Asked by: Blake Stephenson (Conservative - Mid Bedfordshire)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps she is taking to improve reliability on Thameslink services.
Answered by Keir Mather - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
Thameslink services transferred into public ownership on 31 May 2026. The new public sector operator has committed to a range of measures intended to improve reliability and reduce cancellations, including recruiting additional drivers, completing the Thameslink automatic train operation training programme and introducing further operational improvements across the network.
Asked by: Blake Stephenson (Conservative - Mid Bedfordshire)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, if he will make a comparative estimate of the level of taxation (a) collected in 2024-25 and (b) expected from Budgets for that tax year.
Answered by James Murray - Financial Secretary to the Treasury and Paymaster General
The independent Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) published its Forecast Evaluation Report in June 2026 which compares its economic forecasts, including forecast tax receipts, with the outturns for 2024/25. The report can be found online here:
Forecast evaluation report 2026
Asked by: Blake Stephenson (Conservative - Mid Bedfordshire)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether he has made a recent assessment of waiting times for responses to Ministerial correspondence.
Answered by Andrew Western - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Department continues to respond to correspondence from Members of Parliament, although increased volumes and the need for detailed investigation in some cases can affect response times.
To address this, the Department has deployed additional resources to complaints and correspondence teams, prioritised the reduction of backlogs, strengthened performance monitoring, introduced enhanced senior oversight, and improved case management processes to support faster and more consistent responses.
As a result of these measures, the Department has begun to reduce outstanding backlogs and increase case-handling capacity, helping to improve response times for hon. Members.
The Department’s aims to respond to complaint within 15 working days or, where a case will take longer than 15 days to respond to, set a resolution plan with the customer where cases are complex and may take longer. A resolution plan is a clear outline of how we will address and resolve a complaint. It sets out what actions will be taken, who is responsible, and the expected timescales for completing these actions.
The Department is committed to ensuring that hon. Members receive timely and accurate in-formation on behalf of their constituents and is taking urgent action to restore performance to expected standards.
Asked by: Blake Stephenson (Conservative - Mid Bedfordshire)
Question
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, when she intends to publish the National Visitor Economy Strategy.
Answered by Stephanie Peacock - Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport)
The Government is working with industry on a Visitor Economy Growth Strategy which will set out an long-term, place-based plan to increase visitor flows across the UK, boost value, and deliver sustainable growth across regional visitor economies - driving growth and opportunity in every postcode. The strategy will be published when that work has concluded.
Asked by: Blake Stephenson (Conservative - Mid Bedfordshire)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what the current maintenance backlog is at a) Bedford Hospital and b) Luton & Dunstable Hospital.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
National Health Service trusts are legally responsible for managing and maintaining their estates using their operational capital allocations, and as part of this, they regularly assess the physical condition of their estate.
The NHS England Estates Related Information Collection (ERIC) survey collects data from trusts on the condition of their estate annually, including backlog maintenance and the projected cost of bringing all the buildings on each NHS site into acceptable condition. The latest data, for 202/25, including from trusts in the East of England, is available at the following link:
Repairing and rebuilding our NHS estate is a vital part of our ambition to create an NHS that is fit for the future through our 10-Year Health Plan. The Government’s 10 Year Infrastructure Strategy set out 10 year maintenance budgets for the public estate, confirming £6 billion per year for maintenance and repair of the NHS estate up to 2034/35.
Asked by: Blake Stephenson (Conservative - Mid Bedfordshire)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if she will support plans to build a new Children’s Hospital in Cambridge.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Department remains committed to working with the Cambridge University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust on this topic, as funding of approximately £100 million has been made available centrally via the Hospital Upgrades Programme with the Department for the Children’s Hospital. We continue to work closely with our NHS England counterparts to deliver this.
Asked by: Blake Stephenson (Conservative - Mid Bedfordshire)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, for what reason her Department encourages schools to join Multi-Academy Trusts.
Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)
We are at the early stages of the development for the new technical education pathways and will encourage schools to consider joining high-quality Multi-Academy Trusts, because collaboration between schools is an important means of improving standards and outcomes for children and young people.
As set out in the Every Child Achieving and Thriving white paper, high-quality trusts enable schools to work together to spread excellence, build workforce capacity and secure continuous improvement, ensuring that children benefit from the collective strength of the school system.
Trusts can support schools by enabling the sharing of expertise, resources and effective practice, strengthening leadership and professional development, and helping schools manage challenges collectively. Evidence also shows that schools can benefit from improved educational outcomes and greater resilience when participating in strong trusts.
Our best trusts have shown that collaboration can drive excellence and innovation across the system. However, we are not setting a timescale for this transition, nor will we compel successful schools to move into trusts.
Asked by: Blake Stephenson (Conservative - Mid Bedfordshire)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment she has made of the risk that delays to landfill gas transitional support leading to increased waste crime, site abandonment or breaches of environmental permit conditions.
Answered by Emma Hardy - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Defra is working closely with the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ) to bring forward potential proposals to support the transition of the landfill gas to energy generation sector, after support ends for the Renewable Obligations scheme. Defra remains committed to the development of long-term solutions for landfill gas capture, which are environmentally and economically sustainable.
Asked by: Blake Stephenson (Conservative - Mid Bedfordshire)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what action she is taking to increase capacity on Thameslink services.
Answered by Keir Mather - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
All train operators, including the operator of Thameslink services, are required to plan services and timetables to meet current and future passenger demand while providing value for money. The operator’s long-term demand modelling considers growth arising from the proposed Universal Studios development in Bedfordshire, Luton Airport expansion and planned housing. It is working with Network Rail and local partners to develop business cases for the timetable, rolling stock and infrastructure improvements required to increase capacity. Great British Railways’ directing-mind function will also support the coherent development of future services and timetables across the network.
Asked by: Blake Stephenson (Conservative - Mid Bedfordshire)
Question to the Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade, whether the Government is taking steps to protect retail shareholders in circumstances where a majority shareholder uses its blocking stake to prevent minority shareholders from accepting a higher competing takeover offer.
Answered by Kate Dearden - Minister of State (Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade)
There are protections in Part 30 of the Companies Act 2006 that allow a shareholder to apply to the court for a remedy if the company’s action (or inaction) is unfairly prejudicial to the interests of that member, or a larger set of shareholders that includes them. The Government is committed to implementing legislation over the course of this Parliament to improve how retail shareholders can exercise their rights through intermediaries, in line with the recommendations of the Dematerialisation Market Action Taskforce (DEMAT), chaired by Mark Austin CBE.