Shaun Davies

Our records show that between 2021 and October 2024, Attorney General’s Office and Crown Prosecution Service employees have taken paternity leave for the birth or adoption of a child.

The average working days taken (AWDT) is shown in the table below.

Management information is held showing the number of cases with the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) which are awaiting a pre-charge decision.

The overall number of cases which were awaiting a charging decision or administrative triage (completed on files sent by the police to the CPS for a charging decision) as of 25 March 2024 was 13,697. This data is provided in line with the last quarterly data release in March 2024. The next quarterly release is due on 17 October 2024 which will be available on the CPS website at CPS quarterly data summaries | The Crown Prosecution Service.

These figures do not include cases that have been referred to the CPS but that are currently with the police to action, having been sent back to them with a request for further information.

This count is of the number of cases, not suspects. A single case may cover one suspect or several. No data is available in the report showing whether the alleged offences are summary, either-way or indictable only. To obtain this information would require a manual review at disproportionate cost.

Management information is held showing the number of cases with the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) which are awaiting a pre-charge decision.

The table below shows the overall number of cases which were awaiting a charging decision or administrative triage (completed on files sent by the police to the CPS for a charging decision) as of 25 March 2024. This data is provided in line with the last quarterly data release in March 2024.

These figures do not include cases that have been referred to the CPS but that are currently with the police to action, having been sent back to them with a request for further information.

This count is of the number of cases, not suspects. A single case may cover one suspect or several.

No data is available in the report showing whether the alleged offences are summary, either-way or indictable only. To obtain this information would require a manual review at disproportionate cost.

Our records show that between 2021 and October 2024, 258 Cabinet Office employees have taken paternity leave for the birth or adoption of a child.

The average working days taken (AWDT) is shown in the table below. ​​

The table below shows the average length of paternity leave taken by staff. This includes paternity leave after birth.

The Department for Business and Trade is a newly formed Department established in February 2023. The new department absorbed the functions of the former Department for International Trade (DIT) and some of the functions of the former Department for Business, Energy, and Industrial Strategy (BEIS).

The figures prior to 01.08.2023 include all former DIT staff and former BEIS staff who transferred to DBT.

The below figures cover the same period for staff at the Competition and Markets Authority.

The Government’s Warm Homes Plan will support investment in insulation, low carbon heating and other home improvements to cut bills. We will set out full details in due course.

The Government’s retrofitting tool ‘find ways to save energy in your home’ (https://www.gov.uk/improve-energy-efficiency), provides tailored guidance to help consumers make their homes greener and cheaper to run.

All businesses installing measures under Government schemes and initiatives must be certified to Publicly Available Specification (PAS) 2030 and follow PAS 2035 standards. In the next review of the standards, the British Standards Institute (BSI), who publish PAS 2030 and 2035, will consider how to address more innovative products that do not fit within existing annexes, subject to steering group consensus.

The Government is committed to protecting homeowners across the UK who have clean heating and energy efficiency products installed. The Government’s Warm Homes Plan will support investment in insulation, low carbon heating and other home improvements to cut bills. We will set out full details in due course.

As the first step towards the Warm Homes Plan, the Government has committed an initial £3.4 billion over the next 3 years towards heat decarbonisation and household energy efficiency, with £1 billion of this allocated to next year.

There are several Government schemes offering loft insulation as a measure to improve energy efficiency. The Government’s retrofitting tool ‘find ways to save energy in your home’ (https://www.gov.uk/improve-energy-efficiency), provides tailored guidance to help consumers make their homes greener and cheaper to run.

All businesses under Government schemes and initiatives must be TrustMark registered. These businesses must be certified to Publicly Available Specification (PAS) 2030 and follow PAS 2035 standards. TrustMark's role under Government schemes is to ensure compliance with the overarching PAS 2035 process, setting clear requirements to protect consumer.

The average length of paternity leave in days taken by staff in the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ) was 9.6 during 2023 and 9.8 during 2024.

The Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ) was established in February 2023. Data before this time is unavailable.

The Government wants all areas of the UK, including Telford constituency, to benefit from good quality mobile coverage. Our ambition is for all populated areas to have higher-quality standalone 5G by 2030.

5G is already available in the Telford constituency. I have raised my concerns about the reporting of mobile connectivity with Ofcom, but according to Ofcom’s Connected Nations report (published on 5 December 2024) 5G is available from at least one operator outside 99% of all premises in the Telford constituency.

In the Telford constituency, over 99% of premises can access superfast broadband speeds (>=30 Mbps) and over 87% have access to gigabit-capable broadband coverage (>1000 Mbps). There is high existing gigabit coverage and commercial plans in the area. Therefore, this constituency is not expected to see significant benefits from Project Gigabit.

Our records show that between 2021 and October 2024, Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) employee’s have taken 160 days paternity leave for the birth or adoption of a child.

The average working days taken per colleague (AWDT) is shown in the table below.

*The Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) was established in February 2023. Data before this time is unavailable.

Heritage plays an important part in the UK economy. In 2023, seven out of ten of the most popular paid visitor attractions in England were heritage attractions, according to evidence from the Annual Visitor Attraction Survey.

According to research undertaken by the UK National Commission for UNESCO in 2020, a UNESCO designation, such as a World Heritage Site designation, leads to increased tourism, brings economic benefits for local communities, and delivers a greater international profile.

DCMS works with World Heritage Site coordinators and heritage agencies across the UK to continue to build the value of these designations and to support economic growth.

Our ambition is to have 50 million international visitors to the UK a year by 2030.

The Independent Football Regulator will create a clearer and more certain regulatory environment for investors which will drive future investment and growth so that English football remains a global success story. A more sustainable game is a more investable game, and this in turn should drive continued economic growth in the market.

The government’s estimate of the economic impact of introducing a football regulator is set out in our Impact Assessment.

The average length of paternity leave taken by DCMS staff was as follows:

2021: 10.8 days

2022: 9.7 days

2023: 10.3 days

Ironbridge Gorge Museum Trust is a National Portfolio Organisation funded by Arts Council England, and receives £749,709 annually.

In 2022 Ironbridge Gorge Museum Trust (IGMT) also received £9.975m from Cultural Assets Fund as part of DCMS Culture Recovery Fund.

In addition, since 1994, National Lottery Heritage Fund has awarded more than £12.7 million within the Ironbridge Gorge World Heritage Site area and has awarded the IGMT more than £20.9 million.

Historic England, the Government’ statutory advisor on heritage and a DCMS arm's length body, provides support and advice on specific issues related to the management of the wider Ironbridge Gorge World Heritage Site.

As the first person recorded to swim unaided across the Channel, Captain Matthew Webb’s achievement has no doubt inspired many people to undertake record breaking challenges of endurance. My department is not planning to commemorate the anniversary. Parliamentarians may choose to mark the occasion in other ways, for example by tabling a debate or an Early Day Motion to mark the achievement.

I refer my hon. friend, the Member for Telford to the answer of 24 January 2025 to Question 24528.

Many schools across the country will either allow others to make use of their facilities, or themselves be making use of land shared with their local communities. The department encourages schools to open their sites in this way. Shared use agreements or other arrangements to facilitate this are primarily a matter for local discussion between schools, their landowners and local authorities, who will all appreciate the individual local needs.

However, in specific circumstances, such as when a school converts to become an academy and the department is involved in agreeing how the academy will access land, the department can and will help schools and councils consider their options. Our good estate management for schools (GEMS) guidance also contains information for schools on allowing others to use their premises. More information about GEMS can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/good-estate-management-for-schools.

The average length of paternity leave taken by employees of the Department for Education for each of the last three years is set out in the table below.

The department collects and publishes forecasts made by local authorities of demand for primary and secondary pupil places from the annual School Capacity (SCAP) survey, which are available here: https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/find-statistics/school-capacity. Forecast data is generated by local authorities based on their own data and local knowledge. These forecasts are challenged extensively during data cleaning processes. As with any forecast figures, there will be variation between the forecasts and the subsequent actual pupil numbers, and the level of accuracy is expected to reduce as forecasts are made further into the future.

This information is published at local authority level, with the latest publication covering the period 2022/23 to 2027/28, available for Telford and Wrekin here: https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/data-tables/permalink/3d7c2bc7-052b-43f5-e0cc-08dccd7b577b. Previous years can be found in earlier publications, all available on Explore Education Statistics. Data on special educational needs provision was collected for the first time in SCAP in 2023 and published as official statistics in development in 2024 within the aforementioned publication.

The department also publishes pupil population projections at national level and by school type annually, which are available here: https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/find-statistics/national-pupil-projections. The latest publication includes historic pupil populations, plus projected population to 2028. These projections are not available at local authority level.

In just five months in Government, we have introduced a series of measures to better protect communities from flooding including:

• Invest £2.4 billion over the next two years to maintain, repair and build flood defences to protect communities across the country.
• Set up a new Floods Resilience Taskforce bringing together representatives from central and local government, Local Resilience Forums, emergency responders and the National Farmers Union, among others, to discuss how they will speed up and co-ordinate flooding preparation and resilience.
• Consultation to review the existing funding formula, ensuring the challenges facing businesses and rural and coastal communities are adequately considered.
• Invested £50 million to Internal Drainage Boards (IDBs) to better enable them to manage water levels for agriculture and environmental needs.
• Supporting farmers impacted by flooding through a £60 million Farming Recovery Fund, which provides grants of up to £25,000 to return their land to the condition it was in before storm damage.

This Government is investing £2.4 billion over this year and next year to improve flood resilience by maintaining, repairing and building flood defences. The list of projects to receive government funding will be consented over the coming months in the usual way through Regional Flood and Coastal Committees, with local representation.

The information requested is not held centrally and to obtain it would incur disproportionate costs.

The Environment Agency is working with partners in the River Severn Partnership (RSP) including local authorities, water companies, Natural Resources Wales (NRW), Natural England and environmental organisations on a long-term, whole-catchment scale view of planning for the future in response to climate change: Severn 2100+.

Under Severn2100+ work, the partnership is developing a Climate Resilience Strategy including an options appraisal of the flood risk adaptation actions needed in the River Severn catchment.

The work includes an ‘Adaptation Pathways Plan’ to help the Environment Agency understand how to sequence those actions, who can help and when.

As a pathfinder, the Environment Agency is working with partners on the Severn Valley Water Management Scheme to examine how a suite of flood risk interventions in the upper catchment of the River Severn can reduce flood risk.

These long-term plans will help the RSP play a key role in bringing forward initiatives to reduce flood risk and improve the water environment whilst supporting economic growth in the area.

A demonstrator programme is underway delivering a series of 8 projects to test concepts and ideas that will support the future roll-out of the Severn Valley Water Management Scheme.

The partnership will be engaging with honourable members in the partnership area to update them soon.

The Defra sponsored capital programme endorsed by the English Severn and Wye RFCC continues to reduce flood risk to properties throughout the Severn Catchment in England.

The Environment Agency is working with partners in the River Severn Partnership (RSP) including local authorities, water companies, Natural Resources Wales, Natural England and environmental organisations on a long-term, whole-catchment scale view of planning for the future in response to climate change: Severn 2100+.

Under Severn2100+ work, the RSP is developing a Climate Resilience Strategy including an options appraisal of the flood risk adaptation actions needed in the River Severn catchment.

The work includes an ‘Adaptation Pathways Plan’ to help the Environment Agency understand how to sequence those actions, who can help and when.

The Environment Agency is working with partners on the Severn Valley Water Management Scheme to examine how a suite of flood risk interventions in the upper catchment of the River Severn can reduce flood risk. A demonstrator programme is underway delivering a series of 8 projects to test concepts and ideas that will support the future roll-out of the Severn Valley Water Management Scheme.

The Department for Transport provided a response to the Office of Rail and road regarding the live Open Access application from Wrexham, Shropshire & Midlands Railway to operate services between Wrexham General and London Euston on 4 February 2025. This letter set out our broad support for the proposal. We note the benefits of improved connectivity that these services would bring to a number of communities, but access to the rail network is ultimately a decision for the regulator, who will weigh stakeholder views against statutory duties and publish its decision in due course.

Access to the rail network is a matter for the Office of Rail and Road (ORR) in its capacity as independent regulator for the rail industry. The Department works closely with both ORR and Network Rail to ensure that information to inform access decisions is provided in as timely a manner as possible, however it is important that decisions are fully considered and potential impacts to taxpayers, the efficient operation of the network, and to other operators are properly assessed.

Access to the rail network is a matter for the Office of Rail and Road (ORR) in its capacity as independent regulator for the rail industry.

ORR have advised that since 2020, it has determined four applications for wholly new open access services. ORR rejected one and approved three. The time taken to go through the industry processes and reach a decision on these applications was as follows:

- Grand Union Trains (London – Stirling): 126 days

- Grand Union Trains Application 1 (London – Carmarthen): 281 days

- Grand Union Trains Application 2 (London – Carmarthen): 163 days

- Go-op: 783 days

The Go-op process involved significant changes to the application from the applicant over the course of two years. For all of these applications, ORR took decisions within 6 weeks of receiving all relevant information from the parties.

Funding for the M54 to M6 Link Road is subject to the multi-year Spending Review, and assurances cannot be provided on individual projects until the conclusion of the Spending Review.

Working with the industry, the Rail Safety and Standards Board (RSSB) has developed a comprehensive strategy to improve safety at the platform train interface (PTI) on the mainline railway. The strategy adopts a whole-system, safety by design, risk-based approach; which includes using human factors and data modelling to inform the design of infrastructure and rolling stock, launching safety campaigns such as ‘Respect the Edge’ to influence passenger behaviour and improve awareness of risks, and enhancing the skills and competence of dispatchers and guards by working with operators and the Office of Rail and Road (ORR) to improve the quality of training and guidance available to staff. This approach has seen PTI incidences decreasing year on year since 2020/2021.

Statistics on the number of children living in absolute and relative poverty on a before housing costs basis by parliamentary constituency are published annually in the “Children in low income families: local area statistics” publication and can be found in tabs “6_Absolute_ParlC” and “5_Relative_ParlC” at Children in low income families: local area statistics 2014 to 2023 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk). The latest statistics published on 21 March 2024 are for the financial period 2022/23. The figures provided for parliamentary constituencies are on the 2010 boundaries.

The latest available data can also be found on Stat-Xplore (https://stat-xplore.dwp.gov.uk/) in the Children in low income families dataset. Figures on both the 2010 and 2024 parliamentary constituency boundaries are available here.

Guidance on how to use Stat-Xplore can be found here: Getting Started (dwp.gov.uk). An account is not required to use Stat- Xplore, the ‘Guest Login’ feature gives instant access to the main functions.

In November 2022, 2,541 households in the Telford constituency received Pension Credit.

In November 2023, 2,509 households in the Telford constituency received Pension Credit.

Data is not yet available for November 2024. The latest available data is for May 2024, in which 2,450 households in the Telford constituency received Pension Credit.

This data is available on Stat-Xplore at https://stat-xplore.dwp.gov.uk in the ‘Pension Credit - Data from May 2018’ dataset. More information on the data included in the ‘Pension Credit’ dataset can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/dwp-statistical-summaries. Guidance on how to use Stat-Xplore can be found here: https://stat-xplore.dwp.gov.uk/webapi/online-help/index.html. An account is not required to use Stat- Xplore, the ‘Guest Login’ feature gives instant access to the main functions.

It is the Government’s ambition to see more disabled people in public office.

The Government has been clear that it will champion disabled people's rights, and work closely with them so that disabled people's voices and views are at the heart of all we do.

We know that some disabled people still face additional financial barriers when standing for elected office. We are looking at how we might work with political parties and others to help tackle this.

This data has been taken from a live system. Staff have 52 weeks to take paternity leave following the birth of the child, so figures for 2024 may rise.

The average working days taken (AWDT) is shown in the table below:

Our plan to get Britain Working includes a new Youth Guarantee for all young people aged 18-21 to ensure that they can access quality training opportunities, an apprenticeship or employment support. This will sit alongside; a new national jobs and careers service to help get more people into work, work health and skills plans for the economically inactive, and the launch of Skills England to open new opportunities for young people. Further detail will be shared in the up-coming White Paper.

Such ambitious plans require input and expertise from a wide range of stakeholders - from community groups and employers through to local authorities and providers of employment support and careers advice. We have convened a small advisory group with the Mayoral Combined Authorities, Local councils and the Central London Forward to gather expertise and support the development of the White Paper, and we are working closely with the Devolved Governments to share insights on what is currently working across Britain.

We look forward to working closely with stakeholders post-publication on the design and implementation of the measures in the White Paper.