Asked by: Stephanie Peacock (Labour - Barnsley East)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what proportion of his Department’s (a) advertising and (b) marketing expenditure was on (i) local newspapers in print and online, (ii) national newspapers in print and online, (iii) social media, (iv) search engines, (v) broadcast and on-demand television and (vi) other channels in the most recent year for which data is available.
Answered by Simon Hoare - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities)
The data requested is not held centrally.
Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what steps his Department is taking to ensure people leaving prison have settled accommodation upon release.
Answered by Edward Argar - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
The Ministry of Justice (MoJ) is committed to preventing homelessness and works closely with the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) and the Welsh Government to do so. Prisons and probation have a statutory duty to refer someone at risk of homelessness to a local authority for assistance, and we have worked closely with DLUHC on the design and delivery of their Accommodation for Ex-Offenders scheme. We have set up a Cross-Whitehall Accommodation Board, attended by officials from MoJ, HMPPS, Welsh Government and DLUHC, to ensure collaboration across policy and operational areas. In the year to March 2023, 86% of prison leavers were in accommodation on their first night of release from custody (excluding cases where the status was unknown). This is up from 80% in 2019-20, the year immediately before our accommodation investments began.
In July 2021, we launched our groundbreaking Community Accommodation Service Tier-3 in five probation regions, to guarantee up to 12-weeks temporary accommodation to prison leavers subject to probation supervision who are at risk of homelessness on release, including those released under the End of Custody Supervised Licence measure. From April 2023, the service was expanded across all probation regions in England and Wales and continues to bring new beds online as the service embeds. By January 2023, the proportion of offenders housed on the first night of their release from custody was 7.6 percentage points higher in CAS3 regions versus non-CAS3 regions.
Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what steps he is taking to help ensure prison leavers do not become homeless upon release.
Answered by Edward Argar - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
The Ministry of Justice (MoJ) is committed to preventing homelessness and works closely with the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) and the Welsh Government to do so. Prisons and probation have a statutory duty to refer someone at risk of homelessness to a local authority for assistance, and we have worked closely with DLUHC on the design and delivery of their Accommodation for Ex-Offenders scheme. We have set up a Cross-Whitehall Accommodation Board, attended by officials from MoJ, HMPPS, Welsh Government and DLUHC, to ensure collaboration across policy and operational areas. In the year to March 2023, 86% of prison leavers were in accommodation on their first night of release from custody (excluding cases where the status was unknown). This is up from 80% in 2019-20, the year immediately before our accommodation investments began.
In July 2021, we launched our groundbreaking Community Accommodation Service Tier-3 in five probation regions, to guarantee up to 12-weeks temporary accommodation to prison leavers subject to probation supervision who are at risk of homelessness on release, including those released under the End of Custody Supervised Licence measure. From April 2023, the service was expanded across all probation regions in England and Wales and continues to bring new beds online as the service embeds. By January 2023, the proportion of offenders housed on the first night of their release from custody was 7.6 percentage points higher in CAS3 regions versus non-CAS3 regions.
Asked by: Jonathan Ashworth (Labour (Co-op) - Leicester South)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what steps his Department has taken to reduce the costs of fraud in his Department in the last three financial years.
Answered by Simon Hoare - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities)
The Government is determined to uncover fraud in the public sector and is proud of its record.
As part of this, the Government established the Public Sector Fraud Authority (PSFA). In 22/23 the PSFA set a target of delivering £180 million of savings to the taxpayer. In fact the PSFA far surpassed this within the first 12 months by preventing and recovering £311 million. As it enters its second year, the PSFA has a target of achieving £185 million of savings for the taxpayer.
The Government has also announced an additional £34 million to deploy cutting edge tools and Artificial Intelligence tools to help combat fraud across the public sector, saving £100 million for the public purse. This is in addition to existing partnerships between PSFA and the tech sector.
Apr. 22 2024
Source Page: Overview and scrutiny: statutory guidance for councils, combined authorities and combined county authoritiesFound: From: Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Published 22 April 2024 Get
Oral Evidence Apr. 22 2024
Inquiry: The Office for Local GovernmentFound: of State, and Catherine Frances, Director General, Local Government, Resilience and Communities, Department
Apr. 22 2024
Source Page: I. List of ministerial responsibilities. 88p. II. List of non-ministerial departments and executive agencies. 22p. III. Letter dated 19/04/2024 from Alex Burghart MP to the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee regarding documents for deposit, and copying them for deposit in the House libraries. 1p.Found: organisations/land-registry Email: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/contact-hm-land-registry Parent Department: Department
Apr. 22 2024
Source Page: I. List of ministerial responsibilities. 88p. II. List of non-ministerial departments and executive agencies. 22p. III. Letter dated 19/04/2024 from Alex Burghart MP to the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee regarding documents for deposit, and copying them for deposit in the House libraries. 1p.Found: for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Ministerial.Correspondence@levellingup.gov.uk Department for