Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, when he plans to respond to letters from the hon. Member for Arundel and South Downs to the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Patient Safety, Women's Health and Mental Health dated (a) 5 February, (b) 25 February, (c) 14 March, (d) 24 March, (e) 1 April and (f) 8 April 2025.

Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Patient Safety, Women’s Health and Mental Health replied to the Hon. Member’s correspondence on 10 April 2025.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, pursuant to the Answer of 3 April 2025 to Question 42849 on the Employment Tribunals Service, if she will make an estimate of the number sitting days that were lost in employment tribunals due to (a) judicial and (b) administrative staff shortages in the last 12 months.

Answered by Sarah Sackman - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)

I refer the hon. Member to the answer given on 3 April 2025 to Question 42849. Information on the number of employment tribunal sitting days lost specifically to judicial and staff shortages, as opposed to some other cause, is not held by the Department.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, pursuant to the Answer of 3 April to Question 42441 on the Employment Tribunals Service, what discussions she has had with HM Courts & Tribunals Service on collecting aggregate data on the time taken to resolve individual employment tribunal cases.

Answered by Sarah Sackman - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)

Ministers regularly meet the CEO of HM Courts & Tribunals Service (HMCTS) to discuss a wide range of matters relating to the operation of court and tribunal services, including the Employment Tribunal. These discussions are aimed at ensuring the efficient delivery of services across all jurisdictions. Publication of Employment Tribunal Timeliness information ceased under the previous Government from April 2021 when the jurisdiction moved to an interim database with only limited management information available. Between July 2022 and July 2024, Employment Tribunals have gradually transitioned to a new case management system as part of the Reform project and timeliness data for single cases only from this system was published for the first time in March 2025 - www.gov.uk/government/collections/tribunals-statistics. It is expected that timeliness and jurisdictional data will be available for single cases held on the reformed platform later in the year.

It is not possible to produce timeliness or jurisdictional data for the legacy case management system, therefore the data we can currently provide is limited. Work is currently ongoing to transition the remaining legacy caseload to the new case management system as part of the HMCTS data strategy to enable more comprehensive data to be produced. That is expected to be available later this year.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, pursuant to the Answer of 3 April to Question 42850 on Employment Tribunals Service: Standards, what assessment her Department has made of the level of staffing of (a) judges and (b) other people necessary to cut delays and ensure timely access to justice for all.

Answered by Sarah Sackman - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)

Ministers regularly meet the CEO of HM Courts & Tribunals Service to discuss a wide range of matters relating to the operation of court and tribunal services, including the Employment Tribunal. The issue of staffing requirements and the role of case coordinators across all jurisdictions form part of those discussions.

Future staffing requirements at the Employment Tribunal will be subject to the outcome of the Spending Review. Judicial recruitment is undertaken to replace known leavers, and also takes into consideration current pressures and assumed future workloads. The transition to the new reformed platform will help to improve efficiency and productivity.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, pursuant to the Answer of 3 April 2025 to Question 42439 on the Employment Tribunals Service, what discussions she has had with HM Courts & Tribunals Service on collecting data on the number of Employment Tribunal cases outstanding aggregated by the duration of time they have been pending.

Answered by Sarah Sackman - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)

Ministers regularly meet the CEO of HM Courts & Tribunals Service (HMCTS) to discuss a wide range of matters relating to the operation of court and tribunal services, including the Employment Tribunal. These discussions are part of ongoing engagement to ensure the efficient delivery of services across all jurisdictions. Work is currently ongoing to transition the remaining legacy caseload to the new case management system as part of the HMCTS data strategy to enable more comprehensive data to be produced.

That is expected to be available later this year.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what discussions (a) she and (b) Ministers in her Department have had with the CEO of HM Courts & Tribunals Service on the Employment Tribunals Service since 5 July 2024.

Answered by Sarah Sackman - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)

Ministers regularly meet the CEO of HM Courts & Tribunals Service to discuss a wide range of matters relating to the operation of court and tribunal services, including the Employment Tribunals. I also have regular meetings with other senior officials in the Ministry of Justice on the operation of the Employment Tribunals.

These discussions are part of ongoing engagement to ensure the efficient delivery of services across all jurisdictions.

Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, how many applications for export licences for objects of cultural interest were (a) received and (b) granted in each month of the past 5 years; and what was the total value of these items.

Answered by Chris Bryant - Minister of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport)

The Export Licensing Unit, run by Arts Council England, received a total number of 27,501 applications for export licenses for objects of cultural interest from May 2020-April 2025, a monthly average of 466. The total number of granted applications was 25,142.

A monthly breakdown is also available, see attached.

The total value of the items for which licenses were issued was £44,987,629,884.

Question to the Department for Business and Trade:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, when he plans to (a) lay his Department’s trade strategy before Parliament and (b) provide copies of that strategy to the media.

Answered by Douglas Alexander - Minister of State (Cabinet Office)

The Department for Business and Trade is committed to upholding our parliamentary commitments and transparency. The Trade Strategy will be laid in Parliament, making the paper accessible to members of both Houses, in due course and will be made available on gov.uk once it is launched.

Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:

To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what discussions she has had with planning authorities in the (a) South West, (b) South East, (c) West Midlands, (d) East Midlands and (e) the East of England on the designation of new green belts.

Answered by Matthew Pennycook - Minister of State (Housing, Communities and Local Government)

Government policy in respect of the designation of new Green Belts may be found in Chapter 13 of the National Planning Policy Framework, which sets out that new Green Belts should be established only in exceptional circumstances.

The Framework was recently updated following extensive consultation, including with local planning authorities.

Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, pursuant to the Answer of 29 April 2025 to Question 47850 on Cultural Heritage: Export Controls, what the total value was of objects in export licence applications received in each month for the same period.

Answered by Chris Bryant - Minister of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport)

The total value of objects in export licence applications received by the Export Licensing Unit, run by Arts Council England, between May 2020- April 2025 was £46,224,886,566

A monthly breakdown is also available, see attached.