Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how many and what proportion of civil servants in his Department were on permanent home working contracts in 2025.
Answered by Calvin Bailey - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Defence) (Minister for Veterans and People)
As at 31 December 2025, 203 Ministry of Defence individuals within the core workforce had their work location listed as either 'tasked from home' or 'home-based' on MyHR, the Civilian HR management computer system, indicating that they had a home-based contract. This represented 0.41% of a total core workforce of 50,026.
Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how much his Department spent on activities relating to Pride Month 2026.
Answered by Calvin Bailey - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Defence) (Minister for Veterans and People)
The information is not held centrally and could be provided only at disproportionate cost.
Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, whether his Department monitors the amount of food waste generated by its offices each month.
Answered by Luke Pollard - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence)
Information relating to the amount of food waste generated by Ministry of Defence offices each month is not held centrally.
Waste, including food waste is tracked across large parts of the Defence Estate through established waste management and sustainability reporting systems. Data on food waste is gathered from facilities management and catering providers to support broader environmental reporting and the Greening Government Commitments.
Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, other than special advisers if his Department has appointed anyone from outside the civil service since July 2024.
Answered by Calvin Bailey - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Defence) (Minister for Veterans and People)
Since July 2024, the Ministry of Defence has made 178 Public Appointments and 61 Direct Ministerial Appointments. These figures represent appointments made during the period and includes individuals whose appointments have subsequently ended following the expiry of their term, resignation or other departure from office.
Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what the cost was to the public purse of upgrading Britain's air defence radar network due to interference from offshore wind farms.
Answered by Luke Pollard - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence)
The Government has signed a £95 million contract with BAE Systems to deliver technologically advanced radar that secures the coexistence of air defence and offshore wind, enabling the government to protect both national and energy security, while promoting good jobs and growth across the country.
The Ministry of Defence has agreed to fund this contract, with financial support from the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero. Funding was allocated at the Spending Review 2025 and has not been diverted from wider RAF or Air Defence budgets.
Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, whether his Department uses numerical reasoning tests as part of the recruitment process for its graduate recruitment scheme.
Answered by Calvin Bailey - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Defence) (Minister for Veterans and People)
The Ministry of Defence employs a range of assessment methods across its recruitment programmes, including numerical reasoning as part of the recruitment process for the Defence Commercial Graduate Programme.
Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how many political appointees have been made by his Department since July 2024.
Answered by Calvin Bailey - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Defence) (Minister for Veterans and People)
We have taken 'political appointees' to mean special advisers. A list of special advisers by department is published each year in the Annual Report on Special Advisers which is laid in parliament. The Annual Report on Special Advisers 2026 will be published in due course.
Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what progress his Department has made on the review into medical records of nuclear test veterans.
Answered by Calvin Bailey - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Defence) (Minister for Veterans and People)
I refer the hon. Member to the answer my predecessor gave on 28 April 2026. The records exercise is nearing completion, and I shall update the House in due course.
In parallel, as part of wider work, the number of historic nuclear testing records that are now publicly accessible having been transferred to the National Archives from the Merlin database is over 28,000.
Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, whether his Department has hired external public relations consultants since July 2024.
Answered by Calvin Bailey - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Defence) (Minister for Veterans and People)
The Ministry of Defence has not directly hired external public relations (PR) consultants since July 2024. Any PR guidance is obtained through third-party arrangements with external agencies, following appropriate procurement rules.
Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, whether his Department permits (a) Ministers, (b) special advisers and (c) officials to use (i) Chat GPT, (ii) Google Gemini, (iii) Claude, (iv) Deepseek and (v) Grok as part of their official duties.
Answered by Luke Pollard - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence)
The Ministry of Defence provides Ministers, special advisers and officials with access to secure, enterprise‑grade generative AI tools that have been assured to the appropriate security standards and approved for official use.