Lord Freyberg

The R&R Programme has been engaging with and learning lessons from other major international heritage restoration projects.

Several other parliaments are undergoing or have recently completed renovation programmes of their buildings, for example the Canadian, Dutch, and Austrian parliaments. The R&R Programme maintains a dialogue with these other parliaments to learn lessons for our own restoration programme. One way it does this is through the International Network of Parliamentary Properties (INPP), an umbrella organisation of international parliaments which is dedicated to the conservation, restoration, rehabilitation and development of parliamentary estates. The INPP holds an annual conference and regular online seminars to share key lessons, which R&R officials routinely attend to learn best practice in how to plan, engage on, and deliver complex projects in a parliamentary context.

The R&R Programme has also learnt lessons from other non-parliamentary international heritage buildings, including a visit to the 400-year old stock exchange building in Copenhagen (after it was partially destroyed by a fire during refurbishment in 2024) to learn about matters such as fire risk during renovation and emergency preparedness. R&R officials also held a lessons-learned event about the Notre Dame restoration in May 2025 to understand better how the restoration works to the Cathedral were project managed, the use of technology in the project (such as the creation of a digital model) and the associated public engagement strategy.

Officials and Board members involved with R&R have also visited heritage restoration projects across the UK, such as Buckingham Palace and Manchester Town Hall, to learn lessons that are being practically applied during the planning stages of R&R, for instance in relation to surveys and engaging with the supply chain.

Over 100 organisations and businesses, including many heritage organisations, have attended 13 R&R supplier engagement roundtables held across every UK nation and region of England. Engagement with these heritage organisations has helped to generate a relevant understanding of, and a diverse insight into, the current and future challenges associated with the conservation, rehabilitation and development of heritage buildings.

In addition, the R&R Delivery Authority is assessing the skills needs across the UK and the significant skills shortages in some areas of the construction and heritage industries, in order to target initiatives at key trades and occupations designated as likely “pinch points”.

The R&R Delivery Authority is already collaborating with the heritage and craft industry, for example by forming a London heritage skills network comprising heritage organisations, further education providers, and craft training bodies. This group will feed into a new national heritage skills network as is supported by Historic England. The network is a means to share information between heritage organisations about labour needs and sector skills shortages, as well as identifying opportunities and training interventions and other schemes, such as targeted apprenticeships and traineeships, to support the development of skills required across the sector and on the R&R Programme. The R&R Delivery Authority also sits on a historic environment steering group, which has a nationwide focus and includes a variety of heritage organisations.

The R&R Delivery Authority is exploring implementing a shared apprenticeship scheme across heritage client organisations. This scheme is intended to provide small and medium enterprises who may otherwise lack a breadth of work or planned projects the opportunity to engage in the upskilling of an apprentice without the need to commit to the full duration of the programme.

The R&R Programme is intending to provide new pathways into heritage skills, offering vocational training and employment opportunities while safeguarding specific endangered trades and techniques (for example, historic stained-glass window-making). The Programme will also require numerous other heritage trades where there are known skills shortages, for example upholstery, heritage plastering, and heritage carpentry/joinery.

The Parliamentary Buildings (Restoration and Renewal) Act 2019 states that the Corporate Officers must have regard to the need to ensure that opportunities to secure economic or other benefits of the works are available in all areas of the UK. Those responsible for running the R&R Programme are committed to delivering benefits for small and medium enterprises all over the country, for example by creating apprenticeships and skills and training opportunities.

Over 100 organisations and businesses, including many heritage organisations, have attended 13 R&R supplier engagement roundtables held across every UK nation and region of England. Engagement with these heritage organisations has helped to generate a relevant understanding of, and a diverse insight into, the current and future challenges associated with the conservation, rehabilitation and development of heritage buildings.

The R&R Delivery Authority has formed a London heritage skills network comprising heritage organisations, further education providers, and training bodies, which will feed into a new national heritage skills network as supported by Historic England. The network aims to establish a ‘pipeline of work’ model to help the supply chain and training providers understand the future requirements and demand for traditional skills across different organisations and projects, including R&R.

The R&R Programme has also developed and launched a procurement system, in collaboration with Parliament’s heritage team, that enables conservation specialists across the nation to bid for contracts to work on heritage collection objects in the Palace.

To mitigate against the existing skills challenges, the R&R Delivery Authority understands the importance of targeting the recruitment of apprentices and trainees into roles where there are known skills shortages. The R&R Delivery Authority is currently exploring implementing a shared apprenticeship scheme across heritage client organisations. This scheme is intended to provide small and medium enterprises who may otherwise lack a breadth of work or planned projects the opportunity to engage in the upskilling of an apprentice without the need to commit to the full duration of the programme.

Regardless of the delivery option selected, the R&R Programme will entail significant heritage restoration and, due to the age of the Palace and its Grade 1 listed status, will require a variety of specialist heritage and construction skills to be involved with the restoration.

Over 100 organisations and businesses, including many heritage organisations, have attended 13 R&R supplier engagement roundtables held across every UK nation and region of England. Engagement with these heritage organisations has helped to generate a relevant understanding of, and a diverse insight into, the current and future challenges associated with the conservation, rehabilitation and development of heritage buildings.

The R&R Delivery Authority is looking closely into the skills needs across the UK and the significant skills shortages in some areas of the construction and heritage industries, in order to target initiatives at key trades and occupations designated as likely “pinchpoints”. In particular, the R&R Delivery Authority is developing an assessment of the labour skill requirements for the R&R Programme to provide an estimate on the type and number of specialist and heritage and construction skills required for the restoration of the Palace. The exact requirements will partly depend on the decisions taken by the Houses on the preferred way forward for R&R. The labour forecast assessment will help form skills planning and the skills interventions required to support the works on the Palace.

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

Please see the letter attached from the Permanent Secretary for the Office of National Statistics.

The Rt Hon. the Lord Freybeg

House of Lords

London

SW1A 0PW

02 March 2026

Dear Lord Freyberg

As Permanent Secretary of the Office for National Statistics (ONS), I am responding to your Parliamentary Question asking whether the Transformed Labour Force Survey (TLFS) records secondary occupations or ongoing professional identities when someone has more than one type of work; and what assessment they have made of how recording only a person’s main job may affect sectors where many people have portfolio careers, such as crafts and the visual arts (HL14678).

The TLFS does collect information on a respondent’s secondary occupation. Where the respondent has a portfolio career such as those mentioned, they can self-determine this as their main or second job. The data collected includes for example, whether this is in an employed or self-employed capacity, the hours usually and actually worked, the pay received and the industry and occupation code of the position. This data is used for a variety of statistical, legislative and policy purposes by a broad range of stakeholders.

Information is collected for up to two jobs. There has previously been a question as to whether information on more than two jobs should be collected. However, there must be a careful balance achieved between data users need, and the respondent burden caused by survey length. While we are not currently in a position to capture more than two jobs, this issue will be thoroughly explored within future developments of the TLFS.

The TLFS also collects data on casual working roles so that those in more informal situations are also captured.

Yours sincerely,

Darren Tierney

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

Please see the letter attached from the Permanent Secretary for the Office of National Statistics.

The Rt Hon. the Lord Freybeg

House of Lords

London

SW1A 0PW

02 March 2026

Dear Lord Freyberg,

As Permanent Secretary of the Office for National Statistics (ONS), I am responding to your Parliamentary Question asking a) further to the Written Answer by Lord Livermore on 17 February (HL14181), whether the Office for National Statistics has assessed the feasibility and statistical acceptability of aggregating multiple Standard Occupational Classification codes that individually fall below publication thresholds into higher-level sector groupings for publication purposes; and if so, what conclusions were reached (HL14677); and b) what statistical disclosure control techniques, including aggregation, rounding, banding or noise adjustment, are available to the Office for National Statistics to enable publication of sectorlevel occupational data derived from low-count Standard Occupational Classification categories (HL14679).

The Standard Occupational Classification (SOC) codes are routinely used for statistical outputs. SOC codes are designed with a hierarchical structure, ranging from 1-digit codes for the broadest categories, 2 = ‘Professional occupations’ for example, to 4-digit codes for the most detailed categories, 2451 = ‘Architects’ for example. The SOC ‘nested’ structure means multiple Standard Occupation Classification codes are aggregated into higher-level groupings by design. The use of these standard groupings allows for better comparisons over time and with other data sources. Statistical outputs that the ONS produces will use an appropriate level of detail of SOC codes, aiming to balance the need for detailed occupation information, with the possibility of smaller categories falling below the publication threshold. Further information about the SOC classification can be found on the ONS website. There is currently a consultation to update SOC2020 because of the continual evolution of occupations, and to ensure that SOC reflects significant changes in the labour market. Submissions to the consultation are live until 11 May 2026.

All the disclosure control techniques you reference in your question are available to use. Aggregation and banding are the most used methods to increase the number of contributors. The choice of disclosure method depends on the source of data, user needs, disclosure risk and other related factors. The disclosure control methods applied are always designed to maximise the usefulness of the data whilst protecting the confidentiality of the contributors.

Yours sincerely,

Darren Tierney

https://www.ons.gov.uk/methodology/classificationsandstandards/standardoccupationalclassificationsoc/soc2020/soc2020volume1structureanddescriptionsofunitgroups

https://consultations.ons.gov.uk/external-affairs/soc2020-revision-consultation/

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

Please see the letter attached from the Permanent Secretary for the Office of National Statistics.

The Rt Hon. the Lord Freybeg

House of Lords

London

SW1A 0PW

02 March 2026

Dear Lord Freyberg,

As Permanent Secretary of the Office for National Statistics (ONS), I am responding to your Parliamentary Question asking a) further to the Written Answer by Lord Livermore on 17 February (HL14181), whether the Office for National Statistics has assessed the feasibility and statistical acceptability of aggregating multiple Standard Occupational Classification codes that individually fall below publication thresholds into higher-level sector groupings for publication purposes; and if so, what conclusions were reached (HL14677); and b) what statistical disclosure control techniques, including aggregation, rounding, banding or noise adjustment, are available to the Office for National Statistics to enable publication of sectorlevel occupational data derived from low-count Standard Occupational Classification categories (HL14679).

The Standard Occupational Classification (SOC) codes are routinely used for statistical outputs. SOC codes are designed with a hierarchical structure, ranging from 1-digit codes for the broadest categories, 2 = ‘Professional occupations’ for example, to 4-digit codes for the most detailed categories, 2451 = ‘Architects’ for example. The SOC ‘nested’ structure means multiple Standard Occupation Classification codes are aggregated into higher-level groupings by design. The use of these standard groupings allows for better comparisons over time and with other data sources. Statistical outputs that the ONS produces will use an appropriate level of detail of SOC codes, aiming to balance the need for detailed occupation information, with the possibility of smaller categories falling below the publication threshold. Further information about the SOC classification can be found on the ONS website. There is currently a consultation to update SOC2020 because of the continual evolution of occupations, and to ensure that SOC reflects significant changes in the labour market. Submissions to the consultation are live until 11 May 2026.

All the disclosure control techniques you reference in your question are available to use. Aggregation and banding are the most used methods to increase the number of contributors. The choice of disclosure method depends on the source of data, user needs, disclosure risk and other related factors. The disclosure control methods applied are always designed to maximise the usefulness of the data whilst protecting the confidentiality of the contributors.

Yours sincerely,

Darren Tierney

https://www.ons.gov.uk/methodology/classificationsandstandards/standardoccupationalclassificationsoc/soc2020/soc2020volume1structureanddescriptionsofunitgroups

https://consultations.ons.gov.uk/external-affairs/soc2020-revision-consultation/

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

Please see the letter below from the Permanent Secretary at the Office for National Statistics (ONS):

Lord Freyberg

House of Lords

London

SW1A 0PW

09 February 2026

Dear Lord Freyberg,

As Permanent Secretary of the Office for National Statistics (ONS), I am responding to your Parliamentary Question asking whether there is a plan to incorporate self-assessment income tax data into the Inter-Departmental Business Register; if so, when to expect that data to be incorporated; and what assessment has been made of the impact of including that data on the representation of sole traders and businesses operating below the VAT threshold in official economic statistics (HL14179).

The ONS is currently developing a new Statistical Business Register (SBR), which will replace the Inter-Departmental Business Register. We are planning to incorporate self-assessment income tax into the new SBR and are working closely with HM Revenue and Customs with the current expectation that they will be able to share the data later this year. We will then assess the data with a plan to incorporate into the SBR and assess the impact of the self-assessment data on economic statistics of businesses operating below the VAT threshold.

Yours sincerely,

Darren Tierney

Merger investigations by the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) are independent of Government. The CMA reviews mergers that meet certain criteria, for example the size of the company being acquired, and whether it believes the merger could result in a substantial lessening of competition.

Government has not made a specific assessment of the impact of Welltower’s acquisition of Barchester Healthcare on market concentration in London and the Southeast. Merger investigations on competition grounds are a matter for the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), which operates independently of Government. The CMA determines which transactions to review based on statutory thresholds and whether there is a realistic prospect of a substantial lessening of competition.

The Government keeps the merger control regime under regular review to ensure it remains fit for purpose and works effectively within the current regulatory environment.

Merger referral thresholds and guidance sit within a well-established statutory framework, designed to ensure that the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) can act where there is a realistic prospect of harm to competition. The merger control regime is regularly reviewed to ensure it remains effective and fit for purpose. To improve clarity, the Government will consult on potential amendments to the “material influence” and “share of supply” tests that underpin the CMA’s jurisdiction.

As set out in the Policy paper The fire safety of domestic upholstered furniture, published on 22 January, the Government will reform the Furniture and Furnishings (Fire) (Safety) Regulations 1988 to ensure they maintain a high level of fire safety while allowing for manufacturing innovation and facilitating a reduction in the use of chemical flame retardants.

The Government is committed to improving the communication of information about chemical flame retardants used in upholstered furniture in order to support more informed consumer choices and more effective enforcement as well as the circular economy.

The Office for Product Safety and Standards is engaging with a broad range of stakeholders to inform policy making, including manufacturers, test houses, charities and consumer groups.

As set out in the Policy paper The fire safety of domestic upholstered furniture, published on 22 January, the Government will reform the Furniture and Furnishings (Fire) (Safety) Regulations 1988 to ensure they maintain a high level of fire safety while allowing for manufacturing innovation and facilitating a reduction in the use of chemical flame retardants.

The Government is committed to improving the communication of information about chemical flame retardants used in upholstered furniture in order to support more informed consumer choices and more effective enforcement as well as the circular economy.

The Office for Product Safety and Standards is engaging with a broad range of stakeholders to inform policy making, including manufacturers, test houses, charities and consumer groups.

The government will publish a report on the use of copyright works in the development of AI systems by 18 March. The report will consider the policy options set out in the government’s consultation on copyright and AI, set out the evidence and views we gathered and outline our next steps.

The government will publish an economic impact assessment by 18 March, as per Section 135 of the Data (Use and Access) Act 2025.

This will assess the impact of each of the policy options described in the consultation on copyright and AI, on copyright owners, and persons who develop or use AI systems.

The government will publish a report on the use of copyright works in the development of AI systems by 18 March. This report will consider the policy options set out in the government’s consultation on copyright and AI, set out the evidence and views we have gathered and outline our next steps in areas such as transparency.

The government has engaged bilaterally with many jurisdictions, such as the EU and the US, to discuss approaches to copyright and AI policy, share best practice and consider technical issues.

The government continues to seek views on how best to meet the UK’s objectives on AI and copyright, from stakeholders and experts, including through the technical working groups and Parliamentary working groups.

The government will publish a report on the use of copyright works in the development of AI systems by 18 March. This will set out the evidence and views we have gathered and outline our next steps.

The government will publish a report on the use of copyright works in the development of AI systems by 18 March. This report will consider the policy options set out in the government’s consultation on copyright and AI, set out the evidence and views we have gathered and outline our next steps.

We committed in the Creative Industries Sector Plan to appoint a Freelance Champion, who will advocate for the creative sector’s freelancers within government and be a member of the Creative Industries Council.

As this is a new role, we have spent time working closely with the sector to develop the role’s remit, identify the priorities within that and understand how the roleholder will engage with the sector once in post. We will make a direct ministerial appointment soon, and will publish a job description at that time.

The role remit will be intentionally broad, in order to allow the appointee scope to decide what issues to look into. Upon appointment, we expect the Freelance Champion to establish their priorities and develop a workplan to address them.

We are developing a proof-of-concept pilot scheme for the Creative Content Exchange (CCE) to test the need for a new marketplace for selling, buying, licensing, and enabling permitted access to digitised cultural and creative assets. The pilot scheme is being developed as a research project with the input of a broad range of partners - including public organisations - to design an exchange that best suits the needs of content owners and data users. We are also working with licensing and rights management societies to benefit from their input and expertise.

We are developing a proof-of-concept pilot scheme for the Creative Content Exchange (CCE) to test the need for a new marketplace for selling, buying, licensing, and enabling permitted access to digitised cultural and creative assets. The pilot scheme is being developed as a research project with the input of a broad range of partners - including public organisations - to design an exchange that best suits the needs of content owners and data users. We are also working with licensing and rights management societies to benefit from their input and expertise.

We are developing a proof-of-concept pilot scheme for the Creative Content Exchange (CCE) to test the need for a new marketplace for selling, buying, licensing, and enabling permitted access to digitised cultural and creative assets. The pilot scheme is being developed as a research project with the input of a broad range of partners - including public organisations - to design an exchange that best suits the needs of content owners and data users. We are also working with licensing and rights management societies to benefit from their input and expertise.

The development of the CCE functions in tandem with the Government’s work on copyright, and we will ensure a copyright regime that values and protects human creativity, can be trusted, and unlocks new opportunities for innovation across the creative sector and wider economy. Supporting rightsholders in licensing their work in the digital age while allowing AI developers to benefit from access to creative material, such as through the CCE, will unlock new opportunities across the whole economy.