Sally-Ann Hart

There has been significant interest in the UK Community Renewal Fund across the four investment priorities and bids are being assessed in line with the published assessment process. Outcomes will be announced shortly and bidders informed. We will provide further guidance on UK Community Renewal Fund as soon as possible, to enable bidders to plan for delivery once decisions have been announced.

Tackling geographic inequality and Levelling Up across the whole country is a key ambition of this government.

To support this, in December the Minister for Women and Equalities announced the Equality Data Programme, to ensure that geographic and socio-economic inequality is taken into account, alongside other factors, when identifying barriers to opportunity.

Sponsorship of the Social Mobility Commission has now moved across to the Equality Hub and will play a crucial role in tackling regional inequalities.

Additionally, as part of our commitment to spreading opportunity the Cabinet Office will relocate to Glasgow and York as part of the Places for Growth programme.

The UK is a major global market for renewables. Last week we confirmed that this year’s Contracts for Difference round will be our largest renewables auction ever with a draft budget of £265 million. We are also spending £160 million to support ports and manufacturing infrastructure for offshore wind – securing local jobs and benefits.

Historic England has no powers to compel the owners of Scheduled Ancient Monuments to keep them in good order, however its Heritage At Risk Repair Grants budget can help fund the repair and conservation of those that have been included on its Heritage at Risk Register. It can also fund activities that help to reduce or avoid related risks.

Implementation of the Universal Service Obligation is the responsibility of Ofcom. The Universal Service Conditions set out by Ofcom require the Universal Service Providers to divide the ‘Total Cost of Provision of Infrastructure which is capable of being shared’ by the ‘Number of relevant premises’.

As the independent regulator, Ofcom is currently investigating BT’s compliance with its obligations as a broadband Universal Service Provider as they are concerned BT may not be complying with the regulatory conditions correctly when it assesses excess costs for a given connection.

We understand that Ofcom expects to determine the next steps before the end of this year.

We recognise that these are extremely difficult conditions for tourism businesses across the country, including those along the South East coast. We continue to listen to people’s priorities for recovery and will closely monitor the ongoing impact on the tourism industry.

We are looking into ways we can work with local authorities to celebrate the UK’s diverse tourism offer once it reopens. We are actively considering all the recovery ideas suggested to us by stakeholders, including schemes to promote domestic tourism.

Through the Cultural Renewal Taskforce and the Visitor Economy Working Group, we have worked very closely with the tourism sector to develop Covid-secure guidance which will help tourism businesses reopen safely. Guidance documents covering hotels and other guest accommodation, the visitor economy and pubs and restaurants are published on Gov.uk.

VisitEngland have also introduced an industry standard quality mark that tourism businesses can acquire if they are compliant with Covid-19 secure guidance. The ‘We’re Good To Go’ industry standard mark is part of VisitEngland’s ‘Know Before You Go’ campaign, which encourages the public to find out what is open and when. This campaign points consumers toward Destination Management Organisations’ websites, helping people to access up to date local information.

The government is committed to continuing support for school breakfast clubs and we are investing up to £24 million to continue our national programme for the next two years. This funding will support around 2,500 schools in disadvantaged areas meaning that thousands of children from low-income families will be offered free nutritious breakfasts to better support their attainment, wellbeing and readiness to learn.

The focus of the programme is to target the most disadvantaged areas of the country, including the Department for Education’s Opportunity Areas. Schools’ eligibility for the programme is based on the Income Deprivation Affecting Children Index (IDACI) deprivation scale – a nationally recognised indicator of need – to ensure provision is directed where it is most needed. Schools will be eligible for the programme if they have 50% or more pupils within bands A-F of the IDACI scale.

The enrolment process for schools joining the programme is currently ongoing, and we have seen a strong interest so far from eligible schools since we invited the expressions of interest. Schools are currently still able to apply to join the programme. As we are still registering schools for the programme, it is too early to publish a list of participating schools. However, we will of course consider the best opportunities to share information on the programme as it progresses.

The government is committed to continuing support for school breakfast clubs and we are investing up to £24 million to continue our national programme for the next two years. This funding will support around 2,500 schools in disadvantaged areas, meaning that thousands of children from low-income families will be offered free nutritious breakfasts to better support their attainment, wellbeing and readiness to learn.

The focus of the programme is to target the most disadvantaged areas of the country, including the Department for Education’s Opportunity Areas. Throughout the contract we will be working with our provider, Family Action, to monitor different aspects of the programme including the food ordering from schools, participation rates among children, and the benefits the programme is having on pupils who are attending. We will consider the best opportunities to share information on the programme as it progresses.

It will be important that adults who are returning to learning get the skills and development they need.

We have already invested £100 million to develop a National Retraining Scheme to support working adults prepare for future changes to the economy and to help them retrain into better jobs and announced an extra £2.5 billion, over the course of this Parliament, for a new National Skills Fund, which will support people to learn new skills and prepare for the economy of the future.

In April we launched the “Skills Toolkit” – a new online platform giving people access to free, high-quality digital and numeracy courses to help build up their skills, progress in work and boost their job prospects.

Apprenticeships will be key to the recovery, helping both young people and those wanting to re-train, and we are looking at ensuring that we support employers, especially small businesses, to take on new apprentices this year and will provide further detail in due course.

The department is also exploring further options for how to boost skills to help the labour market recover from the economic effects of COVID-19.

There are a range of further and higher education opportunities open to young people leaving education this summer. In addition, we want to work with employers to ensure that young people have access to an offer of work-based training, work experience, and/or training programmes. My right hon. Friend, the Prime Minster, announced this on 29 June.

The investigation and subsequent prosecution of Southern Water focused on unlawful discharges of sewage through the storm system thus bypassing full treatment at Wastewater Treatment Works (WwTW) and discharging to the environment in non-storm conditions. The sites all discharged either directly into, or in close proximity to, designated shellfish waters off the North Kent coast, around the Solent, and Langstone and Chichester Harbours.

During the current water company investment round (2020 - 2025), water companies are required to install overflow operation monitors on storm overflows at around 3500 WwTW, including Southern Water WwTWs, along with Flow Passed Forward Flow monitors. Permits will be reviewed and conditions tightened to afford even greater levels of scrutiny and environmental protection. The data from these monitors will be used to assess compliance with permit Flow Passed Forward Flow limits when overflows operate. As well as ensuring that the required flows are passed forward for full treatment through the WwTW when the overflow operates, the monitors will also be used by the Environment Agency to check that the overflows only operate within permit requirements of rainfall and snowmelt.

The Government is pushing forward in working towards improving the state of the water environment by setting robust and ambitious water quality targets within the Environment Bill. Alongside these targets the Government will consider the policy levers required to meet the targets, including taking further action to tackle sources of water pollution.

As part of our 25 Year Environment Plan, the Government commissioned an independent review of designated landscapes in England, led by Julian Glover. We welcome the Glover Review and are now considering its findings, including proposals for new National Parks.

The Government takes the impact of road noise on health, wellbeing and the natural environment seriously and recognises that proportionate and dissuasive penalties are an effective way to minimise it. The Department is continuing to research into whether noise enforcement can be automated using an acoustic camera system.

A review of the current penalties for all vehicles may need to be considered if acoustic camera systems prove to be a reliable and efficient way of enforcing noise limits.

The Government is committed to ensuring deaf people can fully participate in society. We understand that mandatory use of face coverings will be difficult to adhere to for some. That is why there are exemptions to the rules for some disabled people and those with certain health conditions on public transport. You also do not need to wear a face covering if you are speaking with someone who relies on lip reading and facial expressions to communicate.

We are working closely with transport operators to make sure that their staff and passengers are aware that not everyone is required to wear a face covering. Our Safer Transport guidance includes a clear reminder to transport operators of the need to provide staff with disability equality and awareness training. In addition to this, the guidance also specifically provides warnings that conventional coverings can prevent many disabled people from accessing oral information and instructions. Our guidance for operators and more information on face coverings can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/coronavirus-covid-19-safer-transport-guidance-for-operators/coronavirus-covid-19-safer-transport-guidance-for-operators#face-coverings

We have approved the entry of the Kent and East Sussex Coastal Connectivity Scheme to formally enter the Government’s rail enhancements pipeline. The Department and East Sussex County Council are funding the production of a Strategic Outline Business Case, due by the end of 2020. As well as exploring options to create a new link to High Speed 1, this programme is considering options for a range of upgrades to the Marshlink line between Ashford and Hastings.

It would be for Parliament to decide whether to make any changes to the law on abortion. As with other matters of conscience, abortion is an issue on which the Government adopts a neutral stance and allows hon. Members to vote according to their moral, ethical or religious beliefs.

This level of detail is not recorded in the Emergency Care Data Set or Hospital Episode Statistics accident and emergency data. The Department acknowledges there are limitations with the abortion complications data that is collected. We are planning to examine with partner organisations how well these systems are working in relation to recording complications arising from abortions and whether improvement is required.

On 24 February the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation published a clarification of their advice on vaccinating people with a learning disability. They confirmed their view that priority should be given to those with a severe and profound learning disability, but recognised the issues around coding of learning disability on general practitioner (GP) systems and supported a practical approach of inviting everyone who is on the GP Learning Disability Register for vaccination in cohort six.

New visiting arrangements will start on 8 March. From that date, every care home will be asked to ensure that each resident can receive regular indoor visits from one person whom they have nominated as their single named visitor. In addition, with the agreement of the care home, visitors to residents who need personal care will have access to the same testing and personal protective equipment as care home staff so that they can provide extra support, like help with washing, dressing or eating.

The content of the red book is determined by The Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health. The Department continues to work with the Royal College and the National Health Service to ensure the red book is up to date and accessible.

The Integrated Review highlighted the UK’s status as a soft power superpower.

The FCDO is continuing to fund projects and programmes that support UK soft power, including through a 27% increase this year in funding for the British Council

Since 2016, we have provided over £370m via the BBC World2020 programme, which has seen the creation of 12 new language services, and we continue to support our Chevening, Marshall and Commonwealth scholarships.

Our international leadership and determination to work as a force for good in the world is an important part of our soft power, as we are seeing through our hosting of the G7 and COP26, and our support for a globally accessible Covid-19 vaccine.

We are working to improve the situation in Myanmar by pushing for implementation of the Rakhine Advisory Commission’s recommendations. The Rohingya were disenfranchised in Myanmar’s recent elections and we have conveyed our concerns to the Myanmar government. We continue to push for accountability for the Rohingya. We are the second largest donor to the Rohingya response in Bangladesh, providing £293.5m since 2017. In Myanmar’s Rakhine state, we have provided over £44m since 2017, including over £25m for the Rohingya.

The Home Office’s Emergency Services Mobile Communications Programme (ESMCP), is building a new Emergency Services Network (ESN) to replace the current Airwave network used by the Emergency Services as well as a range of other users.

The software that ESN runs on is being provided by Motorola Solutions and the infrastructure is being built by EE; created by upgrading their existing network, including deploying more 4G radio frequencies in rural areas.

To maximise coverage for the emergency services the government will build 292 further sites in the most remote and rural areas of Britain. These sites will also form part of the Shared Rural Network.

To support ESN, we need to activate these masts before ESN goes live for emergency services users. Detailed plans are still being refined but we currently expect ESN to be fully operational during 2025. As individual masts are activated as part of the ESN programme, they will be available to EE’s commercial customers immediately, even before ESN itself is live. Wherever possible, we have chosen a “future-proofed” design for these mast structures, meaning that they can be easily upgraded to allow access by all of the UK’s commercial mobile operators to improve coverage to communities.

ESMCP remains a complex and challenging programme. Over the past year, core elements of the technology have been delivered. The ‘push-to-talk’ solution now works with ESN devices connected to EE’s commercial network. The Air-to-Ground solution, interworking with Airwave and Control Room integration have all been successfully demonstrated. A ‘data only’ service is also in operational use by an increasing number of emergency services users. The programme is now working to complete development of the core technology, and deliver additional coverage including for rural areas and London Underground. We currently expect to switch off Airwave during 2025 once we have completed the technology delivery and proving and then deployment to users.

The Government has put forward a package of support for business in recognition of the disruption caused by COVID-19. As part of this, as of 28 June, £10.57 billion has been paid out to over 861,000 business properties under the Small Business Grant Fund (SBGF) and the Retail, Hospitality and Leisure Grant Fund (RHLGF). Local authorities are working hard to make grant payments to eligible businesses across the country at pace and we are continuing to work closely with them to deliver the remaining funding. We have published a full breakdown of grant funding allocated to and distributed by each local authority here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/coronavirus-grant-funding-local-authority-payments-to-small-and-medium-businesses .

We believe areas moving to unitary status with more sustainable and efficient councils can have significant benefits for local people and businesses, including improved and more affordable local services, stronger and more accountable local leadership, and by removing a layer of governance enabling town and parish councils and local communities to be genuinely empowered.

Ernst & Young’s 2016 ^[1] study of the two-tier councils in England estimated that each existing two-tier county area moving to a single unitary could produce annual savings (post implementation costs) approaching £30 million. A number of areas are now talking to us about unitarisation and are estimating annual savings of some £50 million.

[1] Independent Analysis of Governance Scenarios and Public Service Reform in County Areas, EY, September 2016.

We believe areas moving to unitary status with more sustainable and efficient councils can have significant benefits for local people and businesses, including improved and more affordable local services, stronger and more accountable local leadership, and by removing a layer of governance enabling town and parish councils and local communities to be genuinely empowered.

Ernst & Young’s 2016 ^[1] study of the two-tier councils in England estimated that each existing two-tier county area moving to a single unitary could produce annual savings (post implementation costs) approaching £30 million. A number of areas are now talking to us about unitarisation and are estimating annual savings of some £50 million.

[1] Independent Analysis of Governance Scenarios and Public Service Reform in County Areas, EY, September 2016.

Building on the success of our directly elected city region Mayors, our English Devolution and Local Recovery White Paper will set out our plans for expanding devolution, creating more elected Mayors in England, giving them and existing Mayors the powers they need to lead economic recovery and long term growth, and more unitary local authorities with stronger town and parish councils to deliver sustainable local services.

We intend to publish the White Paper in Autumn 2020.

The key initiative which allows community groups an opportunity to take publicly or privately-owned buildings or land into community ownership is the assets of community value scheme introduced through the Localism Act 2011. The scheme however does not place any further restrictions on the asset after a sale is complete. The Government continues to recognise the value of community ownership and access to assets, and we have set out our commitment to strengthen the rights of community groups to protect and take over local assets and to introduce a £150 million Community Ownership Fund to support groups who wish to do so.

Legal advisers are an important component of Covid-19 recovery in the courts system, and the recruitment of legal advisers continues to be a priority for HMCTS. Last year 145 trainee legal advisers were recruited following a national campaign, and a further campaign is underway to recruit a minimum of 100 trainee legal advisers by October 2021. Legal adviser pay and grading does not correlate with that of CPS lawyers due to the differing nature of the roles. The Ministry of Justice has submitted a pay flexibility case to invest in changes to our reward framework via a multi-year deal effective from August 2020. The case is currently being considered by the Cabinet Office and HM Treasury, and aims to reduce both operational and financial risks.