Asked by: Lord Beamish (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, pursuant to the Answer of 5 June 2023 to Question 186306 on Office for Veterans' Affairs: Photography, what was the budget for the Cabinet Office Communications team in each of the last five financial years.
Answered by Alex Burghart - Shadow Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster
Setting out the budget may lead to inaccurate figures due to in-year budget changes. Instead, I can provide the actual spend.
The Cabinet Office Communications team employs two Digital Media Officers who support all Ministers in the Department. This is an essential part of helping to explain the Department's policies and priorities to a wider audience, such budgets have existed under successive administrations.
The budget for Communications team staff, including the two Digital Media Officers, is held by the Director of Communications and is accounted for in line with Cabinet Office personnel budget management processes.
The total actual expenditure for the Cabinet Office Communications cost centre, for the periods in question is as follows:
FY | Total expenditure (£) |
18/19 | 2,105,850.23 |
19/20 | 2,018,372.96 |
20/21 | 2,077,533.20 |
21/22 | 2,124,742.32 |
22/23 | 2,659,096.71 |
Asked by: Emily Thornberry (Labour - Islington South and Finsbury)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, with reference to her Department’s transparency data entitled Home Office procurement card spend over £500: March 2023, for what purpose her Delivery Directorate hired an event photographer on 16 March 2023; and whether her Department made an assessment of the potential merits of the creative and video team within her Department’s Communications Directorate carrying out that work.
Answered by Chris Philp - Shadow Home Secretary
The photographer was engaged on behalf of the Commissioner for Countering Extremism, to take photographs at an extremism conference in March 2023.
The photographer provided the best value for money and the most appropriate way of meeting the requirements of the event.
Asked by: Lord Beamish (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, pursuant to the Answer of 18 May 2023 to Question 184900 on Office for Veterans' Affairs: Photography and Social Media, how the budget for cross-government photography services is accounted for.
Answered by Alex Burghart - Shadow Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster
The Cabinet Office Communications team employs two Digital Media Officers who support all Ministers in the Department. This is an essential part of helping to explain the Department's policies and priorities to a wider audience.
The budget for Communications team staff, including the two Digital Media Officers, is held by the Director of Communications and is accounted for in line with Cabinet Office personnel budget management processes.
Asked by: Lord Beamish (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, pursuant to the Answer of 18 May 2023 to Question 184900 on Office for Veterans' Affairs: Photography and Social Media, who is the budget holder for cross-government photography services.
Answered by Alex Burghart - Shadow Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster
The Cabinet Office Communications team employs two Digital Media Officers who support all Ministers in the Department. This is an essential part of helping to explain the Department's policies and priorities to a wider audience.
The budget for Communications team staff, including the two Digital Media Officers, is held by the Director of Communications and is accounted for in line with Cabinet Office personnel budget management processes.
Asked by: Lord Beamish (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, pursuant to the Answer of 18 May 2023 to Question 184900 on Office for Veterans' Affairs: Photography and Social Media, whether the Office for Veterans’ Affairs has a dedicated photographer.
Answered by Johnny Mercer
The Office for Veterans’ Affairs does not have a dedicated photographer and draws on resources from the Cabinet Office Communications team who support all Ministers in the Department.
Asked by: Lord Beamish (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, pursuant to the Answer of 18 May 2023 to Question 184900 on Office for Veterans' Affairs: Photography and Social Media, how many photographers and videographers work in the Cabinet Office as of 18 May 2023.
Answered by Alex Burghart - Shadow Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster
The Cabinet Office Communications team employs two Digital Media Officers who support all Ministers in the Department. This is an essential part of helping to explain the Department's policies and priorities to a wider audience.
Asked by: Lord Beamish (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, how much from the public purse the Office for Veterans' Affairs has spent on (a) photography, (b) videography and (c) social media promotion in each of the last 12 months.
Answered by Johnny Mercer
We are in a digital age, where social media and digital communications are an essential part of government. Photographers are a cross-government resource, supporting departments and Ministers, and play a critical role in the support of the Government’s digital communications activity and in progressing key policy areas.
Asked by: Alan Brown (Scottish National Party - Kilmarnock and Loudoun)
Question
To ask the hon. Member for Broxbourne, representing the Restoration and Renewal Client Board, what the estimated cost is for drone surveys associated with the restoration and renewal project.
Answered by Charles Walker
The R&R Programme is carrying out tens of thousands of hours of complex building surveys and investigations to develop even more detailed records of the Palace of Westminster. These records are being used to inform design and planning, and future decisions on the essential restoration work required.
Two intrusive surveys, the Photogrammetric and Heating, Ventilation and Air-Conditioning (HVAC) surveys, have recently started which contain an element of drone surveys as well as other activities such as high-resolution photography. The total estimated cost of these surveys is £1 million although this covers a number of activities.
Due to how the activity schedules in these contracts are priced it is not possible to disaggregate the costs of the drone flights from the rest of the works being undertaken. However, it is anticipated that a significant portion of the costs will relate to the contractor resource required to deliver the surveys and the processing of the images taken (rather than the cost of the drones themselves).
This figure also does not include Delivery Authority internal staffing costs or the costs of the contractor planning and overseeing the overall survey programme because those costs cannot be disaggregated by individual survey.
Asked by: Baroness Helic (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government what guidance they have issued to police and forensic nurses regarding the use of Alternative Light Sources to detect bruising on dark skin; and what steps they are taking to support the use of this process.
Answered by Lord Sharpe of Epsom - Shadow Minister (Business and Trade)
The Home Office has not issued any official guidance.
The identification and interpretation of bruising is medical opinion and well established (see for example Assessment of bruise age on dark-skinned individuals using tristimulus colorimetry - PubMed (nih.gov)) in terms of amount of force, type of impact and longevity. Darker skin makes it more difficult but not impossible to examine. Various light sources and other means can be used to reveal or enhance the information which is a branch of forensic photography.
Asked by: Matt Western (Labour - Warwick and Leamington)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, how many photographers were employed by the Treasury to accompany the Prime Minister while he was in post as Chancellor of the Exchequer; and what was the cost of their salary to his Department.
Answered by James Cartlidge - Shadow Secretary of State for Defence
Photographs of the Chancellor were taken by members of the Communications team alongside other duties, as is common across Government Departments. These photographs were then used to communicate Departmental policy aims.