Anneliese Dodds

The UK Health Security Agency and the Malaria Reference Laboratory work closely together and are in regular communication with the African Diaspora Malaria Initiative. The initiative is a diaspora-led charitable initiative whose primary objective is the eradication of malaria in the United Kingdom’s African diaspora.

This information is not held centrally. The UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) holds data on all malaria cases diagnosed in the United Kingdom by the Malaria Reference Laboratory and Public Health Scotland. The UKHSA publishes annual reports on malaria in the UK, which are available at the following link:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/malaria-in-the-uk-annual-report

The UKHSA does not collect data on the cost to the National Health Service of treating patients who have contracted malaria.

NHS England captures and publishes aggregated costs, the average unit cost of providing defined services to NHS patients in England, and patient-level costs, a cost based on the specific interactions a patient has and the events related to their healthcare activity, with further information available at the following link:

https://www.england.nhs.uk/costing-in-the-nhs/national-cost-collection/

This information is not held centrally. NHS England captures and publishes aggregated costs, namely the average unit cost of providing defined services to NHS patients in England, and patient-level costs/PLICS, a cost based on the specific interactions a patient has, and the events related to their healthcare activity, which are available at the following link:

https://www.england.nhs.uk/costing-in-the-nhs/national-cost-collection/

This provides cost information about patients who have been admitted to a hospital for treatment with a primary diagnosis of tuberculosis, rather than patients who have contracted tuberculosis in the last five years.

The UK Health Security Agency publishes malaria-specific migrant health guidance for healthcare practitioners. Further information is available at the following link:

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/malaria-migrant-health-guide

This calls for all practitioners to raise awareness of the risk of malaria by asking non-United Kingdom born patients from malarious countries whether they will be returning home to visit friends and relatives, and to advise how and when they should seek travel advice. The guidance reinforces that anyone visiting a malarious area can become infected regardless of age, sex, ethnicity, or country of birth, and that malaria is particularly dangerous for pregnant women.

Travellers are advised to get advice before they travel to areas where malaria is found. Pre-travel health services are available from private travel clinics, pharmacies, and some general practices. Further information on the pre travel health services that are available can be found at the following link:

https://www.cqc.org.uk/guidance-providers/gps/gp-mythbusters/gp-mythbuster-107-pretravel-health-services

There are no current plans to ensure that opportunities to talk about future travel plans are being taken up with people that are potentially susceptible to contracting malaria at new patient checks or childhood immunisation appointments, or outside of specific travel health consultations.

There are no International Classification of Diseases, Tenth Revision (ICD-10) codes in the Hospital Episode Statistics database that would allow treatment-resistant tuberculosis and complications from treatment-resistant tuberculosis to be identified. ICD-10 codes are used to classify and identify diagnoses.

The UK Health Security Agency uses epidemiological tools, such as whole genome sequencing, to better understand the transmission of tuberculosis. However, it is not possible to determine the proportion of the individuals admitted to hospital who contracted tuberculosis outside of the United Kingdom.

The Foreign Secretary made clear in his statement on 23 May that any use of chemical weapons is unacceptable. We remain deeply concerned by the US determination that the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) have used chemical weapons in Sudan. It is imperative that the SAF engages constructively with the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons in order to facilitate a thorough and impartial investigation. We expect the SAF to abide by its obligations under the Chemical Weapon Convention not to develop, produce, possess, or use chemical weapons.

The UK Government reserves the right to suspend preferences on particular goods, or to suspend a country from the Developing Countries Trading Scheme (DCTS) if it finds that they have seriously and systemically breached international conventions in relation to human rights.

When considering suspensions, the UK may assess, among other things, the impact on the beneficiary country's economic and development prospects, the impact on the country's most vulnerable people and the effectiveness of a suspension in bringing about change.

The UK continues to encourage all states to uphold their international human rights obligations, and hold all those who violate or abuse human rights to account. Our Embassy in Bishkek actively monitors the human rights situation in Kyrgyzstan and ministers have raised concerns regarding human rights and media freedom with the Kyrgyz Government.

The human cost of the conflict in Sudan is appalling with the warring parties showing a total disregard for the wellbeing of civilians and women and girls bearing the brunt of the violence. Reports that survivors of sexual violence are said to be increasingly contemplating suicide is an indication of how desperate the context is. The UK is doing all it can to address and respond to such abuses. In February, Lord Collins chaired a UN Security Council Briefing on conflict-related sexual violence in Sudan, emphasising the need for an immediate cessation of hostilities. The UK has also led efforts at the Human Rights Council to establish and renew the mandate for the UN Fact-Finding Mission which is crucial for supporting future accountability efforts in Sudan. On 24 April, the Foreign Secretary issued a statement calling for the warring parties to adhere to their commitments under the Jeddah Declaration to protect civilians. This followed the UN Security Council statement, released on 16 April, condemning the escalation of violence and calling for the parties to urgently implement UN Security Council Resolution 2736.

I raised human rights issues with my Kyrgyz counterpart during the inaugural UK-Kyrgyz Strategic Dialogue in February 2025. We regularly raise human rights at ministerial level with Kyrgyzstan.

Conflict-related sexual violence in Sudan has been, and remains, unacceptably high. Given the frequent internet and communications shutdowns and lack of access to conflict zones, it is particularly challenging to monitor implementation of the Murad Code. As such we are currently unable to provide an assessment of trends in the level of adherence.

In 2022, together with Nobel Laureate Nadia Murad and the Institute for Inter­national Criminal Investi­gations (IICI), the UK launched the Murad Code, which sets out minimum standards for gathering information from survivors of conflict-related sexual violence safely and ethically. It is now available in 14 languages, including Arabic. Many non-governmental organisations and civil society actors, including those working in Sudan, have shown commitment to its principles. We continue to promote the Murad Code.

The Government recognises the vital role played by the charity sector and the generosity of the British public. We support charitable giving with over £1.6billion in Gift Aid each year.

Charities have the flexibility to decide on their own strategy for fundraising and are free to partner with other organisations to process their Gift Aid claims. It will ultimately be a commercial decision on the part of a charity to work with a fundraising platform. If they do, any fee paid to the platform for processing gift aid claims may be calculated by reference to the amount claimed but is not itself gift aid.

Fundraising platforms do not receive financial support from the government and their profits are taxable.

Many of the fundraising platforms are voluntarily registered with the Fundraising Regulator which is the independent, non-statutory regulator of charitable fundraising in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. The Fundraising Regulator can act if it believes standards have been breached.

The Defending Democracy Taskforce is driving forward a programme of work to secure the democratic integrity of the UK from the full range of threats. Alongside its work to protect elections, since the General Election the Taskforce has:

• Conducted a wide-ranging review to understand how we can prevent and deter harassment and intimidation of anyone involved in our electoral institutions and processes and is now taking forward priority work to address this issue.
• Sponsored the National Cyber Security Centre to deliver an enhanced cyber security offer for elected representatives across the UK to help better protect them online.
• Concluded a comprehensive assessment of the UK’s response to Transnational Repression to understand the scale and nature of Transnational Repression in the UK, as well as Government’s response to the issue.

Engaged with international partners to share lessons learnt and expertise to help tackle similar threats to our democracies.

The Department for Science, Innovation and Technology is a core member of the Defending Democracy Taskforce and is working to build information resilience and protect our democracy, including through key levers such as the Online Safety Act.

My officials have been in touch with Demos to learn more about their work and consider any potential policy implications arising from their research.

The Department for Culture, Media and Sport who are core members of the Defending Democracy Taskforce, are in the process of developing a Local Media Strategy, in recognition of the importance of this vital sector. Our vision is for a thriving local media that can continue to play an invaluable role as a key channel of trustworthy information at local level, and thereby contributes to the UK’s democratic resilience.

The Defending Democracy Taskforce is driving forward a whole of Government response to the full range of threats to our democracy.

Meetings of the Taskforce are complemented by private engagement with partners outside central Government and Parliament, including civil society organisations such as the Jo Cox foundation, on subjects relevant to the work of the Taskforce.

The first duty of this Government is to keep the country safe. We are committed to addressing foreign interference, including those actions which amount to transnational repression (TNR). We continually assess potential threats in the UK, and take protection of individuals’ rights, freedoms, and safety very seriously. As I set out in my statement to the House on 14 May, and reiterated during my evidence session at the Joint Committee on Human Rights on 21 May, any attempt by any foreign state to intimidate, harass or harm individuals in the UK will not be tolerated, irrespective of the perpetrating country.

The legislation and tools designed to detect and disrupt transnational repression are actor agnostic. Where we become aware of individual victims of TNR, we work to deploy a range of tailored support and security assistance mechanisms for their protection. This assistance is based on threat and varied in its scope and approach.

In line with recommendations from the Defending Democracy Taskforce’s TNR Review, new guidance is available on GOV.UK to provide those who believe themselves to be at-risk of TNR with practical advice for their safety both physically and online. Anyone who thinks they might be a victim should report incidents or suspicious activity to the Police via 101, a local police station, or 999 in emergencies.

The Government inherited a recruitment crisis from the last Government.

The Defence Secretary has undertaken to review the current recruitment policies and has already announced several changes to prior outdated approaches.

An update to Joint Service Publication (JSP) 950 Leaflet 6-7-7, which sets out the Medical Employment Standards for the Armed Forces, was published in August 2024 following an intensive period of review undertaken by clinical experts, Defence personnel staff and the recruiting agencies.

The updated JSP 950 Leaflet 6-7-7 is now in use and applies to both Regular and Reserve Forces. In the case of acne, the update confirms that candidates with acne that has resolved with or without treatment, are now able to join the Armed Forces.

The Defence Secretary has undertaken to review the current recruitment policies and has already announced several changes to prior outdated approaches.

An update to Joint Service Publication (JSP) 950 Leaflet 6-7-7, which sets out the Medical Employment Standards for the Armed Forces, was published in August 2024 following an intensive period of review undertaken by clinical experts, Defence personnel staff and the recruiting agencies.

The updated JSP 950 Leaflet 6-7-7 is now in use and applies to both Regular and Reserve Forces. In the case of mood disorders, including depression, the update confirms that candidates with a single episode of depressive disorder may be able to join the Armed Forces providing they meet certain criteria.

For mild or moderate episodes, candidates may be eligible providing the episode has lasted for less than two years and candidates have remained asymptomatic without relapse following the completion of all treatment for at least one year or for severe episodes for at least two years post treatment.

MHCLG and the Building Safety Regulator (BSR) both recognise the impact of Gateway delays on the construction pipeline of high-rise projects and are taking action to address the current challenges.

The Department is working closely with the BSR to improve processing times and has already taken several actions. As a new function, the BSR has needed to refine and improve its processes. We have provided funding to the BSR to recruit an extra 30 frontline staff to bolster its capacity. On 14 May, the BSR also launched a campaign to directly recruit Registered Building Inspectors (RBIs) with significant further recruitment planned in June 2025. The impact of these mitigations will scale up in the coming months as the BSR continues to clear applications.

MHCLG and the BSR are also reviewing better ways to access specialist advice on multi-disciplinary teams (MDTs) which assess applications to enable faster assessment times.

Whilst the BSR and MHCLG are exploring all possible opportunities to strengthen the new Gateway process and guidance to industry, it is important to recognise that a significant volume of applications continue to be invalidated or rejected for not meeting the legislative requirements. These are buildings that, had they been constructed, might have placed residents at risk and/or living in housing that did not meet long-standing requirements. It is also important to note that additional information requests for missing details in applications can add between at least 4-6 weeks onto the process. In recognition of this, the BSR issued new guidance in March 2025 to assist applications in preparing high quality applications.

The government recognises the considerable financial strain that rising services charges place on leaseholders and tenants. The level of service charge that leaseholders pay depends on a range of factors, including the terms of a lease or tenancy agreement and the age and condition of a building.

By law, variable service charges must be reasonable. Overcharging through service charges is completely unacceptable. Should leaseholders wish to contest the reasonableness of their service charges they may make an application to the appropriate tribunal.

My Department does not hold data on the number of unreasonable service charge challenges that are upheld by the First-tier Tribunal (Property Chamber).

The Leasehold and Freeport Reform Act 2024 includes measures designed to drive up the transparency of service charges to make them more easily challengeable if leaseholders consider them to be unreasonable. Once commenced, these will ensure all leaseholders receive minimum key financial and non-financial information on a regular basis, including introducing a standardised service charge demand form and an annual report.

The government is committed to acting quickly to implement the provisions of the Act. Further detail can be found in the Written Ministerial Statement made on Thursday 21 November 2024 (HCWS244).

The government does not regulate the level of service charges for social housing tenants.

Our policy statement on social housing rents states that Registered Providers of social housing should endeavour to keep any service charge increases for tenants within the limit on rent increases, to help keep charges affordable.

Registered Providers are expected to set reasonable and transparent service charges for tenants which reflect the service being provided, and tenants should also be supplied with clear information about how service charges are set.