Question to the Cabinet Office:

To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office, what steps he is taking to improve response times to correspondence from (a) hon. Members and (b) Peers.

The Government places great importance on the effective and timely handling of correspondence. While each department and agency is responsible for its own performance, the Cabinet Office published data on response timeliness for each department on 15 July 2021, and will publish data more frequently in the future. While the overall performance against departmental targets decreased from 85% in 2019 to 70% in 2020, the volume of correspondence sent from MPs and Peers to the Government increased by 81% between 2019 and 2020.

To further improve the timeliness of correspondence, the Cabinet Office will shortly publish a revised Guide to Handling Correspondence to remind departments and agencies of their obligations and the expected standard of service.