Andrew Mitchell

The Government Property Agency is currently developing plans to refurbish the building for use by civil servants.

Due to reasons of commercial sensitivity, I will write to my Hon. Friend separately with details of these costs.

As of 10 January 2021, 2,057 loans have been offered at a value of £62,409,360 in the Sutton Coldfield constituency, through the Bounce Back Loan Scheme.

In March 2020, the Government put forward an initial and unprecedented package of support to help businesses with their ongoing business costs in recognition of the disruption caused by Covid-19. This included the Small Business Grants Fund (SBGF) and the Retail, Hospitality and Leisure Grants Fund (RHLGF). These schemes closed in August last year.

Over the lifetime of the two schemes, more than £11.12 billion was paid out to 906,620 businesses in England. In the West Midlands region, Local Authorities have reported to the department that a total of £1.11 billion was paid to 94,265 business premises under these schemes.

A full breakdown of grant funding allocated to and distributed by each Local Authority is available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/coronavirus-grant-funding-local-authority-payments-to-small-and-medium-businesses.

We are providing the hospitality sector with a wide package of support. On 5 January, my Rt. Hon. Friend Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer announced a one-off top up grant for retail, hospitality and leisure businesses worth up to £9,000 per property to help businesses. A £594 million discretionary fund is also being made available to Local Authorities to help them support other impacted businesses.

The Equality Act 2010 provides strong protection against direct and indirect age discrimination in employment and makes it unlawful for an employer or an employment service provider such as a recruitment agency, to discriminate against any employee or job applicant because of their age. This applies both to when the employer is making arrangements to fill a job and in respect of anything done during the course of a person’s employment. To be lawful, any differential treatment based on age must be objectively justified.

In order to tackle outdated perceptions about older workers, the Government has appointed Andy Briggs as Business Champion for Older Workers, to spearhead the Government’s work to support employers to retain, retrain and recruit older workers. His team will actively promote the benefits of older workers to employers across England, both strategically and through the provision of practical advice.

The Corporate Transparency and Register Reform Consultation was launched on the 5th May 2019 and closed on the 5th August 2019. It received a significant number of responses. The Government plans to publish the response in due course.

Last year the government announced the unprecedented £1.57 billion support package for the culture sector, of which over £1 billion has now been allocated to over 3,000 arts and culture organisations across the country. This funding is supporting the arts and culture sector to survive the pandemic and continue operating.

We have now also announced a second round of the Culture Recovery Fund to support organisations to make the transition to full reopening.

So far 289 organisations in the West Midlands received funding through the recovery grants programme, the capital grants programme and via repayable finance. These include world-renowned organisations such as the Royal Shakespeare Company and the Birmingham Royal Ballet as well as those at the heart of their communities, such as the Black Country Living Museum, the People’s Orchestra in West Bromwich and Re-form Heritage in Stoke-on-Trent.

Overall, funding awarded through the first Round of the Culture Recovery Fund is supporting organisations which employ 69% of arts sector employees in the West Midlands.

We are in regular contact with Treasury colleagues regarding the impact of Covid-19 on the business events industry.

Events businesses can continue to make use of the broader support package available to them. This includes the Bounce Back Loans scheme, the Self-Employed Income Support Scheme and the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme.

We recognise that the events industry and its supply chain has been severely impacted by Covid-19. We continue to meet with the stakeholders, including through the Visitor Economy Working Group and the Events Industry Senior Leaders Advisory Panel, to discuss the specific issues facing the industry.

The Government has also implemented a series of Covid-19 related financial measures that will assist tourism businesses, including those in the West Midlands. This includes the significant cut to VAT and business rates relief for hospitality, retail and leisure businesses, both of which will last until the end of March.

Between April and July, VisitEngland’s £1.3 million Destination Management Organisation Resilience Fund supported local tourism organisations in the West Midlands. The West Midlands Growth Company received £29,866 from the DMO Resilience Fund. Visit Shropshire received £25,066.

More broadly, the £45m Discover England Fund has supported the development of internationally marketed tourism products in the region, including the ‘England’s Waterways’ project. We are also working with regional partners to maximise the tourism benefits of hosting the UK City of Culture in Coventry and the Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games.

My Department has taken a number of steps to increase tourism in the West Midlands.

The £45m Discover England Fund supports the development of internationally marketed tourism products in the region. For example, the England’s Waterways project encourages visitors to explore the canals in and around Birmingham and the Midlands, while the England’s Originals project provides itineraries that include Worcester as a destination.

We are also working with regional partners to maximise the tourism benefits of hosting the UK City of Culture 2021 in Coventry and the Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games.

Government’s first annual report on tackling loneliness was published in January 2020. It highlighted the progress made so far across the country, including in the West Midlands.

This includes: action by frontline workers across the public sector to recognise and act on loneliness; the launch of the Let’s Talk Loneliness campaign; the commitment to include measures in the Public Health Outcomes Framework so we can understand local rates of loneliness; and the announcement of an additional £4m of grant-funding, in partnership with the National Lottery Community Fund, to help frontline grassroots organisations that bring people together.

The report also highlighted the good work of the 126 projects supported through the £11.5m Building Connections Fund to bring people and communities together. 14 grants, totalling £1.2million, have been made to projects in the West Midlands. This includes grants to the Chell Area Family Action Group to appoint volunteer social isolation champions to work with the people most at risk of loneliness and to Edward’s Trust to create and support a compassionate community of bereaved young people.

I refer the right hon. Member for Sutton Coldfield to the answer I gave on 2 June 2021 to Question 7328.

The Department has provided additional funding to schools, on top of existing budgets, to cover unavoidable costs incurred between March and July 2020 due to the COVID-19 outbreak that could not be met from their budgets. We have paid schools £102 million for all claims in the first claims window that were within the published scope of the fund, and we will shortly process claims made in the second window in December 2020.

Last term, the Department announced the COVID-19 workforce fund for schools and colleges, to help those with high staff absences and facing significant financial pressures to stay open. It funded the costs of teacher absences over a threshold from 1 November 2020 until the end of the autumn term. We expect the schools claims form to be launched in spring 2021.

The Department will also fund schools for costs relating to COVID-19 testing. We have published a workforce planning tool which illustrates the levels of funding available. Funding will be paid to schools who have conducted testing in respect of workforce costs and other incidental costs relating to testing, such as waste disposal.

The Government is delivering catch-up funding worth £1 billion, including a ‘Catch-Up Premium’ worth a total of £650 million to support schools to make up for lost teaching time. Alongside this, we have also announced a new £350 million National Tutoring Programme for disadvantaged pupils, including the National Tuition Fund for students age 16-19.

Finally, schools have continued to receive their core funding throughout the outbreak, regardless of any periods of full or partial closure, with this year marking the first year of a three-year increase to core funding - the biggest in a decade. This will ensure schools can continue to pay their staff and meet other regular financial commitments.

The early years sector has benefitted from the continuation of early years entitlement funding during the summer and autumn terms in 2020.

According to the 2019 Provider Finances report, the biggest cost for early education providers is staff, comprising 70% of costs for private nurseries, 75% for voluntary, 81% for school-based nurseries and 79% for Maintained Nursery Schools. The report is available here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/providers-finances-survey-of-childcare-and-ey-providers-2019/.

Providers who have seen a drop in either their income from parents or the government, as a result of the COVID-19 outbreak, can access support through the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme (CJRS), as long as the staff meet the other criteria for the scheme. An early years provider can access the CJRS to cover up to the proportion of its salary bill which could be considered to have been paid for from that provider’s private income. This would typically be income received from ‘parent-paid’ hours that have not yet returned as a result of COVID-19.

Eligible nurseries can also benefit from a business rates holiday and can access the business loans as set out by my right hon. Friend, the Chancellor of the Exchequer.

We continue to work with the early years sector to understand how they can best be supported to ensure that sufficient safe, appropriate and affordable childcare is available to those who need it now, and for all families who need it in the longer term.

On 7 January 2021, we published guidance to schools on the current national lockdown, available here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/actions-for-schools-during-the-coronavirus-outbreak.

Children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) and their families can be disproportionately impacted by being out of education. We therefore set out in the guidance that schools are expected to allow vulnerable children and young people to attend, including those with an Education, Health and Care plan. We want these children and young people to continue to receive high-quality teaching and specialist professional support. The system of protective measures that schools have in place means that any risks associated with attendance are well managed. If a pupil does not attend, we expect the school to provide remote education.

Specialists, therapists, clinicians, and other support staff for pupils with SEND should provide interventions as usual.

We will update the guidance as needed and, as part of this, we will be providing more detailed advice and support for special schools.

We recognise that extended family members often provide informal childcare. In relevant areas where local restrictions are in place on household mixing, people cannot host others they do not live with, or who are not in their support bubbles, in their homes and gardens. Informal childcare is not exempt from these restrictions.

Nationally, our ‘Rule of Six’ guidance specifies the exceptions where groups can be larger than six people, which includes registered childcare and supervised activities provided for children, including wraparound care, youth groups and activities, and children’s playgroups.

Parents who need support to obtain suitable childcare to meet their circumstances can contact their local authority for information and guidance about what childcare is available in their area.

The government funds a significant package of free and subsidised childcare. All 3 year olds and 4 year olds in England are entitled to 15 hours of free childcare a week, with 30 hours of free childcare available for eligible working parents. The government has acted to protect families that have faced a reduced income as a result of the COVID-19 outbreak. Parents who who were eligible for the 30 hours free childcare entitlement prior to the COVID-19 outbreak remain eligible until October even if they have experienced a change in income. Disadvantaged 2 year olds are also eligible for 15 hours of free childcare a week and eligible working parents may also be eligible for tax-free childcare. Parents can find out more about the free and subsidised childcare offers at: www.childcarechoices.gov.uk.

My right hon. Friend, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, announced a series of policies to support people, jobs and businesses on 20 March 2020, during which he confirmed an increase to the Universal Credit standard allowance for 12 months, in addition to planned uprating of 1.7%. The Universal Credit childcare offer remains the same, and working families can claim back up to 85% of their registered childcare costs each month. This can be claimed up to a month before starting a job. For families with 2 children, this could be worth up to £13,000 a year.

Help with up-front childcare costs for starting work is available through a non-repayable Flexible Support Fund (FSF) award for eligible Universal Credit claimants. The FSF received an additional £150 million this financial year to help support Universal Credit claimants to move closer to, or into, work. Help with up-front costs for eligible Universal Credit claimants is available through Budgeting Advances.

While biodegradable materials may be seen as a solution to reduce the impact of waste, they can also be more environmentally damaging than non-biodegradable materials if disposed of incorrectly. The Government is also concerned that, in the absence of robust standards, claims about the biodegradability of plastic-based products cannot be verified.

In order to consider impacts carefully, Defra and the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy published a call for evidence to help us consider the development of standards or certification criteria for bio-based, biodegradable, and compostable plastics, and to better understand their effects on the environment and our current waste system. We are currently analysing responses to the call for evidence with a view to publication of a government response shortly.

Recycling rates for 2019/20 for local authorities in England are not yet available. Reporting of waste and recycling data for local authorities in England for the year 2019/20 was delayed due to Covid-19.

Recycling rates for 2019/20 will be published on 3 March 2021 (https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/announcements/local-authority-collected-waste-management-for-england-for-201920)

The most recent publication of waste statistics shows that the recycling rate for Birmingham in 2018/19 was 22.0%

The Government’s 25 Year Environment Plan sets out our ambition to eliminate all avoidable plastic waste. We are making great strides to tackle plastic pollution. In December 2018 we published the Resources and Waste Strategy, which sets out how we want to achieve this and move towards a circular economy. We know more needs to be done, and for the most problematic plastics we are going faster, which is why we have committed to work towards all plastic packaging on the market being recyclable, reusable or compostable by 2025.

We have made significant progress, by introducing one of the world’s toughest bans on microbeads in rinse-off personal care products and have significantly reduced the use of single-use carrier bags by the main supermarket retailers by 95% with our 5p charge. We have announced our plans to increase the minimum charge to 10p and to extend the charge to all retailers later this year. In October 2020, we introduced measures to restrict the supply of plastic straws, plastic drink stirrers, and plastic-stemmed cotton buds. We will continue to review the latest evidence on problematic products and/ or materials to take a systematic approach to reducing the use of unnecessary single-use plastic products, including problematic packaging materials.

As the hon. Member will be aware, it is an offence to drop litter (including in public parks), and councils have legal powers to take enforcement action against offenders. Anyone caught littering may be prosecuted in a magistrates’ court, which can lead to a criminal record and a fine of up to £2,500 on conviction.

Instead of prosecuting, councils may decide to issue a fixed penalty (on-the-spot fine) of between £65 and £150.

With regards to improving enforcement, we are seeking powers in the Environment Bill to ensure that enforcement powers are used with a high degree of professionalism, whether by council staff or private contractors, and to place our improved enforcement guidance on a firm statutory footing, giving those to which it applies a clear and explicit duty to have regard to it when exercising their enforcement functions.

We also continue to campaign to raise awareness of littering issues in public spaces. Last summer, in response to Covid-19, Defra developed a ‘Respect the Outdoors’ campaign to encourage people to follow the Countryside Code and to highlight the impacts of littering. This was promoted both online and in locations across the country near to urban parks, beaches and national parks. We also supported, and provided funding for, Keep Britain Tidy’s Love Parks campaign, which encouraged people to treat our parks with respect.

Preliminary evaluation of these campaigns indicated that they had a positive influence on the target audience’s intended disposal of PPE litter, with anecdotal reports from local authorities that the intervention resulted in a markedly beneficial outcome.

We recognise this has been an extremely tough time for the sector and would like to assure zoos that we remain committed to ensuring the sector can deliver the best possible care for its animals. We have extended the application deadline for the Zoo Animals Fund from 29 January 2021 to 26 February 2021, and the fund provides support up until the end of March 2021. The Zoo Animals Fund is an envelope of funding which to provides for zoos which, due to a coronavirus-related drop in income are experiencing severe financial difficulties and need support in caring for their animals. The focus of the fund is on the welfare of zoo animals and if zoos are downsizing or rehoming their collections, including if they are closing, then the fund can also provide support for this to ensure the animals' welfare. The fund has been a lifeline for many zoos and has been accessible to all zoos which need funds to care for their animals, as evidenced by the success of small, medium and large zoos in securing grant funding. We stand ready to process applications and encourage any zoo in need to apply.

Beyond the Zoo Animals Fund, the Government has provided a package of temporary, timely and targeted measures to support businesses, including zoos, through this period of disruption caused by COVID-19 and we encourage zoos to explore these. Zoos are eligible to apply for a range of support schemes including the Job Retention Scheme, VAT deferral, Business Rates Relief, the Business Interruption Loan, the option to reclaim the costs of Statutory Sick Pay and grant funding.

The Litter Strategy for England was published in April 2017, setting out the Government’s aim to clean up the country, including our precious waterways, and deliver a substantial reduction in litter and littering within a generation.

The Government is committed to encouraging local solutions for local problems, and this is particularly relevant in dealing with litter and fly-tipping. Our role is to enable and support this local action by providing a clear legal framework of rights and responsibilities, setting national standards and, where possible, making sure that the costs of dealing with these issues are passed to those responsible.

Navigation authorities in England and Wales are responsible for ensuring the canals and rivers that they own and manage are properly maintained and navigable. Local authorities are responsible for clearing fly-tipping from public land, and navigation authorities work closely with them to remove fly-tipping that occurs on waterside land. Councils also have legal powers to take enforcement action. They can prosecute anyone caught fly-tipping or littering or, alternatively, issue a fixed penalty notice.

Navigation authorities may also take steps to remove litter from their waterways as part of routine maintenance with the assistance of their volunteers, as well as in some cases running awareness-raising publicity campaigns. An example of this is the recently re-launched Canal and River Trust ‘Plastics Challenge’ campaign, which encourages all users of their waterways to pick up a piece of plastic litter and take it home with them to dispose of properly.

It is encouraging to see that there are a growing number of public-spirited individuals and community groups tackling litter all over the country. We have been proud to support and endorse national clean-up days such as the Great British Spring Clean, and the Great British Beach Clean, and we will continue to use our influence to encourage as many people and businesses as possible to participate in these types of events, whilst following Government guidance on staying safe outside the home.

Passengers in the West Midlands will see the introduction of two new fleets of electric and diesel trains on local services commencing later this year. Cross Country is also adding carriages to some of its local services into Birmingham in 2021.

The West Midlands network also plans to grow by adding new stations on existing lines to serve communities that lost their rail services during the 20th century. These include three stations on the Camp Hill Line in south Birmingham, and two in the Black Country to serve the towns of Willenhall and Darlaston.

On infrastructure, the Department is working with Network Rail and Midlands Connect to develop an Outline Business Case for the Midlands Rail Hub. This work will further develop infrastructure proposals to enable up to ten additional trains per hour to serve central Birmingham.

Birmingham City Council, as the local highway authority, is responsible for the maintenance of its local road network. Birmingham City Council has a Highways Maintenance Private Finance Initiative project for the comprehensive upgrade and maintenance, over 25 years, of their highway network.

The project commenced operation on 7 June 2010; the Department is providing over £1.2 billion towards the £2.7 billion total cost.

On 12 May, the Government published guidance for passengers and transport operators to help them keep themselves and their staff safe, including how social distancing rules should be interpreted to do this. The Department is working with transport providers, their representative groups, and local authorities across England as they seek to implement this guidance. This guidance will be kept?up-to-date?as restrictions on travel change.

As the Prime Minister announced on 10 June, the Government will be expanding targeted testing of occupations and groups at higher risk, including those individuals working in front line jobs, which bring them regularly into close contact with the public. This will help us learn more about who is at higher risk and how the virus is spread.

Funding for cycling and walking comes from a variety of Government and non-Government sources. Government funding includes ringfenced and non-ringfenced funds. Over the last three years, local authorities in the West Midlands have received a total of approximately £56 million from ringfenced funds including the Cycle City Ambition fund, Bikeability and the Access Fund, and approximately £63 million from non-ringfenced funds including the Local Growth Fund, Transforming Cities Fund and National Productivity Investment Fund. The Department intends to publish further details of the funding that has been made available to local authorities for cycling and walking when it reports to Parliament later in 2020 on the progress that has been made in delivering the Cycling and Walking Investment Strategy.

Work Coaches refer suitable candidates to available vacancies, statistics on referrals is not currently available.

Our Plan for Jobs is a Cross-Government initiative that will promote employment opportunities to people of all ages.

Our local jobcentres are now fully reopened and we will provide additional support to claimants by doubling the number of Work Coaches in this financial year. We are expanding our sector-based work academy programme (SWAP), which supports claimants aged 18+ into a wide range of current vacancies through a short period of training and work experience linked to a guaranteed job interview.

We have launched our ambitious Kickstart scheme, which will provide a vital first step on the jobs ladder for many young people. Funding for 6-month Kickstart placements covers the relevant National Minimum Wage rate for 25 hours a week, the associated employer National Insurance contributions, and employer minimum automatic enrolment contributions, as well as £1500 of employability support.

Nine Small and Medium Employers in Sutton Coldfield are interested in taking part in the Kickstart Scheme. Each have under 30 vacancies to offer and we are waiting for intermediaries to be appointed, who will then make applications on their behalf via Gov.uk.

Jobcentre Plus Older Claimants Champions work with Work Coaches to deliver Jobcentre Plus’ commitment to support older people to find work and stay in work. Champions liaise with employers and providers to promote and raise the profile and benefits of employing older workers.

Jobcentre Plus staff are meeting employers and organisations in their area to promote Kickstart and encourage participation with the scheme.

Officials have also engaged with representatives from the Greater Birmingham and Solihull Local Enterprise Partnership to engage with their networks of local employers and organisations.

We are providing £1.2 billion to enhance work search support service in Great Britain which includes doubling the number of frontline Work Coaches in Jobcentre Plus before the end of the financial year. We are also increasing the flexible support fund which includes extending the Rapid Response Service, tripling the number of Sector-based Work Academy Placements in England, and expanding the work and health programme to deliver Job Entry: Targeted Support. Further, the Job finding support service will provide tailored one-to-one job finding support to the recently unemployed.

The Department is working closely with other government departments, external organisations and local partners to support people into work. The Kickstart scheme was recently announced to help young people aged 16-24 find 6-month work places and in Sutton Coldfield there are 9 Small and Medium Employers have expressed an interested in taking part in the Kickstart Scheme. We urge all those wishing to get involved to visit gov.uk.

There are no specific claim processes designed for individual health conditions such as Parkinson’s Disease. This is because PIP claims are assessed on the basis of individual functional need rather than health condition. We actively manage and review our PIP claim processes to ensure claims are assessed and paid as quickly and accurately as possible. Normal rules new claims are currently being dealt with in an average of 14 weeks from registration to initial decision. There is also a fast-track process for any claimants with a terminal illness.

Menopause clinics are operated by clinical commissioning groups (CCGs) and implemented as local services. CCGs have a statutory responsibility to commission healthcare services that meet the needs of their whole population, including the provision of menopause clinics.

Each medical school in the England sets its own undergraduate curriculum which must meet the standards set by the General Medical Council (GMC) in its Outcomes for Graduates. The GMC updated the Outcomes for Graduates in 2018, following extensive engagement and consultation with medical education experts. The GMC would expect that, in fulfilling these standards, newly qualified doctors are able to identify, treat and manage any care needs a person has, including the menopause and perimenopause.

The training curricula for postgraduate trainee doctors is set by the relevant Royal College and must also meet the standards set by the GMC. The perimenopause and menopause are included in the curriculum set by the Royal College of General Practitioners and emphasised in the College’s clinical topic guides, which supplement the curriculum.

In the West Midlands, the Birmingham and Solihull Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) has received additional funding for mental health services during 2021/22. National planning guidance sets out the deliverables which are expected will be achieved with this funding and some of these relate to further improving access and reducing waiting times for patients.

Birmingham and Solihull CCG have undertaken modelling work to help understand and plan for an increase in demand for services to ensure that waiting times are maintained or improved.

In Sutton Coldfield the bowel screening programme has increased colonoscopy capacity and the provider is currently sending invitations at 150% of weekly rates compared with before the pandemic. The cervical screening programme has also increased its invitation rate, with normal service expected to be resumed by May 2021. For breast screening a new mobile screening unit will be available within the next month, allowing an additional 720 women to be screened per month.

In January 2019, we published the first Cross-Government Suicide Prevention Workplan. It will see every local authority, mental health trust and prison in the country implementing suicide prevention policies. Every local authority now has a multi-agency suicide prevention plan in place and we are working with local government to assure the effectiveness of those plans.

Coventry and Warwickshire sustainability and transformation partnership (STP), which includes Sutton Coldfield, has received £352,000 in 2018/19, £352,000 in 2019/20 and £185,304 in 2020/21 for suicide prevention.

In 2020/21, Birmingham and Solihull STP received £252,595 for suicide prevention, Black Country and West Birmingham STP received £280,078, Staffordshire and Stoke on Trent STP received £300,000 and Herefordshire and Worcestershire STP received £152,187.

As set out in the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations, we cannot interfere in the internal affairs of other countries, or bypass their laws, just as we would not accept similar interference here. The FCDO cannot seek to interfere in Monegasque court processes. Any concerns about the way in which Mr Taylor might be able to give evidence are a matter for the Monegasque legal system and Mr Taylor's lawyers. As part of our consular assistance to British nationals overseas we can raise concerns about individuals on diplomatic channels. I raised Mr Taylor's case with the Monegasque Foreign Secretary on 13 November 2020 to seek assurances that he would be treated fairly. Monaco provided direct assurances to Croatia in January.

As set out in the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations, we cannot interfere in the internal affairs of other countries, or bypass their laws, just as we would not accept similar interference here. The FCDO cannot seek to interfere in Monegasque court processes. Any concerns about the way in which Mr Taylor might be able to give evidence are a matter for the Monegasque legal system and Mr Taylor's lawyers. As part of our consular assistance to British nationals overseas we can raise concerns about individuals on diplomatic channels. I raised Mr Taylor's case with the Monegasque Foreign Secretary on 13 November 2020 to seek assurances that he would be treated fairly. Monaco provided direct assurances to Croatia in January.

I raised Mr Taylor's case with the Monegasque Foreign Secretary and the Croatian State Secretary for European Affairs on 13 November 2020 and sought assurances that both authorities would treat Mr Taylor fairly. Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) officials are providing ongoing consular support to Mr Taylor. Consular officials continue to seek updates from the Croatian courts. In December 2020, the British Ambassador in Zagreb met Mr Taylor to discuss his concerns and explain how the FCDO could assist him, and the Acting Deputy Head of Mission spoke to Mr Taylor on 10 March.

The table below provides total bilateral Official Development Assistance (ODA) spend by former Department for International Development in Africa on family planning and reproductive health between 2015 and 2019.

Source: Statistics on International Development: Final UK Aid spend 2019

In the Autumn, FCDO will publish "Statistics on International Development: Final UK Aid Spend 2020". This publication will contain detailed breakdowns including finalised UK bilateral ODA by sector.

An estimated 218 million women of reproductive age (15-49) in low and middle income countries want to avoid or delay pregnancy but for a range of reasons are not currently using modern contraception. That is why the UK is a major stakeholder in the FP2020 global partnership and its follow-on partnership, FP2030.

The UK is proud to advance universal access to comprehensive sexual and reproductive health and rights, including access to modern family planning methods in the world's poorest countries. Between 2019-2020 alone, UK aid helped over 25 million women and girls use modern methods of contraception. We are working through the implications of the ODA reductions for individual programmes and activities. No decisions on individual country or sectoral budgets have been made yet.

The Government appreciates the significant disruption the pandemic has had on travel agents. Companies facing difficulties can draw upon the unprecedented package of measures announced by the Chancellor, including the COVID loans schemes and extended furlough.

In England, travel agents can benefit from the £5 billion package of grant support announced at Budget. This includes Restart Grants worth up to £6,000 if classified as non-essential retail or up to £18,000 if classified as a leisure or accommodation business. This package of support also includes the £425 million top-up to the Additional Restrictions Grant which has already provided Local Authorities (LAs) with £1.6 billion. This funding is at the LAs discretion and is intended to support businesses which are not eligible for Restart Grants, but which are nonetheless experiencing a severe impact on their business.

The Government continues to review all the economic support schemes, including grant support, as the public health response evolves.

We regularly work with our international partners in the G7, G20 and Paris Club on debt issues, including private sector participation in debt restructurings. We also engage directly with the private sector, including through the Institute of International Finance.

Support for Low-Income Developing Countries is a key priority for the UK’s G7 presidency this year and we have made clear our expectation that the private sector will offer debt treatment on at least as favourable terms as the official sector under the Common Framework agreed by the G20 last November.

Company formation service providers are regulated entities under the UK’s Money Laundering, Terrorist Financing and Transfer of Funds (Information on the Payer) Regulations 2017. The Regulations set out the high-level requirements on regulated firms to combat money laundering and ensure that key professionals identify their customers, understand the purpose behind transactions including the source of funds and have policies, controls and procedures in place to mitigate against the risks of money laundering and terrorism financing they face.

As a regulated entity under the Regulations, company formation service providers must be registered with an anti-money laundering supervisor. Anti-money laundering supervisors must effectively monitor the compliance of regulated entities they supervise. In December 2018, the Financial Action Task Force, the global standard-setter for anti-money laundering and counter terrorism financing (AML/CTF), published its Mutual Evaluation Report of the United Kingdom. It recognised that the UK’s AML/CTF regime is the strongest of over sixty countries assessed by FATF and its regional bodies to date.

The government is committed to making the UK the best place to start and grow a digital business, and to ensuring the benefits of digital are felt across the country.

The Midlands is well-placed to make the most of the digital revolution, with its leading universities and strengths in advanced manufacturing and engineering. It is already home to more than 20,000 digital technology businesses.

We are driving further growth in the region’s digital economy through:

• The £250m Midlands Engine Investment Fund (MEIF), which enables effective collaboration between lenders, local bodies and the British Business Bank to help local firms access the investment they need to thrive. The MEIF complements other British Business Bank programmes to give small and medium-sized businesses increased flexibility in the types of funding available to them.
• A Skills deal with West Midlands Combined Authority, which will unlock up to £69m to boost digital and technical skills, job opportunities and productivity across the region.
• Committing over £20m for large-scale testing of new 5G applications in urban areas across the West Midlands, helping local people and businesses to benefit from new digital technologies. This builds on the £4.8m invested in the 5G testbed in Worcestershire, putting the Midlands at the forefront of 5G developments.

The region is also benefitting from:

• Our investment of £21m in Tech Nation’s regional network, which is helping tech entrepreneurs across the UK to scale their businesses.
• The government’s commitment since 2016 to invest an additional £7bn by 2022 in R&D – the largest increase on record and demonstrable progress towards our goal of increasing economy-wide R&D investment to 2.4% of GDP by 2027.
• Support for businesses through R&D tax reliefs, which has more than tripled overall since 2010 and totalled £4.4bn in 2016-17.

The Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act lists a range of public authorities who use Covert Human Intelligence Sources (CHIS) for general investigative purposes. The CHIS (Criminal Conduct) Bill restricts the number of public authorities able to authorise participation in criminal conduct to only those public authorities who have demonstrated a clear operational need for the tactic. Authorisations will be subject to a robust set of safeguards and an authorisation can only be granted where it is necessary and proportionate to the criminality it is seeking to prevent.

The Food Standards Agency is tasked with protecting consumers and the food industry from crime within food supply chains. Examples of such criminality include the use of stolen food in the supply chain, unlawful slaughter, diversion of unsafe food, adulteration, substitution or misrepresentation of food and document fraud.

An example of where they might need to authorise participation in criminal conduct is where an individual working within a food business, contacts handlers to pass on intelligence. This relates to the ongoing misrepresentation of meat as being of premium quality and the extension of meat durability dates, leading to out of date meat being consumed.

The continuing presence of the individual within the workplace necessitates them actively participating in presenting, packaging and re-labelling produce in order to misrepresent its quality and fitness for consumption, which are criminal offences. This provides opportunities for the evidential seizure of unfit produce and to identify those complicit in, and responsible for, directing fraudulent activity. As a result, evidence is available to support a successful prosecution.

All authorisations are granted by an experienced and highly trained authorising officer who will ensure that the authorisation has strict parameters and that this is communicated to the ‘agent’ or CHIS. Authorising Officers receive robust training to ensure they understand necessity, proportionality and risk considerations.

Public authorities each have in place their own training processes for their authorising officers to reflect the specialist remit in which they operate.

The authorisation of CHIS participation in criminal conduct is, and will continue to be, subject to robust and independent oversight by the Investigatory Powers Commissioner.

The Commissioner has wide-ranging statutory responsibilities for the oversight of investigatory powers, including this power, which are set out in Part 8 of the Investigatory Powers Act 2016. The Bill sets out particular requirements in relation to participation in criminal conduct. It amends the Investigatory Powers Act to provide a requirement for the Investigatory Powers Commissioner to pay particular attention to public authorities’ use of the power to grant criminal conduct authorisations under new section 29B.It also requires the Investigatory Powers Commissioner to include information about public authorities’ use of criminal conduct authorisations in his annual report. This will include information such as statistics on relevant public authorities’ of the power, the operation of safeguards in relation to authorisations, and errors.

As part of this, we anticipate that the IPC and his office will identify if any public body is failing to train and assess their officers to a sufficiently high standard.

A covert human intelligence source (CHIS) will never be given authority to commit any and all crime. All authorisations must be necessary and proportionate to the criminality they are seeking to prevent and the Authorising Officer must ensure that the level of criminality authorised must be at the lowest level of intrusion possible to achieve the aims of the operation.

There are limits to the activity that can be authorised under this Bill and these are contained in the Human Rights Act. This includes the right to life, and prohibition of torture or subjecting someone to inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.

The Bill does not list specific crimes which may be authorised, or prohibited, as to do so would place into the hands of criminals, terrorists and hostile states a means of creating a checklist for suspected CHIS to be tested against. This would threaten the future of the CHIS capability, and result in an increased threat to the public.

With regards to international comparisons, different countries have different legal systems, threat pictures and operational practices which means that simply comparing respective legislation gives only a very partial picture. In the course of developing this Bill, officials have engaged with a variety of stakeholders, including US counterparts.

In 2020/21, we are providing over £700 million to tackle homelessness and rough sleeping across England.

Birmingham City Council have been allocated more than £2.5 million through rough sleeping programmes in 2020/21. This includes:

• Rough Sleeping Initiative funding to support the establishment or enhancement of coordinated local services for rough sleepers or those at risk of sleeping rough;
• Next Steps Accommodation funding to prevent those bought in during the COVID-19 pandemic returning to the streets and long term funding through the Rough Sleeper Accommodation Programme, from 2020/21 – 2023/24;
• Cold Weather Funding to bring forward COVID-secure accommodation this winter and to keep vulnerable people safe;
• Protect Programme funding, which provides targeted support to local authorities with higher numbers of rough sleepers to meet the specific challenges they faced;
• Drug and alcohol misuse funding for those with drug and alcohol support needs to get the help they need to rebuild their lives, and;
• Funding for Housing First is also providing accommodation for up to 130 individuals in the city by the end of June 2021.

Birmingham City Council have been closely supported by our MHCLG Rough Sleeping Initiative and homelessness advisers. These expert advisers are pro-actively working with local areas as they adapt to the new restrictions and will continue to support these authorities beyond COVID-19.

This Government is committed to ending rough sleeping and we have taken unprecedented steps to protect rough sleepers during the pandemic. This work has not stopped, and through Everyone In, by November we had supported around 33,000 people with nearly 10,000 in emergency accommodation and over 23,000 already moved on into longer-term accommodation.

The Government’s support for biodiversity is made clear in the National Planning Policy Framework and accompanying planning guidance. The Framework says that to protect and enhance biodiversity, planning policies and decisions should minimise impacts on and provide net gains for biodiversity, and it contains a number of policies in support of this. The accompanying planning guidance was updated on 21 July 2019 and provides advice on how development can achieve biodiversity net gains. The Environment Bill will take biodiversity net gain a stage further by making it a mandatory requirement for development.

We have no plans to publish a draft document prepared for the previous government which was not issued, and no plans to review the law on assisted suicide or issue a call for evidence.

The government’s view remains that that any change to the law in this area must be for individual Parliamentarians to consider as an issue of conscience, rather than a decision for Government.

I note the Rt. Hon. Member’s ongoing interest in this matter, and would reassure him that discussions are taking place at official level on the statutory review.

The right to a fair trial is a fundamental part of our society and the Closed Material Procedures contain strong procedural and judicial safeguards.

We will bring forward the statutory review as soon as possible.

I can advise that discussions are still ongoing and an announcement will be made in due course.

I can advise that discussions are still ongoing and an announcement will be made in due course.

I can advise that discussions are still ongoing and an announcement will be made in due course.