Shaun Davies

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.

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.

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.

The impacts of coastal erosion and flooding on heritage assets are included in the economic impacts assessment for flood and coastal erosion schemes. Last year, the Environment Agency published the Environment and Historic Environment Outcomes Valuation Guidance which contains specific arrangements for the valuation of heritage assets such as religious buildings.

Flood schemes protecting world heritage sites attract funding through the Government’s Partnership Funding Policy. The amount of funding a project can attract will depend on the damages it will avoid and the benefits it will deliver, including those to heritage assets.

Local authorities can issue fixed penalty notices of up to £1,000 to fly-tippers. The income from these fixed penalty notices must be spent on enforcement and clean-up specifically. The department has not yet made an assessment of this policy, which was introduced under the previous Government, or how it might be changed.

Protecting communities around the country from flooding and coastal erosion is one of the new Secretary of State’s five core priorities.

This Government will improve resilience and preparation across central Government, local authorities, local communities and emergency services to better protect communities across the UK. We will launch a new Flood Resilience Taskforce to turbocharge the delivery of new flood defences, drainage systems and natural flood management schemes, which will ensure we’re prepared for the future and help grow our economy.

Over the past 10 years, the Environment Agency (EA) has deployed the temporary flood barriers within Ironbridge Gorge 19 times, reducing flood risk to 23 homes along the Wharfage. The EA is supporting Telford & Wrekin Council in developing a scheme to reduce flood risk to those properties currently undefended in the Ironbridge Gorge. The council has secured investment of £1.14m and the project is planned to reduce flood risk to a further 32 properties.

The EA is also exploring options to reduce flood risk in neighbouring Coalbrookdale investing £70k to update its flood model.

As well as investing in flood risk management projects, the EA also provides a free Flood Warning Service in the Telford constituency.

No assessment has been made of the economic benefit of introducing a direct train from Telford to London. Since June 2024, Telford Central has had a regular fast service every 30 minutes to and from Birmingham New Street that provides good onward connections to and from London Euston, and journey times of as little as 2 hours 20 minutes.

With an indicative cost of ~£270m, Midlands Connect, the sub-national transport body which researches, develops and progresses transport projects in the Midlands, view electrification of this route as prohibitively expensive.

However, they are refreshing the Business Case for line speed improvements to this route, and my officials are in regular contact with Midlands Connect to support them in this work. The Minister of State for Rail expects to receive an updated Business Case later this year.

The proposed M54 to M6 link road in the Road Investment Strategy was most recently assessed as high value for money and with a benefit to cost ratio of 3.17.

DWP continually review One Public Estate opportunities, and at any time, a number of these are individually being evaluated. The department’s estate is leased rather than owned, so there are no opportunities to sell buildings. However, there can be divestment running cost savings, although these need to be balanced by the material investment costs of re-location to new premises, which are typically substantial.

In each case, a value for money assessment is undertaken, alongside customer and operational considerations.

DWP share personal data with local authorities. That includes three shares of Universal Credit data, with improvements to two of these due in the next 6 months, and an additional Universal Credit data share currently being explored. Similarly, DWP share information about citizens on unemployment benefits, and young people out of work in multiple different data shares. On benefit fraud, we work closely with local authorities on HB fraud, and are not aware of any specific requests for any data in relation to this topic. But we are always open to considering local authority requests, so long as there is a legal gateway and business justification to do so.

The Government has been clear that National Health Services are currently not meeting the high standards that patients should expect, and is committed to supporting the NHS to return to the standards set out in the NHS Constitution. As a first step, my Rt hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care has appointed the Professor Lord Darzi to lead an independent investigation of NHS performance, which will report this month.

NHS England holds integrated care boards (ICBs) and NHS providers to account for delivery of national priorities and statutory functions and oversees them via the NHS Oversight Framework, which assesses the effectiveness of each NHS system across five themes: quality of care, access, and outcomes; preventing ill-health and reducing inequalities; people; finance and use of resources; and leadership and capability. More information is available at the following link:

https://www.england.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/B1378_NHS-System-Oversight-Framework-22-23_260722.pdf

NHS England has allocated the Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust and the Shropshire, Telford and Wrekin ICB to segment four of the NHS Oversight Framework segmentation. As a result, both are receiving national mandated support with NHS England’s Recovery Support Programme. They are also subject to NHS England’s regulatory undertakings.

The Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust and the Shropshire, Telford and Wrekin ICB are currently in Tier 1 for urgent and emergency care, electives, and cancer, which means they receive intensive and significant national and regional support and oversight. The Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust's overall rating from the Care Quality Commission, published in May 2024, is ‘requires improvement’.

Palliative care services are included in the list of services an integrated care board (ICB) must commission. This promotes a more consistent national approach and supports commissioners in prioritising palliative and end of life care. To support ICBs in this duty, NHS England has published statutory guidance and service specifications.

Whilst the majority of palliative and end of life care is provided by National Health Service staff and services, we recognise the vital part that voluntary sector organisations, including hospices, also play in providing support to people, and their loved ones, at the end of life.

Most hospices are charitable, independent organisations which receive some statutory funding for providing NHS services. The amount of funding charitable hospices receive varies by ICB area, and will, in part, be dependent on the breadth and range of palliative and end of life care provision within their ICB footprint.

The Government is going to shift the focus of healthcare out of the hospital and into the community, and we recognise that it is vital to include palliative and end of life care, including hospices, in this shift.

The Department, alongside NHS England, will continue to proactively engage with our stakeholders, including the voluntary sector and independent hospices, on an ongoing basis, in order to understand the issues they face.

The UK Infrastructure Bank (UKIB) sets out financial information in their Annual Reports and Accounts, which are published on their website at https://www.ukib.org.uk/publications and provided to the house on a yearly basis. Further UKIB provides factsheets for each deal it enters into via their website, which can be found at https://www.ukib.org.uk/factsheets.

The PWLB lending facility exists to provide cost effective loans to local authorities to support investment and service delivery. HM Treasury keeps the interest rates of PWLB loans under review to ensure that PWLB lending remains supportive of prudent investment by local authorities, while meeting the requirement in the National Loans Act 1968 that HM Treasury does not lend at a loss. This includes keeping under review the discounted rate for investment in social housing through Housing Revenue Accounts that is currently available until June 2025.

The findings of the independent inquiry into child sexual exploitation in Telford exposed shocking cases of the most vulnerable in our society being abused and let down by adults who were supposed to protect them. The Government recognises the important role local inquiries like this, and others in Rotherham, Oldham and elsewhere, play in improving our response to child sexual abuse and exploitation.

The report of the independent inquiry in Telford did not make any direct recommendations for national government. However, we review the findings of all local inquiries, and other reports such as the Final Report of the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse and HMICFRS’ inspection of policing’s response to group-based child sexual exploitation, to ensure we are constantly reviewing and updating national policies.

At a national level, the Government continues to drive national action to better safeguard children, provide support and care to victims and survivors, and ensure perpetrators face the full force of the law. This includes funding the Child Sexual Exploitation Police Taskforce, which is giving practical, expert, on the ground support for local forces investigating child sexual abuse, with a focus on complex and organised child sexual exploitation; and the Tackling Organised Exploitation programme, which is helping forces to uncover more of this offending.

As you know, I have had contact with Telford survivors and will ensure that their voices are part of any future progress.

Strong and consistent leadership is essential in ensuring high standards in police forces. In the absence of a permanent Chief Constable, regulations allow for an acting Chief Constable to be in place on an interim basis, in order to provide for consistency in leadership.

The recruitment of Chief Constables is a matter for locally elected Police and Crime Commissioners (PCCs). Schedule 8 to the Police Reform and Social Responsibility Act 2011 sets out the requirements that PCCs must follow when appointing a Chief Constable. This includes a requirement for the local Police and Crime Panel to review and report on the proposed appointment, as well as the Panel’s right to veto the proposed appointment with a two-thirds majority. PCCs should use the national guidance set out by the College of Policing for appointing chief officers, which includes advice on encouraging applications and generating a strong and diverse pool of applicants.

I will be taking robust action on tackling child sexual abuse as a priority. The work of the Inquiry over seven years and its final recommendations marks an important contribution in that regard.

The strength and bravery of the victims and survivors who came forward to share their stories cannot be overstated.

I will be working with ministerial colleagues across government over the coming weeks to revisit the final 20 recommendations of the Inquiry to determine our key priorities going forward.

Estimates of how many homes received planning permission in each year are published by the department as part of its quarterly statistics on Planning Applications in England and can be found here: Planning applications statistics - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk).

We do not hold information on how many of these had not been built after one, two, three, four, five, six years or more.

Council tax levels are decided by individual local authorities. Decisions on future local authority funding will be a matter for the next Spending Review and Local Government Finance Settlement.

We understand that improving how local government is funded is crucial to enabling councils to deliver for local residents and ensuring we can deliver our missions. We are committed to delivering a multiyear settlement in this Parliament giving certainty on allocations going forward. The department will work with local government leaders to ensure they are better able to fulfil their statutory duties.

The process for combined authority expansion is set out in the Local Democracy, Economic Development and Construction Act 2009. A combined authority must apply to the Secretary of State regarding their proposal to expand. There must be a public consultation on that proposal across the whole of the proposed expanded area. The legislation sets out the consent criteria for expansion which will depend on the nature of the proposal. The timescales for expansions are subject to this process, along with Parliamentary timescales for approval of the required secondary legislation and will therefore vary for any combined authority seeking to expand. We will consider all aspects of devolution and Combined Authorities in the landmark English Devolution Bill.

HMCTS records the availability of courtroom in ‘sessions’. A ‘session’ represents the time that court/hearing room space is available, with up to two sessions available each day. Available and unavailable sessions are recorded for all jurisdictions.

Telford Magistrates Court had the following number of sessions recorded as available and then confirmed as used during the enquired period:

Data relating to total sessions is extracted from HMCTS Courtroom Planner database, data relating to Confirmed Sessions is extracted from the Rota database. The data relating to session availability and confirmed sessions are from different source systems and are therefore not directly comparable. Please note all data provided is internal and subject to data quality issues inherent in any large-scale manual system.

HMCTS records a session being unavailable for a number of reasons, including important alternative uses. For example:

• box work

• case-related unavailability

• community engagement

• where the room is connected to chambers which are in use

• court closures due to severe weather or security incidents, holidays (not public holiday) or formerly due to COVID

• external meetings (e.g., Court User Group)

• use for external organisations (e.g., Coroner)

• maintenance work

• mediation (parties present)

• overspill (in support of a hearing taking place elsewhere)

• staff meetings and/or training

• video link being used for other matter

The amount of time we use our available estate for hearings is also connected to the funded number of sitting days in any one year, and the availability of key participants such as judiciary and legal professionals.

It should be noted that Courtroom 6 in Telford Magistrates has been out of operation since March 2023 owing to the need to replace the roof. This has progressed through the required government approvals process and building work is due to be instructed shortly on the roof replacement.

Replacement of the roof will enable the room to be brought back into operation.

We have interpreted waiting time to refer to the time between the date of sending a case to the Crown Court and the start of the substantive “main” Crown Court hearing.

The average (median) waiting time at Shrewsbury Crown Court in 2023 was 42 days, compared to 40 days nationally.

The Crown Court outstanding caseload remains one of the biggest challenges facing the Criminal Justice system. We want to make sure every victim has the swift access to justice they deserve, and we are committed to reducing the caseload and bringing waiting times down.

Courts have wide ranging powers to impose cost orders on defendants and to recover some of the costs of investigating the offence and bringing the case to court. All such orders are at the discretion of the court, ensuring that they are just and reasonable, taking into account the means of the offender. The Legal Aid Agency is responsible for recovering contributions towards defendants’ legal aid costs from their income during the case and from their capital if they are convicted. Income contributions are returned to defendants who are acquitted.

We do not publish a ‘waiting time’ measure for Magistrates’ courts. The Magistrates’ courts timeliness tool contains published estimates of timeliness from offence to case completion at the Magistrates’ courts. It is available down to Local Criminal Justice Board (LCJB) level, not to court level: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/66040ea791a320001a82b079/time_mags_tool.xlsx

More than 90 per cent of all criminal cases are dealt with at the magistrates’ courts, where cases continue to be completed swiftly. However, in the last year, the magistrates’ courts outstanding caseload has begun to increase, following an increase in the number of cases coming before the criminal courts.