The Civil Service has seconded staff in from private, public and voluntary sector organisations and has also seconded staff out. Secondments remain a key route to utilising essential skills and experience into the right roles and teams, enabling talented individuals from within and outside the Civil Service to share critical capabilities and innovative thinking for a set period of time.

The secondments data commission provides insight on inward and outward secondments taking place across government. The Cabinet Office has worked closely with departments to improve the amount, detail and quality of the data available including names of organisations individuals have been seconded from or to, where this information is available. The limited number of records/ data sets can impact third party organisations and makes the data personally identifiable information, and therefore it will not be possible to publish this data.

There are currently 13 vacant properties within the Government Property Agency’s managed portfolio. This total includes sites that are in the process of being disposed of or have been vacated to facilitate ongoing refurbishment work with the aim to improve the overall condition and efficiency of the managed estate.

I refer the Hon Member to my answer of 20 November 2025, Official Report, PQ 90245.

The Cabinet Office has published consultation principles which set out how consultations should be conducted.

They are available here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/consultation-principles-guidance.

The National Fraud Initiative (NFI), as part of the Public Sector Fraud Authority (PSFA), works closely with local authorities to help them identify and prevent fraud.

As part of this, the NFI is currently collaborating with local authorities to understand the fraud risks related to council tax second home premiums.

In October 2025, the ICO Review Board observer submitted an inquiry to the DEA Secretariat regarding a news article pertaining to a data sharing arrangement between HMRC and the Home Office.

The DEA Secretariat subsequently contacted HMRC, who forwarded it to the ICO observer.

The minutes from the DEA Debt and Fraud Review Boards are also routinely published on GOV.UK.

We are inviting the public to have their say in the upcoming consultation as we develop a safe, secure, and inclusive system for the UK, including on the possible range of uses of the digital credential.

I refer the Hon Member to the answer of 2 January 2026, Official Report, PQ 99825.

Requests made under the terms of the Freedom of Information Act (2000) are handled on a case by case basis. The relevant records are not structured in such a way that would provide an answer without incurring a disproportionate cost.

Total spend with our media buying and planning agency for the last three financial years is as follows:

The same Publication Guidance the Hon Member quotes makes clear that in such scenarios, "the meeting should be declared including the names of these [external] organisations or individuals only”.

Subscriptions are delegated to team level and not managed departmentally.

There are currently no plans to publish this guidance as the area remains subject to ongoing policy development.

Government Digital and Data is related to recruitment, and Great Futures forms part of the wider GREAT campaign which encourages international audiences to visit, study and do business with the UK.

The guidance in place in August 2019 has been published by the National Archives: https://cdn.nationalarchives.gov.uk/documents/popapersguidance2009.pdf

Political activity information is collected from candidates as part of the public appointments digital service’s online application process. This was the source of the Commissioner’s data.

Abhorrent practices such as forced labour and modern slavery have no place in government contracts or in wider society. This Government is determined to stamp this out.

The Procurement Act 2023 provides contracting authorities with stronger powers to exclude suppliers from public procurements where there is compelling evidence of modern slavery within their supply chains.

In February 2025, the Government updated Procurement Policy Note (PPN) 009 ‘Tackling Modern Slavery in Government Supply Chains’, advocating a risk based approach to identifying and managing modern slavery risks, and encourages departments to conduct due diligence using a range of tools, such as the Modern Slavery Assessment Tool (MSAT), and approaches to support decision making.

The MSAT is a modern slavery risk identification and management tool. This tool has been designed to help public sector organisations work in partnership with suppliers to improve protections and reduce the risk of exploitation of workers in their supply chains.

This government has also made the Anti-Slavery Risk Tiering Tool (ARTT) available for public sector buyers in October 2025. This tool enables faster risk assessments and clear next steps to mitigate modern slavery risks across the commercial lifecycle.

The information requested falls under the remit of the UK Statistics Authority.

A response to the Hon gentleman’s Parliamentary Question of 2nd January is attached.

The information requested falls under the remit of the UK Statistics Authority.

A response to the Hon gentleman’s Parliamentary Questions of 6th January is attached.

The information requested falls under the remit of the UK Statistics Authority.

A response to the Hon gentleman’s Parliamentary Questions of 6th January is attached.

The information requested falls under the remit of the UK Statistics Authority.

A response to the Hon gentleman’s Parliamentary Questions of 6th January is attached.

The information requested falls under the remit of the UK Statistics Authority.

A response to the Hon gentleman’s Parliamentary Question of 7th January is attached.

The information requested falls under the remit of the UK Statistics Authority.

A response to the Hon gentleman’s Parliamentary Question of 7th January is attached.

The National Security Adviser sets direction – on behalf of the Prime Minister – for national security and foreign policy in the National Security Secretariat. Some leadership and corporate responsibilities – such as the line management of civil servants, accounting or matters affecting a civil servant’s career such as recruitment, promotion, reward and discipline – are not carried out by the National Security Adviser.

The Government Car Service (GCS) offers vehicles to government departments as a shared resource. Each department independently determines the allocation of these vehicles. GCS does not invoice separately for ministerial or civil servant use.

The Integrated Security Fund delivers programmes which align to UK national security and resilience priorities. Programmes promote gender equality where it is relevant and appropriate.

The senior official-level Undersea Infrastructure Security Oversight Board will escalate issues to Cabinet Office ministers and the National Security Council as required.

The Undersea Infrastructure Security Oversight Board provides a joined-up function and sets strategic direction across government on undersea infrastructure security.

The core membership includes key government stakeholders with an interest in undersea infrastructure security. This includes representation from DSIT, DESNZ, MOD, Defra, DFT, Home Office, Royal Navy and others as required. It is chaired and convened by the Cabinet Office.

Where legislation is required, Parliament will scrutinise this in the usual way.

The details of many companies who received certain forms of Covid support have previously been published. However, the government does not intend to publish full data on the recipients of support across every Covid scheme.

Whether companies made repayment of Covid support, either through the Voluntary Repayment Scheme or through other means, will also remain confidential. We do not want to discourage repayment. Voluntary repayment does not necessarily indicate fraud.

I refer the Hon Member to the answer of 13 October 2025, Official Report, PQ 77563.

The administration of the Civil Service Pension Scheme is the responsibility of the Cabinet Office. While the scheme does not publicly report overpayments due to administrator errors, in the last ten years overpayments caused solely by ‘administrative errors’, resulted in a total of 381.

The scheme follows the HM Treasury guidance on “Managing Public Money” which requires the scheme, where possible, to recover any money that a member is not entitled to. Recognising that recovery of overpayments may cause distress we work closely with individual members to ensure that payment recovery plans are affordable, take account of hardship and minimise the impact for the member both in terms of finances and wellbeing. This usually includes setting payment plans to recover monies owed over a reasonable period of time.

The Government publishes data on grant funding annually in the Government grants register on gov.uk.

Grant funding for the period 2023/24 is publicly available. Grants funding data for 2024/25 will be published in March 2026. Grants funding data for 2025/26 is scheduled for publication in March 2027.

The Government’s Child Poverty Strategy, Our Children, Our Future: Tackling Child Poverty, was published on 5 December 2025. It sets out the steps this Government will take to reduce child poverty and to reverse the trend from 2010-2024.

Responsibility for the Child Poverty Strategy lies with the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions and Secretary of State for Education, as co-chairs of the Child Poverty Taskforce.

The Government’s Child Poverty Strategy, Our Children, Our Future: Tackling Child Poverty, was published on 5 December 2025. It sets out the steps this Government will take to reduce child poverty and to reverse the trend from 2010-2024.

The new guidance document designed to assist local authorities’ understanding of their statutory duties and interaction with No Recourse to Public Funds (NRPF) will be published in the Spring.

WPP Media has been awarded a place on Lot 1 of the Crown Commercial Service (CCS) RM6364 Media and Creative Services agreement.

The agreement, managed by CCS, will play an important role in ensuring that the UK public receives clear, accurate, and authoritative information from the government. By uniting media planning and buying under a single agency, the government will streamline its work to reach target audiences more effectively across diverse platforms. This consolidation is designed to drive value, improve operational efficiency, and ensure more effective media buying for every pound of public money spent.

Spend and related savings will be determined by individual public sector bodies based on their specific requirements.

The Crown Commercial Service reviews framework-level performance on a quarterly basis, including pricing commitments, financial transparency, social value delivery, and client satisfaction.

Individual departments are responsible for managing day-to-day performance and specific service-level agreements for their own call-off contracts.

Cabinet Office responded to the hon. Member’s request on 8 January 2026, within the statutory time limit.

In accordance with the Ministerial Code, the Government is committed to transparency regarding official travel. Information relating to relevant ministerial travel is published on a quarterly basis and can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/ministers-transparency-publications#2024

The Home Defence Programme (HDP) is led by the COBR Directorate in the Cabinet Office. COBR is responsible for coordinating preparedness and response to a range of risks facing the UK, including potential hostilities affecting the UK. For national security reasons, the government does not routinely comment publicly on the size of such teams.

The COBR Directorate in the Cabinet Office is responsible for the coordination of resilience, civil contingencies planning, and crisis management across the system.

This brings together the former Resilience Directorate and the former COBR Unit, which will ensure that all phases of the crisis management cycle report to a single Director and is in line with the Cabinet Office vision for a specialist, smaller and more strategic centre.

The Resilience Action Plan and Home Defence Programme are led by the COBR Director and COBR Directorate, with oversight by the Deputy National Security Advisor (DNSA) for Intelligence, Defence and Security. Ministerial oversight is provided by the Security Minister.