Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:

To ask His Majesty's Government whether, and if so why, they are advocating for parish councils to change to ‘gov.uk’ domain names and associated email addresses for councillors; and what assessment, if any, they have made of the cost of such a change.

The Government has advocated for Parish Councils to use .gov.uk domains for their websites and email accounts although there is no legal obligation to do so. This helps councillors to use government branded email for official business, have additional security benefits and meet legal obligations such as Freedom of Information and Data Subject Access Requests.

The Department of Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) has helped to lower the cost of buying .gov.uk domain names and has set up the Parish Council Domains Helper Service to support councils, which choose to move to .gov.uk. The department also works with the National Association of Local Councils and Society of Local County Clerks to support their efforts to professionalise the Parish Council sector.