Asked by: Carolyn Harris (Labour - Neath and Swansea East)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, if she will include the British Standard Institution's health and safety document entitled BS 30416 on Menstruation, Menstrual Health and Menopause in the Workplace, published on 31 May 2023, in her Department's guidance on the Employment Rights Act 2025.
Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
We recognise that employers already have access to a wide range of guidance on supporting employees experiencing menopause, including resources produced by the British Standards Institution. While current government guidance does not specifically reference BS 30416: Menstruation, Menstrual Health and Menopause in the Workplace, our aim is to ensure that current and future government advice complements and aligns with such materials.
As part of the Employment Rights Act 2025, this government took the first step towards requiring large employers to publish an action plan detailing what steps they are taking to support employees through the menopause. To support employers to develop these plans, the Office for Equality and Opportunity will provide guidance on recommended actions. This will be drawn from existing evidence, such as DWP's own Menopause in the Workplace Literature Review, while recognising that some actions may also support women managing other reproductive health conditions at work.
Additionally, as part of Government’s wider commitment to Make Work Pay, DWP committed to publishing guidance, including for small employers, on measures to consider relating to uniform and temperature, flexible working and recording menopause-related leave and absence. This is available on the Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service (ACAS): Managing the menopause - Menopause at work - Acas. Actions set out in this guidance are aligned with, and complement, the advice set out in BS 30416 on Menstruation, Menstrual Health and Menopause in the Workplace.
We will keep the evidence base and our guidance under review to ensure it reflects emerging research and best practice in supporting employees experiencing menopause and wider reproductive health conditions.
Asked by: Mohammad Yasin (Labour - Bedford)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps his Department is taking to help ensure that people who leave employment due to long-term health conditions or disability can access Employment and Support Allowance and Personal Independence Payment without (a) delays and (b) repeated appeals.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Department for Work and Pensions is committed to providing timely and accurate support to people whose ability to work is affected by long-term health conditions or disabilities through Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) and Personal Independence Payment (PIP). Anyone who claims ESA and PIP must satisfy the relevant conditions of entitlement, regardless of the circumstances in which the claim is made. Initial decisions on claims will be made without delay once all evidence needed is available.
Decisions are made within a statutory framework, which allows for revision within one month of notification, with extensions where reasonable. Decisions may also be revised or superseded where there has been official error, where new medical evidence is presented or where a customer has had a relevant change in circumstances. These provisions help ensure accurate decision making and reduce the need for repeated appeals.
We recognise that some customers have complex needs and may require additional support and reasonable adjustments, including adapted communication, additional time, and advocacy from representatives or appointees.
Asked by: Mohammad Yasin (Labour - Bedford)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what guidance his Department has issued on the consideration of occupational health reports when assessing claims for (a) Employment and Support Allowance and (b) Personal Independence Payment for people with cognitive or fluctuating conditions.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Department provides comprehensive training and guidance for assessment providers and the health professionals (HPs) who carry out both Work Capability Assessments (WCA) in Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) and Universal Credit (UC), and Personal Independence Payment (PIP) assessments. The WCA Handbook and the Personal Independence Payment Assessment Guide (PIPAG) sets out how HPs should evaluate all relevant evidence when assessing a claimant’s functional limitations against the respective criteria.
Both WCA and PIP assessments are functional assessments, focusing on the impact of health condition(s) or disability. HPs consider all available evidence. DWP decision makers give due consideration to all available evidence when making decisions on benefit entitlement, including the HP’s assessment report and any evidence provided by the individual, their GP or consultant, and anybody else that provides them with formal or informal support.
HPs receive training on cognitive and fluctuating conditions and how these might impact on how individuals perform the activities/descriptors which form the assessments.
Asked by: Lord Mackinlay of Richborough (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask His Majesty's Government what discussions they have had with amputee charities regarding helping amputees into work.
Answered by Baroness Sherlock - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Good work is good for health, so we want everyone to get work and get on in work, including amputees, whoever they are and wherever they live. Backed by £240 million investment, the Get Britain Working White Paper launched in November 2024 is driving forward approaches to tackling economic inactivity.
Blesma, the veterans’ limbless charity, are members of the Operational Stakeholder Engagement Forum and have been members of a Universal Credit stakeholder forum and the Health Transformation Forum.
Disabled people are a diverse group so access to the right work and health support, in the right place, at the right time, is key. We therefore have a range of specialist initiatives to support individuals to stay in work and get back into work, including those that join up employment and health systems.
Existing measures include support from Work Coaches and Disability Employment Advisers (DEAs) in Jobcentres and Access to Work grants, as well as joining up health and employment support around the individual through Employment Advisors in NHS Talking Therapies, Individual Placement and Support in Primary Care and WorkWell. We are also rolling out Connect to Work, our supported employment programme for anyone who is disabled, has a health condition or is experiencing more complex barriers to work.
We set out our plan for the “Pathways to Work Guarantee” in our Pathways to Work: Reforming Benefits and Support to Get Britain Working Green Paper, and are building towards our guaranteed offer of personalised work, health and skills support for disabled people and people with health conditions on out of work benefits. The guarantee is backed by £1 billion a year of new, additional funding by the end of the decade. We anticipate the guarantee, once fully rolled out, will include: a support conversation to identify next steps, one-to-one caseworker support, periodic engagement, and an offer of specialist long-term work health and skills support.
Additionally, we have developed a digital information service for employers, oversees the Disability Confident Scheme, and continues to increase access to Occupational Health.
The 10 Year Health Plan, published in July, builds on existing work to better integrate health with employment support and incentivise greater cross-system collaboration, recognising good work is good for health. The Plan also states the Government’s intention to break down barriers to opportunity by delivering the holistic support that people need to access and thrive in employment by ensuring a better health service for everyone, regardless of condition or service area. It outlines how the neighbourhood health service will join up support from across the work, health and skills systems to help address the multiple complex challenges that often stop people finding and staying in work.
Asked by: Lord Mackinlay of Richborough (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask His Majesty's Government what support is available to amputees seeking work.
Answered by Baroness Sherlock - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Good work is good for health, so we want everyone to get work and get on in work, including amputees, whoever they are and wherever they live. Backed by £240 million investment, the Get Britain Working White Paper launched in November 2024 is driving forward approaches to tackling economic inactivity.
Blesma, the veterans’ limbless charity, are members of the Operational Stakeholder Engagement Forum and have been members of a Universal Credit stakeholder forum and the Health Transformation Forum.
Disabled people are a diverse group so access to the right work and health support, in the right place, at the right time, is key. We therefore have a range of specialist initiatives to support individuals to stay in work and get back into work, including those that join up employment and health systems.
Existing measures include support from Work Coaches and Disability Employment Advisers (DEAs) in Jobcentres and Access to Work grants, as well as joining up health and employment support around the individual through Employment Advisors in NHS Talking Therapies, Individual Placement and Support in Primary Care and WorkWell. We are also rolling out Connect to Work, our supported employment programme for anyone who is disabled, has a health condition or is experiencing more complex barriers to work.
We set out our plan for the “Pathways to Work Guarantee” in our Pathways to Work: Reforming Benefits and Support to Get Britain Working Green Paper, and are building towards our guaranteed offer of personalised work, health and skills support for disabled people and people with health conditions on out of work benefits. The guarantee is backed by £1 billion a year of new, additional funding by the end of the decade. We anticipate the guarantee, once fully rolled out, will include: a support conversation to identify next steps, one-to-one caseworker support, periodic engagement, and an offer of specialist long-term work health and skills support.
Additionally, we have developed a digital information service for employers, oversees the Disability Confident Scheme, and continues to increase access to Occupational Health.
The 10 Year Health Plan, published in July, builds on existing work to better integrate health with employment support and incentivise greater cross-system collaboration, recognising good work is good for health. The Plan also states the Government’s intention to break down barriers to opportunity by delivering the holistic support that people need to access and thrive in employment by ensuring a better health service for everyone, regardless of condition or service area. It outlines how the neighbourhood health service will join up support from across the work, health and skills systems to help address the multiple complex challenges that often stop people finding and staying in work.
Asked by: Rebecca Long Bailey (Labour - Salford)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, what external oversight mechanisms are in place to ensure that publicly owned broadcasters investigate whistleblowing concerns independently of senior management.
Answered by Ian Murray - Minister of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)
Our public service broadcasters are operationally independent of Government and so probationary periods rightfully remain a matter for them.
Employees of public service broadcasters, like most employees in Great Britain, who blow the whistle on certain types of wrongdoing are protected from retaliatory unfair dismissal and detriment under the Employment Rights Act 1996 if legislative conditions are met. This is a day one right, meaning employees do not need to satisfy any qualifying period of service to seek remedies in employment tribunals.
Employees of publicly owned broadcasters will be protected if they blow the whistle to Ofcom, the independent media regulator, if certain conditions in the legislation are met. Ofcom is a ‘prescribed person’ under the Public Interest Disclosure (Prescribed Person Order) 2014. The Government is also exploring the addition of the Creative Industries Independent Standards Authority (CIISA) to this list and the Secretary of State continues to call on the television sector and wider creative industries to support the work of CIISA to improve standards of behaviour across industry.
Asked by: Rebecca Long Bailey (Labour - Salford)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, what assessment she has made of trends in the use of extension of probationary periods in publicly owned broadcasters to detriment whistleblowing employees.
Answered by Ian Murray - Minister of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)
Our public service broadcasters are operationally independent of Government and so probationary periods rightfully remain a matter for them.
Employees of public service broadcasters, like most employees in Great Britain, who blow the whistle on certain types of wrongdoing are protected from retaliatory unfair dismissal and detriment under the Employment Rights Act 1996 if legislative conditions are met. This is a day one right, meaning employees do not need to satisfy any qualifying period of service to seek remedies in employment tribunals.
Employees of publicly owned broadcasters will be protected if they blow the whistle to Ofcom, the independent media regulator, if certain conditions in the legislation are met. Ofcom is a ‘prescribed person’ under the Public Interest Disclosure (Prescribed Person Order) 2014. The Government is also exploring the addition of the Creative Industries Independent Standards Authority (CIISA) to this list and the Secretary of State continues to call on the television sector and wider creative industries to support the work of CIISA to improve standards of behaviour across industry.
Asked by: Nadia Whittome (Labour - Nottingham East)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment he has made of the potential impact of long working hours and workforce burnout on staff wellbeing, retention and safe staffing levels within the NHS.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
We know from engagement on the 10-Year Health Plan that many National Health Service staff feel disempowered and overwhelmed. Tackling this and providing proper support for staff is a top priority. NHS organisations have a responsibility to create supportive working environments for staff, ensuring they have the conditions they need to thrive, including access to high quality health and wellbeing support.
The Government is committed to publishing a 10 Year Workforce Plan which will have a focus on supporting and retaining our hardworking and dedicated healthcare professionals. This includes the development of a new set of staff standards for modern employment, which will reaffirm our commitment to improving retention and are likely to focus on flexible working, improving staff health and wellbeing and dealing with violence, racism, and sexual harassment in the NHS workplace. Additionally, we will roll out Staff Treatment Hubs that will ensure staff have access to high quality support for occupational health, including support for mental health and back conditions.
Asked by: John McDonnell (Labour - Hayes and Harlington)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, if he will take steps to establish the (a) hourly rate of pay and (b) annual hours of each seafarer grade at the Royal Fleet Auxiliary.
Answered by Louise Sandher-Jones - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Defence)
We are already working to redefine Terms and Conditions of service for the Royal Fleet Auxiliary, including salaried obligations, is already underway. This work will inform a pay and reward strategy to enhance lived experience and optimise effective and efficient capability in line with the recommendations of the Strategic Defence Review.
Asked by: John McDonnell (Labour - Hayes and Harlington)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, with reference to the current online Royal Navy recruitment campaign, how many merchant seafarers currently employed by the Royal Fleet Auxiliary work a 3-month on, 3-month off schedule; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Louise Sandher-Jones - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Defence)
The ability to opt-in to a reduced assignment length continues to be available to all Royal Fleet Auxiliary Seafarers. As of January 2026, 10% of permanent employees have chosen this schedule. The previous detail on the recruiting site suggesting this as the default crewing model has been removed.