Asked by: Nadia Whittome (Labour - Nottingham East)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of the potential merits of making education on antisemitism mandatory in schools.
Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)
There is no place for antisemitism in our society.
The department supports teachers through our Educate Against Hate website, which provides teachers with a range of free, quality-assured resources, including on building resilience to antisemitism, teaching about tolerance and rejecting discrimination.
The department has committed £7 million to fund projects and programmes to improve confidence and resilience in tackling antisemitism in education. My right hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Education has also asked Sir David Bell to undertake an independent review into antisemitism in schools and colleges, which will be published this autumn.
Asked by: Nadia Whittome (Labour - Nottingham East)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, for what reason applications for Indefinite Leave to Remain under the European Community Association Agreement (ECAA) route are subject to delays, including the processing times and backlogs of UK Visas and Immigration; and, with reference to her Department's document entitled Restoring control over the immigration system: white paper, published on 12 May 2025, whether proposed changes to settlement rules will apply to existing ECAA applicants.
Answered by Mike Tapp - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
The volume of applications for Indefinite Leave to Remain under the ECAA route has increased significantly over the last twelve months; with applications received currently 65% above forecasted intake.
Applications are routinely accompanied by exceptionally large volumes of supporting evidence which must be reviewed and considered to ensure lawful and robust outcomes are reached.
To address the delays currently being experienced additional resource has been assigned to this area and the Home Office expect to see increasing output and quicker turnarounds throughout the second half of 2026 as that takes effect.
A public consultation on proposed changes to settlement rules ran for 12 weeks, from 20 November 2025 until 12 February 2026, to gather views on proposed changes. The Home Office are now reviewing and analysing all responses received, which will help inform the development of the final earned settlement model, including consideration of any potential exemptions or transitional measures for those already on a pathway to settlement. Once the final model has been decided, the Government will communicate the outcome publicly. As with all significant policy changes, the proposals will be subject to both economic impact assessments and equality impact assessments.
Asked by: Nadia Whittome (Labour - Nottingham East)
Question to the Department for Business and Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, what assessment he has made the potential impact of the proposed steel trade measure on the adequacy of the range and supply of products that are not currently domestically manufactured; and what steps he is taking to support domestic firms currently reliant on imported steel products or components.
Answered by Chris McDonald - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Energy Security and Net Zero)
The measure has been designed to strike the right balance between securing the future of domestic steelmaking while maintaining secure supply chains for downstream users. The measure only covers steel requirements that can be met in the UK. In some instances, this is not feasible for technical reasons. Where this is the case, quotas have been designed to allow for sufficient imports to ensure these goods continue to be available to UK downstream users without unnecessary additional costs.
The Government has engaged extensively with manufacturers and wider industry to inform the design of the new steel trade measure, including through ongoing discussions and a Call for Evidence in 2025. We will keep the measure under review, including a review after twelve months to ensure it remains effective and fit for purpose.
To ease short term impacts, we will introduce a transitional arrangement under which the new measure would not apply to goods agreed under contract before 14 March 2026 and imported between 1 July and 30 September 2026.
The Steel Strategy aims to create a more competitive landscape for steel production in the UK, to enable companies to use more domestic content and reduce their dependency on imports.