Asked by: Jim Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party - Strangford)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, what recent steps he has taken to protect critical national infrastructure from cyber threats.
Answered by Angela Eagle - Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
The Government is working tirelessly to improve the cyber resilience of our most critical services and systems, including the UK’s Critical National Infrastructure (CNI).
The Cyber Security and Resilience (Network and Information Systems) Bill, currently going through Parliament, will strengthen the UK’s cyber defences to tackle the evolving cyber threats we face. The Bill will protect more essential and digital services from cyber attacks, enable cyber regulators to be more effective, and provide the Government with the flexibility to respond to new threats in the cyber landscape.
In addition, the new Cyber Resilience Index, currently under development, will allow us to monitor progress of interventions against cyber resilience across the CNI landscape, ensuring that they keep pace with the evolving threat.
Asked by: Jim Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party - Strangford)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, what recent steps he has taken with Cabinet colleagues to improve citizen access to public services.
Answered by Satvir Kaur - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
The Government is committed to the effective delivery of public services, including ensuring that services are easy for citizens to access. The Prime Minister has established a Public Services Committee, chaired by the Chief Secretary to the Prime Minister. The Committee is considering all matters related to improving the population’s experience of public services, and their ability to access services.
Asked by: Jim Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party - Strangford)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, what recent assessment he has made of the effectiveness of freedom of information processes across government departments.
Answered by Chris Ward
Government Departments are individual public authorities in their own right under the Freedom of Information Act 2000. It is the responsibility of each department to ensure that their processes enable them to comply with the legislation.
Asked by: Jim Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party - Strangford)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, what steps he has taken to ensure continuity of government operations during extreme events such as flooding and cyberattacks.
Answered by Angela Eagle - Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
As part of prudent resilience planning the COBR Directorate has a number of operational arrangements in place for the continuity of crisis management against a range of national security incidents. These plans include response to severe weather and infrastructure denial. These arrangements build on routine departmental business and crisis continuity plans.
Asked by: Jim Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party - Strangford)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, what lessons have been learned from recent public sector responses to health and natural emergencies.
Answered by Angela Eagle - Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
Recent responses to outbreaks of meningitis B and hantavirus have shown the importance of rapid convening of departments and Devolved Governments to offer government support, and provide coordination to the response. Bringing together the right individuals facilitated the repatriation of high-risk hantavirus contacts from UK Overseas Territories, safeguarding vulnerable populations and protecting healthcare systems.
The Cabinet Office is the lead government department for severe weather. This role involves managing current seasonal incidents while proactively preparing for the upcoming season. Ongoing preparations include updating cross-government plans with lessons learned, leading horizon scanning meetings with the Severe Weather Resilience Network, and conducting cross-government exercises.
The Cabinet Office is conducting a rapid lessons learned review with the Severe Weather Resilience Network regarding last week’s heatwave to ensure key lessons are implemented ahead of any further extreme weather this summer.
Asked by: Jim Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party - Strangford)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, what steps he is taking to increase transparency in Government decision-making.
Answered by Nick Thomas-Symonds
The Government publishes details of ministers’ meetings with external individuals and organisations on a quarterly basis.
Following the Prime Minister’s correspondence dated 11 March 2026, the Ethics and Integrity Commission is undertaking a review into lobbying, disclosure, and access to government.
On receipt of the EIC's report, the Government will look carefully at any recommendations to improve transparency in these areas.
Asked by: Jim Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party - Strangford)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, what recent initiatives have been undertaken to improve inter-departmental coordination on national security matters.
Answered by Angela Eagle - Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
National security policy is decided by the National Security Council, and is supported at official level by the National Security Council (Officials) – both of which are attended by a range of departments depending on the subject.
The National Security Secretariat in the Cabinet Office coordinates national security across Government, and with agencies. The Secretariat implements the National Security Strategy, and has developed an internal implementation approach to ensure accountability and delivery.
Asked by: Jim Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party - Strangford)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, what assessment he has made of the adequacy of preparedness for national emergencies.
Answered by Angela Eagle - Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
As set out in the UK Government Resilience Action Plan, the Cabinet Office provides scrutiny of response capabilities across the UK government through National Capabilities Assessments which take place every 2-3 years.
These are supplemented by regular check-ins and assessments of risk plans by the Cabinet Office, informed by the near-term risk profile.
Asked by: Jim Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party - Strangford)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, how many government contracts were published in full during the last financial year.
Answered by Chris Ward
Details of Government contracts awarded during the last financial year (2025/26) are published on the Find a Tender service central digital platform which is available at https://www.find-tender.service.gov.uk/Search. Under the requirements of the Procurement Act 2023, the whole contract should be published when the procurement is valued over £5m.
Asked by: Jim Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party - Strangford)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, what assessment he has made of the effectiveness of the implementation of the Government Functional Standard for procurement.
Answered by Chris Ward
The effectiveness and implementation of the Government Functional Standard for Commercial (GovS 008) is assessed through the Commercial Continuous Improvement Assessment Framework (CCIAF). The CCIAF provides a structured framework that allows government departments and wider public-sector organisations to self-assess their commercial practices against the standard and benchmark their performance against their peers.
Since the current version of the GovS 008 and CCIAF launched in May 2022, a total of 149 contracting authorities across the public sector have enrolled, representing a combined third-party spend in excess of £162 billion.
The Government Commercial Function utilises the assessment detail to drive capability and maturity initiatives across government.