First elected: 12th December 2019
Speeches made during Parliamentary debates are recorded in Hansard. For ease of browsing we have grouped debates into individual, departmental and legislative categories.
e-Petitions are administered by Parliament and allow members of the public to express support for a particular issue.
If an e-petition reaches 10,000 signatures the Government will issue a written response.
If an e-petition reaches 100,000 signatures the petition becomes eligible for a Parliamentary debate (usually Monday 4.30pm in Westminster Hall).
These initiatives were driven by James Wild, and are more likely to reflect personal policy preferences.
MPs who are act as Ministers or Shadow Ministers are generally restricted from performing Commons initiatives other than Urgent Questions.
James Wild has not been granted any Urgent Questions
James Wild has not been granted any Adjournment Debates
James Wild has not introduced any legislation before Parliament
Road Traffic (Testing of Blood) Bill 2023-24
Sponsor - Jonathan Gullis (Con)
This Government is steadfast in its dedication to protecting women and fostering a society in which they feel respected and empowered. We will uphold the Equality Act and its framework to protect single-sex spaces for women, and ensure that service providers understand how to lawfully protect such spaces.
We will also treat violence against women and girls as a national emergency and have committed to halving the instances of this in a decade. This Government believes that women and girls should feel safe and protected wherever they go whether that be at home, on the street or at work.
The Equality Act 2010 protects people from discrimination based on the protected characteristics of 'sex' and ‘gender reassignment’. The Government is committed to upholding this important legislation. The Public Sector Equality Duty requires public bodies, in carrying out their functions, to have due regard to the need to achieve the objectives set out under section 149 of the Equality Act 2010. These are to: eliminate discrimination, harassment, victimisation and any other conduct that is prohibited by or under the Act; advance equal opportunities between people who have a protected characteristic and those who do not; and foster good relations between people who have a protected characteristic and those who do not.
Paragraph 7.16 of the Ministerial Code (3.17 of the Ministerial Code updated on 6 November 2024) obliges Ministers involved in legal proceedings in a personal capacity to consult the Law Officers in good time and before legal proceedings are initiated.
The Law Officers do not disclose whether ministers have consulted them on legal proceedings in a personal capacity.
This is due to the long-standing convention, observed by successive Governments, that the fact of, and substance of advice from, the Law Officers of the Crown is not disclosed outside government. The purpose of this convention is to enable the Government to obtain frank and full legal advice in confidence. This is set out in paragraph 21.27 of Erskine May, is known as the Law Officers’ Convention, and it applies to your question.
Air Passenger Duty (APD) is payable for travel undertaken on aircraft that are on the civilian register – it is not payable for aircraft on the military register.
It is therefore payable for all ministerial travel undertaken on the RAF Envoy as that is currently on the civilian register.
The British Business Bank’s recently published Impact Report shows that in 2023 alone the Bank funded 23,100 businesses. Data on the number of businesses supported by the Bank since its inception in 2014 is intended to be published in 2025.
Investment is at the heart of the government’s growth mission, increasing the number of good, well-skilled jobs and improving productivity across the country. The Department for Business and Trade works with all investor-facing business units to deliver support for the highest-value, highest-impact FDI projects into the UK. DBT officials work on a daily basis with businesses of all sizes to ensure a close partnership between government and business, and to showcase the multitude of investment opportunities the UK has to offer.
The Industrial Strategy Green Paper (published 14 October) sets out a credible, 10-year plan to deliver the certainty and stability businesses need to invest in UK.
The government also hosted an international investment summit in October 2024 where nearly 38,000 jobs across the country were announced alongside a record-breaking £63 billion of investment.
Investment is at the heart of the government’s growth mission, increasing the number of good, well-skilled jobs and improving productivity across the country. The Department for Business and Trade works with all investor-facing business units to deliver support for the highest-value, highest-impact FDI projects into the UK. DBT officials work on a daily basis with businesses of all sizes to ensure a close partnership between government and business, and to showcase the multitude of investment opportunities the UK has to offer.
The Industrial Strategy Green Paper (published 14 October) sets out a credible, 10-year plan to deliver the certainty and stability businesses need to invest in UK.
The government also hosted an international investment summit in October 2024 where nearly 38,000 jobs across the country were announced alongside a record-breaking £63 billion of investment.
In September, the Government announced that it would establish an HSS appeals process to provide individuals with a chance to have their claims reassessed through a DBT-run process. We are working with representative groups and the Horizon Compensation Advisory Board to make sure that that the process is fit for purpose and that claims can be assessed and resolved quickly. We will announce further details as soon as we can.
It is essential that we identify areas where the costs of regulations may be unnecessarily high and burdensome for businesses. Best practice analysis of regulatory interventions and reforms, as well as monitoring and evaluating the success of interventions will help us understand these issues further. The Department for Business and Trade is in the process of developing an ambitious regulatory reform agenda to ensure that any future regulation or regulatory reform will work for businesses and consumers, and aids economic growth. Our proposals will be set out in due course.
The Industrial Energy Transformation Fund (IETF) Phase 3 spring 2024 window (3.1) is currently awaiting outcomes from the autumn fiscal event before decisions on applications can be made.
Our mission is for clean power by 2030 because this is the best way to achieve energy independence and protect billpayers. New, clean renewable energy will reduce our exposure to volatile fossil fuel markets. As part of the Review of Electricity Market Arrangements (REMA) programme, the Government is considering what further steps can be taken to shield consumers from the impacts of potential price spikes and to ensure they benefit from lower cost renewable energy.
The Government is committed to supporting Life Sciences manufacturing to deliver an NHS fit for the future and stimulate economic growth across the UK. It has invested over £405 million to secure vaccine manufacturing through the Vaccine Taskforce and is providing up to £118 million in capital grants to boost UK manufacturing investment.
DSIT is discussing plans to support investment in the sector with the Treasury. The £520 million funding announced in the Autumn Statement for Life Sciences manufacturing is part of these discussions.
The Government is committed to supporting Life Sciences manufacturing to deliver an NHS fit for the future and stimulate economic growth across the UK. It has invested over £405 million to secure vaccine manufacturing through the Vaccine Taskforce and is providing up to £118 million in capital grants to boost UK manufacturing investment.
DSIT is discussing plans to support investment in the sector with the Treasury. The £520 million funding announced in the Autumn Statement for Life Sciences manufacturing is part of these discussions.
Updated guidance was published on the Listed Places of Worship Grant Scheme website on 19 March 2025.
This Government, and the previous one, has engaged extensively with a wide range of stakeholders as the policy set out in the Football Governance Bill has developed over the last 3 years. This includes engagement with UEFA and FIFA. These discussions have been constructive, and we continue to speak to the relevant football authorities on a regular basis.
The Government does not share private correspondence provided to us by stakeholders including international organisations.
Information held on the average values of fines for parents who had failed to secure their child’s attendance at school will be held by local authorities.
The amount payable was £60 if paid within 21 days of receipt, rising to £120 if paid between 22 and 28 days. From August 2024, the fine for school absences increased to £80 if paid within 21 days or £160 if paid within 28 days. In the case of repeated fines, if a parent receives a second fine for the same child within any three-year period, this will be charged at the higher rate of £160.
Tackling absence is at the heart of the government’s mission to break down the barriers to opportunity. If children are not in school, it does not matter how effective or well-supported teaching and learning is, they will not benefit. Thanks to the hard work of the sector there has been progress, but we remain a long way off pre-pandemic levels.
The department’s statutory attendance guidance, ‘Working together to improve school attendance’, promotes a support-first model. The guidance is clear that all partners should always work together to understand and remove the barriers to attendance. However, where that support is not successful, not appropriate (for example for term-time holidays), or not engaged with, the law protects pupils’ right to an education. The guidance outlines a role for legal intervention based on effective practice within the sector.
The vast majority of penalty notices are issued due to unauthorised family holidays. However, usage has been uneven across the country, with 26 out of 153 local authorities accounting for half of all penalty notices issued in 2023/2024. The new National Framework for Penalty Notices, introduced in August 2024, is designed to create consistency in that area by establishing a common threshold at which a penalty notice must be considered. In a public consultation in 2022, 71% of local authority employees and 59% of school and academy trust employees and governors or trustees strongly or somewhat agreed with the proposed national thresholds which were subsequently adopted within the framework.
The statistical release on parental responsibility measures, which includes information on the number of penalty notices issued for unauthorised absence, can be found here: https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/find-statistics/parental-responsibility-measures.
The investigation remains ongoing and all reasonable lines of inquiry will be pursued.
The Office for Budget Responsibility had forecast that local authorities would spend £1.4 billion more than the funding they would receive on high needs in the 2025/26 financial year. This was on the assumption that high needs funding would increase only by the gross domestic product (GDP) deflator. In fact, overall high needs funding increased by £1 billion, and given this higher level of funding, HM Treasury have recorded in their tables that this creates a corresponding £865 million reduction in expected local government spending on high needs (that is, in the level of local government spending over the funding they will receive).
This government’s ambition is that all children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) or in alternative provision receive the right support to succeed in their education and as they move into adult life.
The department is providing the almost £1 billion increase in high needs funding to help meet the rise in costs faced by local authorities next year, as they in turn provide support to schools and children with SEND.
Local authorities’ responsibility to provide the required support remains unchanged. No part of the additional funding that is being provided has been ear-marked for use by local authorities to reduce existing dedicated schools grant deficits.
I refer the hon. Member for North West Norfolk to the answer of 29 October 2024 to Question 11051.
The government wants to ensure children thrive in education, whatever type of school they are in, including free schools. Capacity varies from place to place, so the department will continue to open new schools where they are needed.
Departmental officials are working with local authorities, academy trusts and other partners to take work forward on the review of mainstream free school projects over the autumn and have written to them, setting out next steps in relation to individual projects. The department will publicly communicate the outcomes of the review in due course.
The government wants to ensure children thrive in education, whatever type of school they are in, including free schools. Capacity varies from place to place, so the department will continue to open new schools where they are needed.
Departmental officials are working with local authorities, academy trusts and other partners to take work forward on the review of mainstream free school projects over the autumn and have written to them, setting out next steps in relation to individual projects. The department will publicly communicate the outcomes of the review in due course.
Local authorities have existing statutory responsibilities to collaborate with local partners in the strategic planning and commissioning of the local offer provision for children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND).
The department has been testing the implementation of SEND and alternative provision (AP) partnerships through the SEND and AP Change Programme. We are reviewing the evidence gathered and will continue to explore options to strengthen partnerships as part of SEND and AP reforms.
The government’s ambition is that all children and young people receive the right support to succeed in their education and as they move into adult life.
The department is committed to improving inclusivity and expertise in mainstream schools, as well as ensuring special schools cater to those with the most complex needs, restoring parents’ trust that their child will get the support they need. Whilst the department recognises the urgency and need to drive improvements, we are conscious that there are no quick fixes and want to take a considered approach to deliver sustainable education reform, including in relation to the introduction of nation standards for speech and language services.
Supporting children’s early language development is one of the department’s key priorities. The department is funding continued support for the 11,100 schools registered for the Nuffield Early Language Intervention programme during the 2024/25 academic year. In partnership with NHS England, the department is funding the Early Language and Support For Every Child (ELSEC) to trial new ways of working to earlier identify and support children with Speech, Language and Communication Needs (SLCN) in early years and primary schools, utilising therapy support assistants.
In further partnership with NHS England and the Department for Health and Social Care, this department is funding the Partnerships for Inclusion of Neurodiversity in Schools (PINS) programme. PINS will build teacher and staff capacity to identify and meet the needs of neurodiverse children, including those with SLCN, through whole school interventions.
Finally, the department is funding evidence reviews from Newcastle University and University College London to highlight what the best available evidence suggests are the most effective tools and approaches to identify and support children and young people, age 0 to 25, with different types of needs including SLCN.
As my right hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Education outlined in her response of 9 September, decisions relating to the conditions of registration and requirements of higher education (HE) providers in England are a matter for the Office for Students (OfS) as the independent regulator.
In order to meet the regulatory requirements of the OfS, English HE providers must uphold applicable public interest governance principles. These include principles on free speech, academic freedom and accountability, such as operating openly and with integrity. As such providers are responsible for ensuring they have adequate governance and risk management procedures in place, including on the acceptance of donations.
The OfS has informed the department that it is engaging with relevant parties as appropriate to understand the issues that have been raised regarding the operation of Peking University HSBC Business School UK Campus (PKBS-UK). PKBS-UK is a registered HE provider in the ‘approved’ category, which means the provider is not eligible for certain grants including eligibility for OfS teaching grant funding or any other OfS payments under sections 39 or 40 of the Higher Education and Research Act (HERA).
As outlined in its regulatory framework, if the OfS identifies a breach of a specific or general ongoing condition of registration as part of its enquiries, then it will consider the use of formal sanctions, which may include monetary penalties, suspension from the register or deregistration.
This government has committed to an audit of the UK’s relationship with China to improve its ability to understand and respond to the challenges and opportunities it poses. This will guide a consistent and coherent approach to relations with China rooted in UK and global interests.
For the 2024/25 financial year, the department has an allocated budget of £2.4 million for the Childcare Choices campaign. This includes promotion of the expanded childcare working entitlements for nine month olds, as well as the existing offers for two, three and four year olds. Final spending will be confirmed.
For the 2023/24 financial year, the department had an allocated budget of £1.4 million for the Childcare Choices campaign. This included promotion of the expanded childcare working entitlements for two year olds as well as the existing offers for three and four year olds.
For the 2024/25 financial year, the department has an allocated budget of £2.4 million for the Childcare Choices campaign. This includes promotion of the expanded childcare working entitlements for nine month olds, as well as the existing offers for two, three and four year olds. Final spending will be confirmed.
For the 2023/24 financial year, the department had an allocated budget of £1.4 million for the Childcare Choices campaign. This included promotion of the expanded childcare working entitlements for two year olds as well as the existing offers for three and four year olds.
High quality early education and childcare is a crucial opportunity to transform life chances.
In the coming months, the government will be setting out plans to deliver new places in 3,000 nurseries through upgrading space in primary schools. This will include both school-run nurseries and schools partnering with private, voluntary and independent providers.
The department is working closely with schools, local authorities and providers to understand what is needed to deliver this, and to ensure provision meets the needs of families and schools and is opened in the right places.
The department knows that to deliver the expanded early years entitlements, the sector will need additional staff. In total, the department estimated that compared to 2023, the new entitlements will create an increased need for workers in the region of 9,000 in September 2024.
In 2023, the number of staff increased by 12,900 (4%), from 334,400 in 2022, to 347,300 in 2023. This was before the department introduced interventions to support the growth of the workforce.
Ensuring that parents are able to access affordable and high quality childcare is a top priority. The department’s focus in reforming the system will be to ensure that there are greater and more equal opportunities to access early education for every family, and that there are greater opportunities for children to thrive and develop. As an initial step, the department is working to deliver new places in 3,000 nurseries through upgrading space in primary schools. This will help deliver the expansion in childcare entitlements and ensure that a variety of different types of provision are available that suit the needs of different parents.
Based on assumptions around take-up, likely hours used and whether children are new or existing users of childcare, there is estimated to be demand of an additional 15,000 places for September 2024.
Thousands of children, aged from nine months, will get government-funded childcare for the first time, allowing them to access 15 hours a week, over 38 weeks a year, of high quality, accessible childcare.
Further information on the underpinning assumptions behind these estimates was published in the 2023 Spring Budget Policy costing information note: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/66221ba8252f0d71cf757d2b/Spring_budget_2023_childcare_expansion_costing_note_information.pdf.
The department will continue to monitor the sufficiency of childcare provision through regular conversations with local authorities.
Ensuring that parents are able to access affordable and high quality childcare is a top priority. The department’s focus in reforming the system will be to ensure that there are greater and more equal opportunities to access early education for every family, and that there are greater opportunities for children to thrive and develop. As an initial step, the department is working to deliver new places in 3,000 nurseries through upgrading space in primary schools. This will help deliver the expansion in childcare entitlements and ensure that a variety of different types of provision are available that suit the needs of different parents.
Based on assumptions around take-up, likely hours used and whether children are new or existing users of childcare, there is estimated to be demand of an additional 15,000 places for September 2024.
Thousands of children, aged from nine months, will get government-funded childcare for the first time, allowing them to access 15 hours a week, over 38 weeks a year, of high quality, accessible childcare.
Further information on the underpinning assumptions behind these estimates was published in the 2023 Spring Budget Policy costing information note: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/66221ba8252f0d71cf757d2b/Spring_budget_2023_childcare_expansion_costing_note_information.pdf.
The department will continue to monitor the sufficiency of childcare provision through regular conversations with local authorities.
Expanding access to affordable and high quality childcare is key to breaking down barriers to opportunity and is one of the driving missions of this government.
From 2 September 2024, hundreds of thousands of eligible working parents of children from nine months old have begun to access 15 hours of government-funded early education per week.
The department is looking ahead to delivering the expansion to 30 funded hours from next September. Eligible working parents of children aged nine months and above will be able to access 30 hours (over 38 weeks a year) from the term following their child turning nine months to when they start school.
The department is already taking action to help deliver the additional places needed for the next phase and to deliver the remainder of the promised 3,000 school-based nurseries from 2026 onwards, with a greater focus on more disadvantaged families.
Since 2 September 2024, eligible working parents of children from nine months old can access 15 hours of government-funded early education per week.
Take up from parents is roughly in line with the position at this point in time prior to the April phase of the rollout for eligible working parents of two year olds. Internal figures show a similar trajectory, with over 200,000 entitlement codes validated by providers, meaning parents have secured a place. Thanks to the hard work of local authorities and childcare providers, the department is confident delivery is on track.
The department has not published figures yet because it normally takes a few weeks for local authorities and providers to have validated codes following the 31 August application deadline. The department will be publishing data on codes issued and codes validated for September 2024 in due course.
Delivery of the Behaviour Hubs will run until the end of March 2025.
Funding beyond the end of March 2025 is subject to the forthcoming Spending Review.
The government is committed to making quick progress on delivering breakfast clubs in every primary school. Breakfast clubs will remove barriers to opportunity, by providing a supportive start to the day, ensuring every child, no matter their circumstances, is well prepared for school and ready to achieve.
The department has already taken decisive action by announcing in the King’s Speech that, under the Children’s Wellbeing Bill, every primary school in England will offer a free breakfast club. Legislating for breakfast club provision will give schools the certainty they need to plan for the future. Before the legislation comes into force, the department will work with the sector to make sure the right support, including funding, is in place.
The government is committed to making quick progress on delivering breakfast clubs in every primary school. Breakfast clubs will remove barriers to opportunity, by providing a supportive start to the day, ensuring every child, no matter their circumstances, is well prepared for school and ready to achieve.
The department has already taken decisive action by announcing in the King’s Speech that, under the Children’s Wellbeing Bill, every primary school in England will offer a free breakfast club. Legislating for breakfast club provision will give schools the certainty they need to plan for the future. Before the legislation comes into force, the department will work with the sector to make sure the right support, including funding, is in place.
Maintained schools in England are legally required to follow the National Curriculum up to age 16, but academies, including free schools, are not. The department does not hold data on the proportion of academies currently following the National Curriculum, but knows that many choose to teach it.
As part of the legislative programme announced in the King’s Speech, the department intends to legislate to require academies to teach the National Curriculum, once changes are made following the Curriculum and Assessment Review. This will give parents certainty over their children’s education, and it will give academies time to prepare. The department will discuss with the sector the practicalities of implementing this change.
The review will recommend a core curriculum that is designed to empower, not restrict, academies and other schools. It will support the innovation and professionalism of teachers, whether in academies or maintained schools, and will enable them to adapt how they teach the curriculum to their students’ lives and life experiences.
In October 2024, the Government published an updated assessment of the impact of introducing the pEPR scheme on packaging producers as a whole. This impact assessment did not split the assessment by sector.
The Government has worked closely with industry, including the brewing sector, throughout development of Extended Producer Responsibility for Packaging (pEPR). Feedback from stakeholders was factored into finalising the regulations, including formally consulting stakeholders on a draft of the pEPR regulations in 2023.
pEPR obligates brands and packaging producers to pay the costs of managing household packaging waste. In most cases, this will not be individual pubs but the business supplying the pub with packaged goods.
My officials have recently attended a number of events organised by the brewing industry, to discuss pEPR and to listen and respond to concerns raised by their members. We have provided extensive guidance to all sectors on how to comply with their obligations under pEPR and continue to work with the brewing sector and others to further refine both the guidance and the wider scheme.
Defra is currently considering measures to restrict per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) in a wide range of industrial and consumer uses under UK REACH. The scope of restriction proposals will be informed by engagement with a wide range of stakeholders, as well as by technical considerations, health and safety factors and the practical feasibility and requirements of adopting non-PFAS alternatives.
Defra is in the process of reviewing the F-gas Regulation, which includes an exemption from the hydrofluorocarbon (HFC) phasedown for metered dose inhalers (MDIs). The review will consider the implementation of the current F-gas Regulation and options for future policy development.
To support this work there is ongoing engagement between Defra, NHS, DHSC and other stakeholders, including the pharmaceutical industry and patient representatives. Through this engagement, Defra will ensure future policy development takes account of the technical considerations and the practical requirements of the key stakeholders in this sector.
HS2 Ltd publish details of their main civil works contracts, and multiple other contractors, on their Contract Opportunities Table (https://www.hs2.org.uk/supply-chain/direct-contract-opportunities/); this table can be found on the supply chain section of the HS2 website. In addition to this, HS2 Ltd publish details of subcontracts, for which there are likely to be onward opportunities in the supply chain, through their Indirect Opportunities Table (https://www.hs2.org.uk/supply-chain/indirect-contract-opportunities/).
I thank the Honorable Member for his continued support for the scheme. Officials are working closely with Norfolk County Council on the outline business case submitted to the Department. When they have completed their assessment, they will put advice to Ministers.
Both the Rail Minister and I are early in our tenure as Transport Ministers. As such, he is yet to speak to Network Rail regarding the Ely Area Capacity Enhancement. However, we do recognise the benefits the scheme could bring for freight and passenger rail services in East Anglia. The Department looks forward to discussing these proposals with Network Rail, and other stakeholders, in the near future.
The DWP will not be extending its appointeeship scheme to include Child Trust Funds. The scheme only applies to Government benefits which help with day-to-day living expenses, as opposed to a capital asset like a Child Trust Fund which matures overtime. Further, applying benefit rules to Child Trust Funds would not provide the protections currently delivered by the Mental Capacity Act and could expose vulnerable people to risk.
The information requested is not held by the Department.
The Office for National Statistics (ONS) plans to link NHS waiting times data to Census, DWP Benefits and HMRC PAYE records to analyse the relationship between waiting time duration (for various health conditions and procedures) and labour market outcomes (such as employment status, gross pay and benefit receipt) in England. This may shed light on the role of extended waiting times witnessed during and after the COVID-19 pandemic on benefit receipt, including sickness related benefit receipt. ONS currently has access to linked Census, DWP Benefits and HMRC PAYE data and is working with NHS England to acquire the waiting times dataset. Due to many dependencies and unknowns, ONS is not able to confirm when the analysis will be available.
No such estimate has been made as the requested information is not available.