Alex Burghart

There has been no engagement between Cabinet Office or Equalities Ministers and the Bank of England on banknote design and imagery. Officials in the Office for Equality and Opportunity engaged with a Bank of England counterpart in August 2025 in relation to their consultation on this topic as part of normal due process.

The Electoral Commission’s guidance for regulated donees sets out the requirements on members associations regarding the declaration of political donations.

Members associations are required to report all permissible donations received for their use or benefit in connection with any of their political activities with a value of over £11,180, and all impermissible donations over £500. The political activities of a members association include promoting or developing policies for adoption by a party or promoting candidates for internal office within the party.

Certain payments and services are not treated as donations, and are exempt from the reporting requirements. A full list of exemptions is available on page 16 of the Commission’s guidance; for example, any donation worth £500 or less, and the provision by an individual of their services voluntarily and in their own time.

The Commission also provides ongoing advice to members associations on whether their activities fall within the definition of political activities.

All vacancies for OEO are advertised via Civil Service Jobs, ensuring the recruitment process is appropriately followed.

Recruitment is by exception where there is a clear business critical need or specialism that can not be found within the Department.

The Commission's guidance for political parties and regulated donees outlines how donations and loans from the same source must be grouped. Donations made in the same calendar year by the same source must be reported when the aggregate amount is above the reporting threshold.

It is a principle of company law that companies have a seperate legal personality from the people who own or operate them. As such, donations from individuals and from companies are considered seperate for the purposes of reporting.

There is no list of genders, sexual orientations or gender identities formally recognised by the Office for Equality and Opportunity.

The Government is committed to commencing the socio-economic duty in the Equality Act 2010. The duty will require public bodies, when making strategic decisions, to actively consider how their decisions might help to reduce the inequalities associated with socio-economic disadvantage. To ensure effective implementation, we will certainly give due regard to the equality impacts of commencement.

The exchequer contribution to the Ministerial Pension Scheme in the financial year 2024–25 is 10.5% of pay per annum.

The responsibility for the publication of information on Direct Ministerial Appointments on the announcement portal rests with individual sponsor departments. The primary function of the portal is to bring together, into a central resource, announcements of new Direct Ministerial Appointments from across government. While the portal records the expected length of term of individual new appointments, it does not record actual end dates for those appointments that come to an end. Questions about the status of individual appointments would be for sponsor departments.

Socio-economic background is one of the considerations that determines whether individuals can apply for the Going Forward into Employment pathways listed below.

• DCMS Learn & Grow Pathway

• DWP Social Mobility Apprenticeship

• Crown Prosecution Service Diversifying CPS Careers

• MHCLG Masterclass Pathway (sometimes referred to as the Civil Service Masterclass)

• Home Office Pathway to Employment

More information on GFiE Pathway opportunities for people from Low Social Mobility Backgrounds can be found on the GFiE Civil Service Careers site: https://www.civil-service-careers.gov.uk/gfie-pathways/#social-mobility. This site is visible in the public domain.

Lead Special Advisers in departments may be titled ‘Chief of Staff’ to their appointing minister. Therefore there are approximately 17 Special Advisers with the title of ‘Chief of Staff’.

This does not change these individuals’ terms of employment. As per paragraph 2 of the Model Contract for Special Advisers (Job title and duties) which can be found on GOV.UK, the formal job title of all special advisers is ‘Special Adviser’.

Individual data regarding the nationality of job applicants and successful appointees cannot be provided, as this information is confidential. However, data on the wider Civil Service, including nationality, is published regularly on gov.uk.

Mission Boards were established under the previous administration and their operation was the responsibility of the lead Secretaries of State.

The government has been clear that all departments should use public procurement to deliver jobs and skills opportunities.

Procurement Policy Notes (PPNs) are applicable to Central Government Departments, Executive Agencies and Non-Departmental Public Bodies unless otherwise stated in the PPN.

All other public bodies are routinely encouraged to adopt PPNs.

The UK and EU are committed to building a closer relationship and are negotiating agreements that will boost trade, enhance energy security and create opportunities for young people. The government will ensure that these agreements are consistent with its wider international obligations.

I refer the Honourable Member to the response to Question 16155 of 28 July 2026.

The services transferring to the OneGov Delivery Agency are expected initially to continue to charge other government departments in accordance with existing agreements or Memoranda of Understanding. Work to establish OneGov has commenced and will consider issues such as longer-term funding models and scope of service delivery.

Accounting officer responsibilities for the Cabinet Office group will be published in due course.

The OneGov Delivery Agency is yet to be formally established. Work is underway to establish the agency for 1 April 2027. Its future budget for 2027-2028 will be determined as design work progresses. Costs incurred during the current year 2026-2027 will be absorbed in existing Cabinet Office budgets.

In line with usual practice, administrative costs to implement Machinery of Government changes will be met within existing departmental settlements, and should not affect the spending power of either the transferring or receiving department.

The 2024/25 gross operating costs are as follows:

As of 31st March 2025 (end of year 24/25) full-time equivalent headcount is as follows:

The Prime Minister has established the new Office of the Prime Minister and Cabinet (OPMC), which includes No10, No10 North and Cabinet Office teams directly serving the Prime Minister and Cabinet. Oversight of the OPMC is by the Prime Minister and Cabinet Office Ministers.

The AI Taskforce is led by AI Minister Kanishka Narayan and is based in the OPMC. The Government People Group’s (GPG) responsibilities will be divided between the OPMC and the OneGov Delivery Agency. The Future Civil Service Group, within the OPMC, brings together reform and people policy functions formerly within GPG, whilst operational service functions formerly within GPG will be delivered by the OneGov Delivery Agency, including the Government Recruitment Service and the pensions response team. The Government Property Agency continues to be one of the executive agencies of the Cabinet Office, overseen by Cabinet Office Ministers.

The Emergency Alerts capability is delivered through cell broadcast technology. This means that the Government does not gather information about individual handsets, including whether or not an individual received an alert. It is therefore not possible to verify how many phones received two or more alerts.

Receiving multiple duplicate alerts is a known technical issue, and we acknowledge that receiving multiple alerts can be distressing. This is more likely if you are moving, such as by car or train, as your phone will connect to multiple different cell masts, or if you have multiple SIMs linked to one device. This is due to each network operator being sent a single activation for their connected devices.

In Wales and along the Welsh border, alerts were broadcast in both English and Welsh, in line with our legal responsibilities under the Welsh Language Act.

The Cabinet Office and Government Digital Service are working closely with all Mobile Network Operators to identify mitigation measures to reduce the frequency of duplicate Alerts. The government is committed to continuously improving the Emergency Alerts service.

The threshold considerations for issuing an emergency alert include considering whether there is a risk to life, and whether those receiving the message need to take urgent action.

There is no separate criteria for issuing alerts locally and nationally.

The One Year Evaluation delivered in September 2024 contains detailed information regarding the operation and processes of the Emergency Alerts system. The capability represents a key part of the UK’s crisis response ability and therefore is unable to be shared publicly in order to maintain the integrity of the system.

In Wales, the alert was sent in Welsh followed by English in order to fulfil our legal responsibilities under the Welsh Language Act 1993.

The Emergency Alert capability was brought into place in 2023 under the previous government. It was signed off by the Cabinet Office, where the honourable Member asking this question was, at the time, a minister.

As he will know, the Civil Contingencies Act (CCA) Part 1 places duties on Category 1 and 2 emergency responders to have arrangements in place to warn the public of emergencies and to provide advice and information.

The Privacy and Electronic Communications (EC Directive) Regulations 2003 (PECR) permits the government to test and operate an emergency alerting system.

Emergency Alerts operate on cell broadcast technology, which does not require or gather any information from individual handsets. Therefore, it is not possible to validate which handsets have opted out in their phone settings.

Emergency alerts contain life-saving information and should be kept switched on for safety. However, individuals can opt out. For example, victims of domestic abuse with concealed phones may find it appropriate to opt out of receiving Emergency Alerts. Information on opting out can be found at https://www.gov.uk/alerts.

The Cabinet Office is committed to delivering value for money to the public. There is no additional or marginal cost of issuing a nationwide Emergency Alert; the most recent activation of the Emergency Alert capability on 14 August was issued at no cost to the taxpayer.

It is important to note that every Emergency Alert is carefully coordinated with responding public bodies and agencies. Each request is evaluated by the Cabinet Office on a rigorous, case-by-case basis to ensure it is necessary for public safety.

The Cabinet Office carries out an internal review of every activation and test of the system. We are committed to learning from this experience and are currently reviewing the thresholds and operational protocols for future alerts to ensure they remain a proportionate and effective tool for preserving life. The National Fire Chiefs Council observed a decrease in wildfire responses in the 72 hours following the broadcast, suggesting the alert played a vital role in preventing further incidents.

Having welcomed numerous Ministers over the last four years, the Second Headquarters will continue to host a regular rhythm of Ministers and senior leadership in line with the Cabinet Office Second Headquarters 2030 strategy.

The aggregate monetary cost of facility time in the Civil Service, based on the Cabinet Office published data for the year 1 April 2023 to 31 March 2024, was £12,525,615.37.

The average percentage of pay spent on facility time in the Civil Service, based on the Cabinet Office published data for the year 1 April 2024 to 31 March 2025, was 0.04%.

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

A response to the Parliamentary Question of 7th July is attached.

As confirmed in the answer to Question 10654, NATO provided a breakdown of the types of spend that could be included within the 1.5% commitment. This included Critical Infrastructure.

In 2023, NATO published a report on the EU/NATO taskforce on the resilience of Critical Infrastructure. Within that report, it noted that Critical Infrastructure enables the fulfilment of the organisation's core tasks of deterrence and defence, crisis prevention and management, and cooperative security.

It is for each NATO ally to determine whether they have eligible Critical Infrastructure spend to include as part of their 1.5% commitment.