Asked by: Lord Patten (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask His Majesty's Government which specific counties are included within the term "the west country of England" when they refer to this region.
Answered by Baroness Swinburne - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities)
The West Country is not an official region, but could be loosely and approximately defined to match the South West region. The West of England, covers a much smaller area, focussed around the Greater Bristol and Bath city region. The West of England Combined Authority is made up of the following local authority areas: South Gloucestershire, Bristol and Bath & North East Somerset.
Asked by: Lord Patten (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment, if any, have they made of the number of illegal migrants who have reached the UK from or via Tunisia in each of the last 3 years.
Answered by Lord Sharpe of Epsom - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
The Home Office publishes statistics on detected irregular arrivals to the UK in the ‘Irregular migration to the UK statistics’ release published on gov.uk. Data on detected irregular arrivals by nationality is published in table Irr_D01 of the ‘Irregular migration to the UK detailed datasets’ with the latest data up to the end of December 2023.
Please note these statistics do not include details of countries of transit, and nationality may differ from country of origin.
Asked by: Lord Patten (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment, if any, have they made of the cultural and economic welfare of the permanent residents of the Scilly Isles.
Answered by Baroness Swinburne - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities)
The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) is committed to levelling up all parts of our country. We have also recognised the unique circumstances and needs of island communities and their residents, including by establishing the Islands Forum. The Forum is a mechanism for discussing the challenges and opportunities faced by island communities, and for considering how by working together local government and the UK Government (and where relevant the devolved administrations) can support the people of islands across the UK.
The Isles of Scilly has been awarded up to £6 million to fund a museum and cultural centre on St Mary’s. In addition, the final Local Government Finance Settlement for 2024-25 makes available up to £6.8 million to the Council of the Isles of Scilly, an increase in Core Spending Power of up to £0.5 million or 8% in cash terms on 2023-24. This includes an additional £150,000 in funding in recognition of the unique circumstances facing our island authorities, and their physical separation from the mainland.