Vikki Slade

We are a mission-led government and women’s equality is at the heart of all our missions.

This means tackling the gender pay gap, where we are taking action much wider than just pay transparency. We are taking the first steps towards requiring employers to publish action plans alongside their figures, detailing the steps they are taking to narrow their gender pay gap and support employees during the menopause, as well as introducing stronger protections against sexual harassment.

Our plan to Make Work Pay will move further and faster to tackle the gender pay gap, improve access to flexible working and provide stronger protections at work. We are also expanding access to high-quality, accessible early years education with more free hours for working families.

Many employers understand that when women succeed, so does their business. As women’s equality and economic growth go hand in hand we need to ensure that every organisation is harnessing the talent, creativity and brilliance of women in their workforce.

Requiring certain companies to provide a one-time full shareholder list will allow Companies House to present shareholder information that is already displayed on the register in a more user-friendly way.

The Government aims to strike the right balance between transparency and privacy. New measures will enable those whose details appear on the register (including people at increased risk of harm such as domestic abuse survivors) to apply to have more personal information protected from public disclosure than currently possible. Any fees payable will adhere to HM Treasury’s cost recovery principles.

The Government has agreed new Heads of Terms with Drax for short term support from 2027 to 2031. It halves the subsidy paid to Drax, strengthens the sustainability arrangements to require 100% sustainable biomass, and reduces Drax’s generation so that it only operates when absolutely necessary on the system.

As usual, the hourly funding rates will vary between local authorities reflecting the different communities that local authorities serve. However, for the 2025/26 financial year, the national average three and four year-old hourly funding rate of local authorities is increasing by 4.1%. On top of this, eligible children can also attract additional funding through the early years pupil premium.

Early education gives all children, especially disadvantaged children, the best start in life. That is why the department is delivering the largest ever uplift to the early years pupil premium, increasing the rate by over 45% from 68p per hour in 2024/25 to £1 per hour in 2025/26, equivalent to up to £570 per eligible child per year.

Future spending decisions beyond 2025/26 will be announced following the next spending review.

Supply teachers perform a valuable role and the department is grateful for their important contribution to schools across the country.

Schools and local authorities are currently responsible for the recruitment of their supply teachers and are best placed to make decisions on their approach to recruitment.

A supply teacher’s pay and working conditions will depend on who employs the supply teacher.

Supply teachers employed directly by a state maintained school or local authority must be paid in accordance with the statutory arrangements for teachers laid down in the School Teachers’ Pay and Conditions Document.

If a supply teacher is employed by a private agency or non-maintained school, the employer can set the rate of pay and conditions of employment.

The department does not have plans at this time to assess the potential benefits of creating an agency for supply teachers to standardise pay and conditions. Instead, we are focused on our central mission to break down barriers to opportunity and boost life chances for every child by recruiting an additional 6,500 new expert teachers across our schools, both mainstream and specialist, and our colleges over the course of this parliament.

The department is already making progress towards this key pledge, including by accepting a 5.5% pay award for teachers and leaders in maintained schools, announcing a £233 million Initial Teacher Training financial incentives package for the 2025/26 recruitment cycle, and confirming targeted retention incentives for shortage subjects worth up to £6,000 after tax. We will continue to work alongside the sector as we seek to re-establish teaching as an attractive profession that existing teachers want to remain in, former teachers want to return to, and new graduates wish to join.

The statutory relationships, sex and health education (RSHE) guidance, which sets out the specific topics pupils should be taught, makes clear that teachers should be aware of common adverse childhood experiences and understand when and how these may be affecting their pupils. This will help teachers to tailor their lessons accordingly, taking decisions on appropriate resources and support to enable them to teach the curriculum effectively. Teachers are free to draw on the support and expertise of subject associations and other providers of curriculum support. The RSHE statutory guidance can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/relationships-education-relationships-and-sex-education-rse-and-health-education.

The RSHE statutory guidance is currently under review. The department is looking carefully at responses to the public consultation conducted last year, considering the relevant evidence and discussing with stakeholders before setting out next steps to make sure the guidance draws from the best available evidence. As part of this process, the department will explore whether additional content is required, including on grief education and bereavement.

The government is committed to 1.5 million homes being built across this Parliament while spreading opportunities and economic growth supported by a strong skills system.

The department is working closely with industry and across Whitehall on this ambition, including with the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, the Department for Business and Trade and the Department for Work and Pensions to understand skill needs and how to address them.

The department has made early progress on expanding the skills offer with the announcement of Construction and Industry Training Board and National Housebuilding Council funding worth £140 million, to deliver up to 32 Homebuilding Skills Hubs and to make 5,000 more construction apprenticeships available, making use of existing flexibilities in our apprenticeships system to help businesses get the skilled workers they need more quickly.

There are 96 high quality apprenticeship standards in the construction and the built environment sector approved for delivery across levels 2 to 6 to support employers and apprentices to develop the skills they need, with three apprenticeship standards in the sector approved for delivery at level 7.

This government had a dire fiscal inheritance with a £22 billion blackhole in the nation’s finances. We are taking difficult decisions to fix the foundations of our economy and prioritise government spending where it can be most impactful, including in order to generate opportunities for young people that enable them to make a start in good, fulfilling careers. The department will therefore be asking more employers to step forward and fund a significant number of level 7 apprenticeships themselves outside of the levy-funded growth and skills offer.

The department is taking advice from Skills England, who have been engaging with employers and sector-representative organisations, including in construction, and expects to make a final decision on affected apprenticeships shortly. Learners who have started these apprenticeships will be funded through to completion and employers will continue to be able to offer these apprenticeships where they choose to do so.

This government will build a modern childcare system that supports families from the end of parental leave, right through to the end of primary school.

Childcare needs do not stop when children start school. To support parents the government will deliver free, universal breakfast clubs in every primary school in England. Free breakfast clubs will be available in up to 750 early adopter schools from April 2025 as part of a ‘test and learn’ phase in advance of a national roll out.

The government is additionally delivering the national wraparound childcare programme which has provided local authorities with more than £160 million to deliver the expansion of new before and after school places for primary school-aged children. The government’s ambition is that, by 2026, all parents and carers of primary school-aged children who need it will be able to access term-time childcare in their local area from 8am to 6pm.

The programme is designed to support local authorities to deliver their statutory duty to ensure there are sufficient wraparound childcare places and remove the additional challenges faced in local areas with shortages. Where local wraparound provision is not available, parents can request that the school their child attends considers establishing wraparound or holiday childcare through the long-standing ‘right to request’ process.

The Government is committed to transitioning to a circular economy. Defra published the Residual Waste Infrastructure Capacity Note and an accompanying statement on 30 December 2024, which set out that government will only back new Energy from Waste projects that meet strict conditions. Proposals for new facilities will have to demonstrate a clearly defined domestic residual waste treatment capacity need to facilitate the diversion of residual waste away from landfill, or enable the replacement of older, less-efficient facilities.

New facilities will have to maximise efficiency and support the delivery of economic growth, net zero and the move to a circular economy. This will be achieved through application of Decarbonisation Readiness requirements that come into force from February 2026, increased heat recovery, and roll-out of Carbon Capture Utilisation and Storage (CCUS). The government is developing a business model to support Waste CCUS projects and stimulate private investment. The UK Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) Authority has confirmed its intention to include waste incineration and energy from waste in the scheme from 2028. Inclusion in the ETS means the sector's emissions will be capped along with other sectors in the scheme, and that cap will reduce in line with delivery of climate targets.

The Environment Agency assesses the emissions from new waste incinerators, also known as Energy from Waste (EfW) plants, as part of the permitting process and consults the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) on every application received. The UKHSA’s position is that modern, well-run and regulated municipal waste incinerators are not a significant risk to public health. This view is based on detailed assessments of the effects of air pollutants on health and on the fact that EfW plants make only a very small contribution to local concentrations and overall national emissions of air pollutants.

The Government is committed to transitioning to a circular economy, which will support economic growth, deliver green jobs, promote efficient and productive use of resources, minimise negative environmental impacts and help us accelerate to Net Zero. There will however still be a need for the safe and sanitary management of residual waste. In accordance with the Waste Hierarchy, sending residual waste that cannot currently be prevented, prepared for reuse, or recycled to Energy from Waste plants is preferable to disposal in landfill. We are clear however that we do not support incineration overcapacity.

Before the end of this year, the Government will publish an analysis of residual waste treatment capacity, including waste incineration, in England setting out our future capacity needs to inform future policy directions.

This is a devolved matter with regard to Scotland and Northern Ireland; hunting with dogs is a reserved matter with respect to Wales and therefore, the information provided relates to England and Wales only.

The Hunting Act 2004 makes it an offence to hunt a wild mammal with dogs except where it is carried out in accordance with the exemptions in the Act. This includes Fox Hunting.

In addition, the Government made a manifesto commitment to ban Trail Hunting as part of a set of measures to improve animal welfare. Work to determine the best approach for doing so is ongoing. Further announcements will be made in due course.

The Animal Welfare Committee’s updated Opinion on the welfare of farmed fish at the time of killing was published last year. A GB-wide farmed trout joint Government and industry working group is now examining the issues raised in the report to explore the potential options for more detailed welfare at killing requirements. The Scottish Government are also working closely with the salmon industry.

This information is not held by the Department for Transport.

The Department’s data on road injury collisions is based on information reported to the police via the STATS19 data collection system. STATS19 does not capture information on the health conditions of those involved in collisions.

The Department has no record of meetings on this matter during the last Parliament.

Where a person has deferred claiming their State Pension, they cannot accumulate increments that will increase their State Pension amount if they have received certain social security benefits including Carer’s Allowance.

The underlying principle is to prevent a person earning an enhancement to their pension while drawing another benefit that would otherwise have not been payable had they been receiving their State Pension.

The Department encourages people to seek independent financial advice before making a decision not to claim their State Pension when they reach State Pension age and this is set out in GOV.UK at https://www.gov.uk/plan-retirement-income/get-financial-advice

Personal Independence Payment, the main disability benefit, is based on an assessment of the customer’s needs and not whether they have a particular condition or not. Award reviews are a key feature of these benefits to ensure that the level of benefit matches the customer’s current needs.

The Health Transformation Programme is modernising health and disability benefit services to improve efficiency and customer experience. By improving how we gather evidence and by enabling the re-use of information, the new service will provide DWP agents and Healthcare Professionals with easier access to relevant information. This will reduce the burden on customers to provide complex information and reduce the need for them to provide it more than once. As part of this, we are exploring the potential for data sharing between the Department for Health and Social Care and DWP.

HMRC and DWP already have well established data-sharing processes and procedures, which are governed by the rules on how data can be accessed, shared and used whilst safeguarding individuals’ data and privacy. DWP officials are currently considering options of using government data, including HMRC data, more effectively to help identify households eligible for Pension Credit. However, a person’s eligibility for Pension Credit and the amount they may get depends on their particular financial and personal circumstances and not all of these can be accurately determined from Government data alone.

All customer-facing DWP colleagues are undertaking mandatory mental health awareness training to better support claimants who may present with mental health issues. All colleagues also have access to a wide range of guidance and signposting to help support customers. Where further specialist help is required, DWP has a national network of Advanced Customer Support Senior Leaders who can provide additional advice and support through the local networks they have built with external partners and organisations.

Additionally, through the national DWP Visiting Service, the department provides additional face-to-face support across all service lines to customers who cannot access DWP services in any other way. A visit can be arranged for a customer if they need extra help to claim benefits, for example because they have complex needs, are disabled, are a vulnerable young person making a claim for the first time, have nobody else to support them or cannot claim benefits in any other way.

Self-employed pregnant women who have paid the required Class 2 National Insurance contributions are entitled to Maternity Allowance.

As a general rule, maternity pay is primarily a health and safety provision relating specifically to pregnancy, childbirth and breastfeeding. As there is no associated period of pregnancy for adopters, they are unable to make a claim for maternity pay regardless of their employment status.

The Government very much values self-employed people who come forward to take on the challenging but rewarding role of being an adoptive parent, that is why there is provision for Local Authorities to make discretionary payments, equivalent to Maternity Allowance, to self-employed adopters who do not qualify for Statutory Adoption Pay and where they satisfy the relevant criteria. This payment is means-tested and ensures that resources are targeted at those adopters who need it most, as part of a package of post-adoption support.

Prospective adopters and the child or children that they intend to adopt are also entitled to an assessment of their family’s needs. This includes a whole host of support including discretionary means-tested financial support, advice, information and counselling, and support services.

Depending on individual circumstances, additional financial support, for example, Universal Credit, Child Benefit and the Sure Start Maternity Grant (a lump sum payment of £500) may also be available to new parents.

The Government has committed to a review of parental leave to ensure that it best supports working families. Work is already underway on planning for its delivery.