Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, what assessment her Department has made of the potential merits of the United Kingdom joining the Partnership for a Lead-Free Future; and whether she plans to do so.

Answered by Chris Elmore - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)

The UK keeps opportunities to engage with relevant international initiatives under review, including where they align with our development, health and environmental objectives. No formal assessment has yet been made of the merits of UK membership of the Partnership for a Lead-Free Future, but we will confirm any decision to participate in the usual way in due course.

Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:

To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, what steps she is taking to (a) improve rural digital inclusion and (b) to address the specific needs of older people.

Answered by Kanishka Narayan - Minister of State (Cabinet Office) (Jointly with the Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Technology)

The Government’s ambition is simple: everyone, whatever their circumstances, should be able to get connected and get online, safely and with confidence.

In the year since the Digital Inclusion Action Plan, over a million people have been supported to get online, more than 22,000 people have received a free device, and communities across the UK have benefited from the £11.9 million Digital Inclusion Innovation Fund. This includes the Rural Media Charity, engaging rural West Midlands communities and supporting older people to benefit from being online, and Age UK’s Digital Champion Programme providing digital skills and devices across England.

Government remains committed to our target to deliver gigabit broadband coverage to 99% of UK premises by 2032.

Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what recent progress he has made in reforming the Child Maintenance Service.

Answered by Andrew Western - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)

This Government has committed to a series of reforms to the Child Maintenance Service (CMS).

These include the intention to remove Direct Pay and move to a single, enhanced Collect and Pay system. This will enable the CMS to monitor all payments, identify non-compliance more quickly and take faster enforcement action. It is estimated that these changes could lift around 20,000 children out of poverty on the relative low-income after housing costs measure. This requires legislation; we will pass such legislation and implement this reform when Parliamentary time allows.

To improve arrears collection, the Government will introduce administrative liability orders to replace the current court-based process, streamlining enforcement and reducing delays. The new process is expected to reduce the time taken to secure a liability order in most cases and allow the CMS to take enforcement action more quickly against parents who do not meet their responsibilities. Work with His Majesty's Courts and Tribunals Service and the Scottish Government is ongoing, and the necessary regulations will be brought forward as soon as possible.

The Department has also recently completed a review of the child maintenance calculation. Following the review, we plan to reduce the income tolerance from 25 per cent to 15 per cent, so that changes in income are reflected more quickly in maintenance calculations. We also plan to include unearned income within the standard calculation, helping to ensure liabilities more accurately reflect a parent’s financial circumstances and that more money reaches children. Similarly, these changes are dependent upon legislation and we are exploring different options in order to pass these reforms in Parliament and implement when possible.

These legislative changes are running alongside ongoing CMS modernisation which are enhancing online services, delivering improved case handling and customer communications across multiple channels.

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Local Housing Allowance rates

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