Asked by: James Cleverly (Conservative - Braintree)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, if he will publish the full meeting, visit and event schedule for Lord Khan's visit to Pakistan from 13 to 17 April 2025.
Answered by Samantha Dixon - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Housing, Communities and Local Government)
A summary of the former Minister’s schedule will be placed in the Library of the House.
Asked by: James Cleverly (Conservative - Braintree)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, with reference to the British High Commission Islamabad news story of 17 April 2025, which individuals and external organisations Lord Khan met during his visit to the (a) Overseas Pakistanis Convention, (b) Faisal Mosque and (c) St Joseph’s Cathedral whilst on his official Ministerial visit to Pakistan.
Answered by Samantha Dixon - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Housing, Communities and Local Government)
A summary of the former Minister’s schedule will be placed in the Library of the House.
Asked by: James Cleverly (Conservative - Braintree)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, pursuant to the Answer of 20 January 2026 to Question 104771 on MHCLG: Remote Working, if he will publish the recorded workplace attendance data for the last quarter, for each of the individual offices outside London.
Answered by Samantha Dixon - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Housing, Communities and Local Government)
MHCLG publishes quarterly HQ Occupancy Statistics for its headquarters at 2 Marsham Street, London (not proportional attendance). We do not intend to publish regional information or numeric staff attendances.
Asked by: Ben Maguire (Liberal Democrat - North Cornwall)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what assessment he has made of the (a) accessibility and (b)) ease of access of online consultations held by his Department.
Answered by Samantha Dixon - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Housing, Communities and Local Government)
Consultations at MHCLG are published on GOV.UK using the ‘consultations’ content type. This page type has been designed by Government Digital Service (GDS) to meet Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.2 standards.
Teams are supported to follow GDS guidelines for creating accessible web documents when creating consultations. Wherever possible, MHCLG publish consultation documents in HTML format to maximise accessibility.
Respondents can comment on a consultation via an online survey that is hosted on MHCLG’s consultation platform, Citizen Space. The Citizen Space platform has been developed to meet WCAG 2.2 accessibility standards and is commonly used by central and local government to conduct accessible consultation processes.
Most consultations at MHCLG also give users the opportunity to make enquiries and to respond to the consultation via email and/or by post.
Asked by: Joe Morris (Labour - Hexham)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps are being taken to ensure the enforcement of regular risk assessment and monitoring of private water supplies by local authorities as per their responsibilities outlined in the Private Water Supplies Regulations 2016.
Answered by Emma Hardy - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Private water supplies are regulated by local authorities. They are responsible for identifying risks to the quality of the water and must have comprehensive monitoring programmes in place to sample the drinking water for any element, organism or substance that they believe may cause the supply not to be wholesome.
Defra expects all local authorities to undertake their statutory duties. Local authorities are regularly reminded of their duties, and where they may not be being complied with, in the Chief Inspector of Drinking Water’s annual reports on the quality of private water supplies in England. Local authorities’ compliance with reporting duties is raised by officials from Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government through their regular liaison meeting with the Local Government Association.
Asked by: Baroness Maclean of Redditch (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the Minister for Housing and Planning’s statement on 27 January (HC Deb col 750) that an immediate peppercorn cap on lease payments “could carry significant risks”, what are those risks; what assessment of those risks have been made by (1) the Ministry of Housing Communities and Local Government, and (2) the Treasury, and if they will publish these analyses; what meetings ministers have had with representatives of freehold estates and pension funds since taking office; and what risks, if any, they consider an immediate peppercorn cap poses to building remediation and safety.
Answered by Baroness Taylor of Stevenage - Baroness in Waiting (HM Household) (Whip)
The government is capping ground rent at £250 per year, before changing to a peppercorn in 40 years. These measures, as set out in the draft Commonhold and Leasehold Reform Bill, deliver on the manifesto commitment to “tackle unregulated and unaffordable ground rent charges” and “bring the feudal leasehold system to an end”. This policy will directly address cost of living pressures for leaseholders, and issues with buying, selling and mortgaging properties with high ground rents, before ending ground rents for good.
We recognise that these reforms will have a significant impact on freeholders and investors, but the government considers this is a justified and proportionate intervention to address harms and deliver a fair and effective housing market. We have taken investors’ concerns into account when developing this policy, which we believe strikes a fair balance between leaseholders, freeholders and those invested in ground rents.
For further information, I refer the Noble Baroness to the (attached) Policy statement on ground rents published on 27 January 2026.
Asked by: James Cleverly (Conservative - Braintree)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, how many headcount staff in his Department work compressed hours on full pay.
Answered by Samantha Dixon - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Housing, Communities and Local Government)
At 31 January 2026 there were 760 active payroll staff who worked full‑time hours over a compressed period, meaning they received full pay. This figure includes a range of different compressed full‑time working arrangements.
Asked by: Bell Ribeiro-Addy (Labour - Clapham and Brixton Hill)
Question to the Department for Energy Security & Net Zero:
To ask the Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero, what assessment he has made of the potential implications for his polices of heat network operators issuing retrospective bills covering multiple years where no prior invoices or statements were provided.
Answered by Martin McCluskey - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Energy Security and Net Zero)
Under the newly established heat network market framework, Ofgem Authorisation conditions limit back-billing to 12 months if no accurate bill or statement of account was previously provided.
Where heat charges are ‘bundled’ into leasehold or social housing charges, the Landlord and Tenant Act (1985), which caps back-billing at 18 months, takes precedence.
We are working closely with the Ministry of Housing, Communities to explore unbundling individual consumption of heat from service charges so that the 12-month back billing rules apply to all heat network consumers.
Asked by: James Cleverly (Conservative - Braintree)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, if he will list the expert advisers who are not civil servants or special advisers that provide advice the Minister for Housing and Planning.
Answered by Samantha Dixon - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Housing, Communities and Local Government)
MHCLG ministers are advised by civil servants employed by the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government.
Details of all meetings with external stakeholders are published on a quarterly basis on gov.uk.
Asked by: Joe Robertson (Conservative - Isle of Wight East)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what assessment he has made of the potential impact of the decision to discontinue Island Forums on island communities; and whether he plans to introduce alternative mechanisms.
Answered by Miatta Fahnbulleh - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Housing, Communities and Local Government)
We recognise the unique opportunities and challenges faced by island communities, including those on the Isle of Wight, and it is essential that they are still able to raise issues with government. We also recognise that there has been positive and constructive engagement across and between Forum members, and we encourage them to continue working closely with colleagues to share best practice and develop effective, evidence‑based solutions.
The decision to discontinue the Islands Forum at the 2024 Autumn Budget was taken considering the difficult fiscal circumstances we are facing. Since then, we have been working closely with other UK Government departments to determine the future of the forum and agree responsibilities for future engagement - we wanted to get this right.
It has been agreed that officials from the Offices for Nations will now take forward island engagement in their respective nations, whilst MHCLG will continue working with island communities in England, on issues that are our responsibility respectively. My officials are also able to help island communities make connections with other departments across government.