Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what recent steps his Department has taken alongside local stakeholders to increase the number of (a) employment and (b) training opportunities in Slough.
Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Local agencies and local government are well placed to understand their local labour market, build connections with employers and coordinate services to increase employment and training opportunities. That is why we have asked all areas across England, including Berkshire, to develop local Get Britain Working plans in partnership with local stakeholders.
Local areas are also delivering Connect to Work, a Supported Employment programme aimed at disabled people and people with health conditions. Berkshire have had their plan approved and are due to go live in January.
Additionally, our Jobcentre teams in Slough work with local employers to help generate opportunities for customers. They also work with local and national providers to understand the needs of local areas and the skills gaps of UC customers related to the local area’s job market, and then request and develop suitable training.
To deliver local training opportunities, we are also spending £1.4 billion this academic year through the Adult Skills Fund, and we are also transforming the apprenticeships offer into a new growth and skills offer, including introducing new foundation apprenticeships.
Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what recent steps he has taken to support young people into employment in Slough.
Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
This Government is investing in young people’s futures. At the Budget, we announced more than £1.5 billion of investment over the next three years, funding £820 million for the Youth Guarantee to support young people to earn or learn, and an additional £725 for the Growth and Skills Levy.
Through the expanded Youth Guarantee, young people aged 16-24 across Great Britain are set to benefit from further support into employment and learning, including:
Support to find a job: For young people on Universal Credit who are looking for work, we are introducing a new Youth Guarantee Gateway, which over the next three years will offer nearly 900,000 16–24-year-olds a dedicated session, followed by four weeks of additional intensive support with a Work Coach. This new support will identify specific work, training, or learning opportunities locally for each young person and ensure they are supported to take those up. This support could be delivered at a Youth Hub.
Further expansion of Youth Hubs: We are expanding our network of Youth Hubs to over 360 locations so that all young people – including those not on benefits – can access opportunities and wider support in every local area of Great Britain. Youth Hubs will bring together partners from health, skills and the voluntary sector, working closely with Mayors and local authorities to deliver joined-up community-based support.
c300,000 additional opportunities for workplace experience and training: For young people on Universal Credit who are looking for work, we will create up to 150,000 additional work experience placements and up to 145,000 additional bespoke training opportunities designed in partnership with employers – Sector-based Work Academy Programmes (SWAPs). At the end of each SWAP, employers offer a guaranteed job interview to participants.
Guaranteeing jobs: Too many young people are spending the first years of their adult life out of work or education. Long periods of unemployment in these early years have lifelong negative impacts.
As part of the Youth Guarantee, we are breaking the cycle of unemployment by guaranteeing paid work for every eligible 18-21 year-old who has been on Universal Credit, looking for work, for 18 months.
The Jobs Guarantee scheme will provide six months of paid employment, for 25 hours a week, at the relevant minimum wage, with the government covering 100% of employment costs. This, will help young people take that crucial first step into sustained employment, supporting the government’s long-term ambition for an 80% employment rate.
The Jobs Guarantee will also provide wraparound support to further develop the required skills and experience needed for the move into sustained employment.
Appropriate safeguards will be built into the scheme to ensure that opportunities are high quality, fair and deliver the intended outcomes for young people.
The Jobs Guarantee will reach around 55,000 young people over the next three years.
Prevention: We are also making it easier to identify young people who need support, by investing in better data sharing for those who are not in education, employment or training (NEET), further education attendance monitoring, and new risk of NEET data tools giving local areas more accurate insights to target support where it's needed most. We are also investing in work experience opportunities for young people at particular risk of becoming NEET, focused on pupils in state-funded Alternative Provision settings, (education provided outside mainstream or special schools for children who cannot attend a regular school, often due to exclusion, health needs, or other circumstances). This builds on measures announced in the Post-16 Education and Skills White Paper earlier this autumn.
Growth and Skills Levy A £725 million package of reforms includes a change to fully fund SME apprenticeships for eligible people aged under 25. We will make available £140 million to pilot new approaches to better connect young people aged 16-24, especially those who are NEET, to local apprenticeship opportunities. These are important steps in the government’s ambition to support 50,000 more young people into apprenticeships, which will also be supported by expanding foundation apprenticeships into sectors that traditionally recruit young people.
In Slough specifically, we already have innovative programmes for young people:
The Football Association Programme, funded by the FA, is a 12 week course to promote different roles within football;
Engage Lime is a project delivered in association with London School of Economics focusing on skills; and
Start-Up UK will encourage young people to think about starting their own businesses.
Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, who is the Chief Risk Officer for national security risks relating to the work of their Department.
Answered by Ian Murray - Minister of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)
At DCMS, the Chief Operating Officer is the Chief Risk Owner for National Security Risks.
Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment her Department has made of the potential merits of grouping Perfluoroalkyl and Polyfluoroalkyl Substances (PFAS) in regulation.
Answered by Emma Hardy - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
PFAS represent a group of thousands of chemicals, with hundreds used commercially across many sectors of industry and society. The structural diversity of PFAS poses a challenge to grouping.
The Health & Safety Executive (HSE) published an “Analysis of the most appropriate regulatory management options (RMOA)” for PFAS in March 2023. This RMOA addresses PFAS, that are potentially on the GB market, by applying a grouping approach to improve manageability and help address the issue of regrettable substitution. HSE’s Restriction Report on PFAS in firefighting foams, published in August 2025, takes a group approach on this basis, using the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD 2021) definition of PFAS.
Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what recent assessment has been made of adequacy of the (a) support and (b) guidance available for those who are unable to access their e-visas.
Answered by Mike Tapp - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
The Home Office has a robust support model in place that strives to ensure that all people, including the most vulnerable, are properly supported to access their eVisa and use the View and Prove service:
We have delivered £4.4m of grant funding across 18 months to 72 voluntary and community sector organisations across the UK to support customers who needed help transitioning from a physical document to an eVisa.
People who need support can contact the UKVI Resolution Centre, which provides support via email and webchat to those creating their UKVI account, and telephone support to those using the online immigration status services. This includes supporting users through the online journey by:
o helping them to access or recover their account
o helping them to update their personal details
o sharing status on behalf of users if they are unable to do so themselves
Should anyone find themselves needing support with creating their UKVI account or getting access to their eVisa, the latest updates and guidance can be found on GOV.UK at: www.gov.uk/evisa.
Employers and landlords in England can use the Employer Checking Service (ECS) and Landlord Checking Service (LCS) to check the status of people who are having difficulty providing digital status evidence.
An Equality Impact Assessment (EIA) was completed on the first phase of the roll out of eVisas to EEA nationals on 9 November 2020, which built on the Policy Equality Statement (PES) for the EUSS which was produced in 2017 and published on the gov.uk website on 18 November 2020:
A separate EIA considering equalities issues in relation to the use of digital only right to work and rent checks was published on gov.uk in June 2022:
We are also in the process of reviewing our eVisas EIA, setting out further analysis of the equalities issues to reflect the current stage in the roll out of eVisas, and we will continue to keep the issue under review.