Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the introduction of a new property tax.

Answered by Lord Livermore - Financial Secretary (HM Treasury)

The Government does not comment on speculation about tax changes. The Government keeps all tax policy under review and tax decisions will be made at the Budget, in the usual way.

Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask His Majesty's Government what plans they have to improve drought resilience by speeding up the development of a new reservoir in Cambridgeshire.

Answered by Baroness Hayman of Ullock - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)

This Government has already taken urgent steps to improve water security, including changing the law to slash red tape and speed up the planning process for the building of new reservoirs. To support this, £104 billion of private sector investment has been secured. This will fund essential infrastructure, including the Fens Reservoir, to help secure our future water supply.

Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the impact of the current VAT threshold on small business growth.

Answered by Lord Livermore - Financial Secretary (HM Treasury)

With a VAT registration threshold of £90,000, the UK’s threshold is higher than any EU country and the joint highest in the OECD. This means the majority of UK businesses are kept out of the VAT system.

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask His Majesty's Government what plans they have to increase the number of mental health practitioners employed in primary care through the Additional Roles Reimbursement Scheme.

Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)

Through the Additional Roles Reimbursement Scheme (ARRS), Primary Care Networks (PCNs) recruit additional staff including mental health practitioners (MHPs), pharmacists, physiotherapists, and social prescribing link workers. There are a wide range of clinicians that are well suited to providing care in general practice as part of a multi-disciplinary team, and these roles are in place to assist doctors in general practice in reducing their workload, assisting patients directly with their needs, allowing doctors to focus on more complex patients and other priorities, including continuity of care.

As of 30 June 2025, there were 1,158 full time equivalent (FTE) MHPs working across practices and PCNs in England, an increase of 314 FTE compared with June 2023, when the time series in the collated data began.

While there are no specific plans to increase the number of MHPs employed through the ARRS, under changes to the GP contract announced earlier in the year the scheme will become more flexible to allow PCNs to respond better to local workforce needs. The two ARRS pots will be combined to create a single pot for reimbursement of patient facing staff costs. There will be no restrictions on the number or type of staff covered, including mental health practitioners.

Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the impact of reduction in funding for farming and countryside programmes as set out in the Spending Review 2025 (CP 1336).

Answered by Baroness Hayman of Ullock - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)

We have allocated a record £11.8 billion to sustainable farming and food production over this parliament. Farmers will directly benefit from an average of £2.3 billion per year - continuing the average annual farming spend over the last Parliament - supporting farm profitability through investment in research and technology and sustainable food production, at the same time as improving the quality of the water in our rivers, the air we breathe and our spaces for wildlife.

We are determined to deliver value for taxpayers’ money. We have identified efficiencies in the farming budget and opportunities to better target incentives for farmers to deliver environmental benefits. For example, rapidly winding down subsidy payments that do not provide returns on investment, and increasing investment in environmental land management schemes from £1.8 billion in 25/26 to more than £2 billion a year by 28/29.

Public funding will also help leverage more private investment into nature restoration, including through the Landscape Recovery scheme where projects will be co-funded by a blend of public and private investment. This will provide farmers with new income streams and opportunities to be rewarded for nature restoration as well as food production.

Question to the Department for Business and Trade:

To ask His Majesty's Government whether they plan to introduce legislation to enact the proposed ‘Hugh’s Law’ to extend entitlement to paid leave to the parents of seriously or terminally ill children.

Answered by Lord Leong - Lord in Waiting (HM Household) (Whip)

The government has committed to a consultation on support for parents of seriously ill children in 2026, and will continue to work closely with relevant stakeholders as it is developed. There are currently no plans to introduce legislation prior to this consultation as this would pre-empt the outcome.

Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the impact of the current value added tax threshold on small business growth.

Answered by Lord Livermore - Financial Secretary (HM Treasury)

At £90,000, the UK has a higher VAT registration threshold than any EU country and the joint highest in the OECD. This means the majority of UK businesses are kept out of the VAT system.

Question to the Cabinet Office:

To ask His Majesty's Government how many meetings have taken place between ministers, special advisors and officials and representatives of the Resolution Foundation since 4 July 2024.

Answered by Baroness Anderson of Stoke-on-Trent - Baroness in Waiting (HM Household) (Whip)

Details of ministers’ and certain senior officials’ meetings with external individuals and organisations are published quarterly in arrears on GOV.UK.

Special Advisers are required to publish meetings with senior media figures. Meetings with other external individuals and organisations are not collected as part of routine Special Adviser Transparency publications.

Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Baroness Hayman of Ullock on 4 November 2024 (HL2037), what further progress they have made towards implementing the UK's Forest Risk Commodity regime.

Answered by Baroness Hayman of Ullock - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)

We are working across Government to agree the most effective way to reduce the impact of the UK’s consumption of forest risk commodities on deforestation.

The Government will set out its approach to addressing UK consumption of forest risk commodities in due course.

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask His Majesty's Government whether they will publish the results of the "war game" exercise carried out as part of the NHS's winter preparations.

Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)

There are no plans to publish individual National Health Service system's plans or the outcomes of stress-testing centrally. System winter plans are locally owned and created in order to meet specific local needs and circumstances and are best communicated by NHS organisations locally. Nationally, the actions being taken to prepare for this coming winter are set out in the Urgent and Emergency Care Plan for 2025/26. A copy of this plan is attached.

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask His Majesty's Government how many times the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care has met the NHS Staff Council since 1 January.

Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)

The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care and the Minister of State for Health meet regularly with individual Agenda for Change (AfC) trade union leaders and with representatives of NHS organisations to discuss matters affecting the NHS workforce.

It is not usual practice for Ministers to attend NHS Staff Council meetings, which are used to discuss policy issues affecting the AfC workforce and to maintain the NHS terms and conditions of service. Accordingly, there have been no meetings between the Secretary of State and the NHS Staff Council as a whole since 1 January.

Both ministers have written to the NHS Staff Council on issues relating to AfC pay, terms, and conditions since 1 January, and Department officials continue to attend meetings of the NHS Staff Council.

Found: Yardley (The Chair); Lord Blencathra; Lord Bradley; Lord Carter of Coles; Baroness Cass; Lord Laming; Lord Mott

Found: Yardley (The Chair); Lord Blencathra; Lord Bradley; Lord Carter of Coles; Baroness Cass; Lord Laming; Lord Mott

Found: Lord Blencathra; Lord Bradley; Baroness Cass; Lord Carter of Coles; Baroness Coffey; Lord Laming; Lord Mott

Found: Recommendation 9a: Association of Electoral Administrators Blueprint 2025 3 See the comments by Lord Mott