Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, for what reason (a) the number of staff and (b) and staff costs have increased at the Civil Aviation Authority since April 2017.

Answered by Keir Mather - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)

Since 2016, the CAA’s regulatory perimeter has expanded significantly. Following EU Exit, the CAA developed new rulemaking and regulatory oversight functions to replace those delivered by the European Aviation Safety Agency until 2020, including the creation of a UK state of design function. As a result of the Space Industry Act 2018, the CAA became the UK Space Regulator in 2021. At the same time, the CAA has grown to respond to the development of novel aviation technology (including drones, air taxis and future propulsion such as hydrogen), setting regulatory frameworks and standards to enable tomorrow’s aerospace to innovate and grow. The Future of Flight technologies have the potential to contribute up to £103 billion to the UK economy over the next 25 years.

Reflecting its strategic objectives and the government’s priorities, the CAA has created additional capacity in five areas; in economic regulation and consumer enforcement to manage increased ambition and expectations; to fulfil CAA’s expanded remit in relation to airspace modernisation; to deliver new cyber security oversight responsibilities for the aviation sector; and to deliver the CAA’s sustainability roles, including those it took on from the Independent Commission for Civil Aviation Noise; together with increases in back-office areas supporting these teams. All of this has been delivered with a focus on efficiency and efficacy, enabling increased investment in CAA services to its customers.

Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:

To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, with reference to (a) SOPS 1.1. in the Department's 2024/5 Annual Report, a breakdown of the £209,590,000 spent in gross administration costs on capability and (b) Table 1, Annex A: Common Core Tables in the Department's 2020/21 Annual Report, a breakdown of the £118,965,000 spent on Capability in 2019/20, on what basis there is a difference between the two figures.

Answered by Ian Murray - Minister of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)

The 2024-25 outturn for Capability gross administration costs is broken down as below:

*As one of DSIT’s major projects, Matrix programme costs have been presented separately i.e. deducted from other totals above.

2019-20 outturn for the Capability line as shown within the 2020-21 Annual Report and Account was prepared for the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, DSIT’s predecessor department. Since then, multiple Machinery of Government (MoG) changes have taken place, resulting in significant movements of policy responsibilities across government departments, including DSIT, DESNZ, DBT, DCMS and the Cabinet Office.

It should be highlighted that the Matrix programme - representing a material element of 2024-25 expenditure has only come into operation in more recent years. For these reasons, the two financial years are therefore not readily comparable.

Question to the Department for Business and Trade:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, how much annual grant funding was issued by the Aerospace Technology Institute (a) in total, (b) for Zero Carbon Emission Aircraft Technologies, (c) for Ultra Efficient Aircraft Technologies, (d) for Cross-cutting Enabling Technologies and (e) for Non-CO2 Technologies in each financial year since 2021-22.

Answered by Chris McDonald - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Energy Security and Net Zero)

The Aerospace Technology Institute (ATI) Programme is jointly delivered by the Department for Business and Trade (DBT), Innovate UK, and the ATI. The Department does not hold the detailed breakdown requested but can confirm the total value of grants awarded, including those relating to non‑CO₂ technologies (see Table). Information on individual projects funded via the ATI Programme, including award values, project leads and focus areas, is published by Innovate UK (link here). Individual R&T projects may undertake activity that falls across several of the categories requested.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, with reference to his Answers to Questions 109199, 109198, 109197 and 109196, if he will publish the spreadsheet with the information requested in these questions with the number of previous occasions the offender has been convicted as individual categories up to a maximum of six times rather than in groups.

Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip

The information requested is provided in the attached excel tables. These tables include data covering the period 2020 – 2024 on:

- The number of offenders who were convicted of a specified offence but did not receive an immediate custodial sentence, by the number of previous convictions for that specified offence up to a maximum of 6.

As set out in response to questions 109196-109199, this data is not regularly published or held in an easily accessible format. The information supplied has been sourced from a bespoke retrieval from the Police National Computer database.

Previous convictions are already a statutory aggravating factor, with Sentencing Guidelines being clear that sentencers must consider the nature and relevance of previous convictions, and the time elapsed since the previous convictions.

Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:

To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, with reference to SOPS 1.1 in the Department's 2024-25 Annual Report, if she will publish a breakdown of the £209,590,000 in gross spend on D) Capability in 2024-25; and for what reasons that figure has increased from the equivalent of £118,965,000 in 2019-20 in the equivalent Common Core table of the 2023-4 Annual Report.

Answered by Ian Murray - Minister of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)

The 2024-25 outturn for Capability gross administration costs is broken down as below:

*As one of DSIT’s major projects, Matrix programme costs have been presented separately i.e. deducted from other totals above.

To note that DSIT was established in February 2023, whereas the reported 2019-20 value is an assumptions‑based apportionment for a department that did not exist at the time; as such the two figures are not directly comparable.

Since the establishment of DSIT, there have been further several structural and operational changes including a further Machinery of Government change during 2024-25, which transferred Government Digital Service (GDS) policy responsibilities from the Cabinet Office to DSIT, increasing the size and scope of the department. New policy areas and programmes have also been established in this period, including the Matrix programme. Collectively, these factors, along with inflationary increases, have contributed to the higher costs recorded within the DSIT Capability line.

Question to the Department for Energy Security & Net Zero:

To ask the Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero, pursuant to his Answers of 26 January and 4 February 2026 to Questions 106583 and 109831 on Energy Supply: Expenditure, if he will publish (a) monthly data collected during the year from departmental management accounts that were incorporated into the OSCAR database for the financial year 2024-5 and (b) adjustments made at year-end 2024-5 to align final outturn with the published annual report and accounts in spending areas associated with sources of reliable energy.

Answered by Michael Shanks - Minister of State (Department for Energy Security and Net Zero)

The final monthly data collected during the year is already published in the OSCAR annual release dataset with the TYPE_LONG_NAME of “IN-YEAR RETURN” and the adjustments to align final outturn with the published annual report and accounts is shown against “FINAL OUTTURN”.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, in the last 12 months, how many individuals convicted of (a) a violent offence and (b) homicide had a recorded history of detention under the Mental Health Act 1983.

Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip

The Ministry of Justice does not hold the information requested. While the Ministry of Justice holds data on convictions, our data relating to the Mental Health Act 1983 covers only individuals detained as restricted [Criminal Justice] patients and does not capture any prior detention under the Act.

NHS England is responsible for information relating to detentions under the Mental Health Act 1983. Any relevant information is therefore held separately by different Departments and is not linked.

As a result, we are unable to provide a breakdown of individuals convicted of violent offences or homicide who have a prior history of Mental Health Act detention.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many people who were a) convicted for theft and b) did not receive an immediate custodial sentence were foreign nationals, by year of conviction.

Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip

The Ministry of Justice publishes data on convictions and sentences for a wide range of offences, including theft in the Outcomes by Offences data tool, that can be downloaded from the Criminal Justice Statistics landing page here: Criminal justice statistics - GOV.UK

However, data held centrally does not include if the defendant is a foreign national. This information may be held in the court records but to examine individual court records would be of disproportionate costs.

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what information his Department holds on the number of homicide incidents in each of the last 12 months which involved a suspect who had been a patient of an NHS mental health trust within the preceding six months.

Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

The Department of Health and Social Care has indicated that it will not be possible to answer this question within the usual time period. An answer is being prepared and will be provided as soon as it is available.

Question to the Department for Business and Trade:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, with reference to his answer to of 28 January 2026 to Question 107135, if he will publish a breakdown of the £313m in CDEL outturn for 2024/5 in the category of "Current grants to persons and non-profit (net)".

Answered by Kate Dearden - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade)

I refer the Member to the answer I gave on 4 February 2026 to question 109830.

Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, if she will review the incomplete Answer her Department provided to Question 97203 on 6 January 2026.

Answered by Angela Eagle - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)

The incomplete answer to Question 97203 on 6 January 2026 was due to a processing and formatting error on the Written Parliamentary Questions website. This error has been corrected and the complete answer to Question 97203 is below:

In core Defra, high performance substantive senior civil servants are those with an end-year performance rating of “Exceeded”. The headcount and proportion of each grade for those employed during the period November 2024 – October 2025 were:

* Where individuals changed substantive grade during the period, they are reported against their earliest substantive grade.

c. These numbers are suppressed in accordance with the Defra data protection policy.

End-year performance decisions were removed from the performance management framework for delegated staff grades in April 2023. Delegated staff grades are recognised through continuous recognition awards.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, with reference to his Answers of 2 February 2026 to Question 109197, 109198, 109199 and 109200, if he will publish the number of people who were (a) convicted of and (b) did not receive an immediate custodial sentence for a (i) robbery, (ii) burglary, (iii) theft and (iv) sexual offence by year of conviction and individual number of previous conviction for that offence up to a maximum of six convictions, rather than grouping previous convictions.

Answered by Jake Richards - Assistant Whip

The breakdown requested for PQ 109197, PQ 109198 and PQ 109199 was provided in PQ response 111800. The data for PQ 109200 is provided in the attached excel table. The table includes data covering the period 2020 – 2024 on:

• The number of offenders who were convicted of a specified offence but did not receive an immediate custodial sentence, by the number of previous convictions for that specified offence up to a maximum of 6.

As set out in previous responses, this data is not regularly published or held in an easily accessible format. The information supplied has been sourced from a bespoke retrieval from the Police National Computer database.

Previous convictions are already a statutory aggravating factor, with Sentencing Guidelines being clear that sentencers must consider the nature and relevance of previous convictions, and the time elapsed since the previous convictions.

Found: Letter dated 05/02/2026 from Louise Sandher-Jones MP to Neil O'Brien MP regarding a question concerning

Found: Letter dated 05/02/2026 from Louise Sandher-Jones MP to Neil O'Brien MP regarding a question concerning

Found: Letter dated 05/02/2026 from Louise Sandher-Jones MP to Neil O'Brien MP regarding a question regarding