Asked by: Patricia Ferguson (Labour - Glasgow West)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, how many active cases are currently being considered by the Debarment Review Service.
Answered by Mark Ferguson - Parliamentary Secretary (Cabinet Office)
The Debarment Review Service (DRS) does not routinely publish or disclose figures on the number of cases currently being considered for potential investigation.
The time taken to consider a case varies according to its complexity, including the scope of evidence and information the referrer has provided which in turn the DRS has to consider and assess. DRS aims to progress each case in line with its published protocol.
To date, no investigations have resulted in a supplier being added to the debarment list.
Asked by: Patricia Ferguson (Labour - Glasgow West)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, how many investigations by the Debarment Service have resulted in an organisation being debarred from tendering for government services.
Answered by Mark Ferguson - Parliamentary Secretary (Cabinet Office)
The Debarment Review Service (DRS) does not routinely publish or disclose figures on the number of cases currently being considered for potential investigation.
The time taken to consider a case varies according to its complexity, including the scope of evidence and information the referrer has provided which in turn the DRS has to consider and assess. DRS aims to progress each case in line with its published protocol.
To date, no investigations have resulted in a supplier being added to the debarment list.
Asked by: Patricia Ferguson (Labour - Glasgow West)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, what the average timescale is for consideration of cases presented to the Debarment Service.
Answered by Mark Ferguson - Parliamentary Secretary (Cabinet Office)
The Debarment Review Service (DRS) does not routinely publish or disclose figures on the number of cases currently being considered for potential investigation.
The time taken to consider a case varies according to its complexity, including the scope of evidence and information the referrer has provided which in turn the DRS has to consider and assess. DRS aims to progress each case in line with its published protocol.
To date, no investigations have resulted in a supplier being added to the debarment list.
Asked by: Patricia Ferguson (Labour - Glasgow West)
Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, whether action is being taken to ensure that no UK contractor bids for contracts connected to the proposed E1 development in Palestine.
Answered by Stephen Doughty - Minister of State (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
I refer the honourable member to the Foreign Secretary's statement on 8 September.
Asked by: Patricia Ferguson (Labour - Glasgow West)
Question to the Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade, what steps his department takes to ensure that technology companies with which it contracts are not associated with the gathering of information and data which could be used by other governments to militarily target civilians.
Answered by Kate Dearden - Minister of State (Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade)
Ethical and integrity considerations are integral to government procurement. Any credible concerns relating to governance, legality, security, or human rights are assessed alongside technical and commercial factors. A supplier that does not meet the required legal, ethical, or security standards will not be eligible for a government contract.
Asked by: Patricia Ferguson (Labour - Glasgow West)
Question to the Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade, what steps his department takes to ensure that technology companies with which it contracts do not have links to incidents of violations of international law.
Answered by Kate Dearden - Minister of State (Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade)
Ethical and integrity considerations are integral to government procurement. Any credible concerns relating to governance, legality, security, or human rights are assessed alongside technical and commercial factors. A supplier that does not meet the required legal, ethical, or security standards will not be eligible for a government contract.
Asked by: Patricia Ferguson (Labour - Glasgow West)
Question to the Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade, what steps his department takes to ensure that technology companies with which it contracts are not involved in actions that are contrary to UK Government values.
Answered by Kate Dearden - Minister of State (Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade)
Ethical and integrity considerations are integral to government procurement. Any credible concerns relating to governance, legality, security, or human rights are assessed alongside technical and commercial factors. A supplier that does not meet the required legal, ethical, or security standards will not be eligible for a government contract.
Asked by: Patricia Ferguson (Labour - Glasgow West)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, in the context of the processing of Civil Service Pension quotes, (a) what retirement month is currently being processed and (b) whether he expects all outstanding full and partial retirement quotations to be processed by the end of June 2026.
Answered by Satvir Kaur - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
The Cabinet Office awarded Capita the contract to administer the Civil Service Pension Scheme in November 2023 under the previous government. The current delays facing scheme members are entirely unacceptable, and this Government has taken firm action to resolve them through a clear recovery plan with strict delivery milestones. We have deployed additional resources to expedite priority cases, ensuring that serving and former staff receive the high standard of service they deserve. Regular progress updates remain available to members via the pension portal and Gov.uk.
Capita is under a firm mandate to restore full service delivery to standard contractual levels by the end of June 2026. We are actively exploring the use of all available commercial and contractual levers and continue to withhold milestone payments for missed transition deliverables. All options remain on the table if they fail to meet the June deadline.
Pension quotation requests are prioritised on the basis of the retirement date to the extent that Capita has all of the required data and information to process the quotation. This may mean that some later retirement dates are processed ahead of earlier retirement dates. Currently Capita is aiming to process all quotation requests received prior to 5 June, where full data and information is available, before the end of June.
Capita were initially instructed to prioritise and clear the most urgent cases such as Death in Service and Ill-Health during February and March. While Capita previously assured us that performance standards for Death in Service and Ill-Health were being met by mid-March, recent information continues to demonstrate unacceptable delays in some ill-health retirement and death-in-service cases. We have urgently escalated this to Capita, who are actively investigating the underlying data and reasons for these continued delays.
Asked by: Patricia Ferguson (Labour - Glasgow West)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, (a) what proportion of in country partner or spouse visa applications were decided within the published processing times for that route in the latest period for which data is available and (b) what the average processing time was for such applications in that period.
Answered by Mike Tapp
The number of spouse partner visa applications made in country and processed within published times can be found at Migration transparency data - GOV.UK.
UKVI are currently assessing spouse/partner visa applications made in country within the published processing times. Information on visa processing times can be found at Visa processing times: applications inside the UK - GOV.UK.
Average processing times do not form part of any current transparency data and are not published.
Asked by: Patricia Ferguson (Labour - Glasgow West)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, whether her Department plans to review the criteria used to ascertain which communities require a banking hub.
Answered by Lucy Rigby - Economic Secretary (HM Treasury)
The Government understands the importance of banking services to communities and is committed to supporting the financial services industry’s roll-out of 350 banking hubs by the end of this Parliament. Over 275 hubs have been announced so far, and more than 230 are already open.
Banking hub locations are independently recommended by LINK, the operator of UK’s largest ATM network. When a bank branch closes, there is a material change to a cash service, or a community request is received, LINK conducts an access to cash assessment under the access to cash regime set out in the Financial Services and Markets Act 2023. In its assessments, LINK takes into consideration a wide range of criteria, including population demographics and public transport links. Any decisions on changes to LINK's assessment criteria are a matter for LINK, the financial services sector, and for the FCA, which oversees the access to cash regime.
The Government keeps the effectiveness of current access to cash and banking arrangements under review through regular engagement with industry and the FCA to ensure they meet the needs of local communities.