Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:
To ask the Deputy Foreign Secretary, what steps the Government is taking to work with EU countries to counter disinformation campaigns orchestrated by foreign state actors.
Answered by Nusrat Ghani - Minister of State (Minister for Europe)
The UK works closely with international partners to counter Foreign Information Manipulation and Interference (FIMI) by hostile actors, including with the European Union and with some EU members States. This includes work to identify and respond to the diverse and evolving threat to our democracies from information manipulation. We work closely with countries across Europe to develop effective national security responses to FIMI; enable communication activities to challenge information manipulation; and support independent media and civil society organisations to build resilience to disinformation. We have sanctioned enablers of Russian disinformation and information manipulation including Russia state media and Kremlin-funded information operations globally, including in Europe.
Asked by: Gregory Campbell (Democratic Unionist Party - East Londonderry)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, when he expects to receive the results of the evaluation of Future Transport Zones commissioned by his Department from the National Centre for Social Research.
Answered by Anthony Browne - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
The Department manages a programme-level evaluation of the Future Transport Zones on how the four Zones designed, procured and implemented their programmes, currently running from 2021-25. The externally commissioned evaluation of Future Transport Zones is still ongoing.
Asked by: Ian Lavery (Labour - Wansbeck)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, whether she has had discussions with the Football Association on increasing funding for third and fourth generation playing surfaces.
Answered by Stuart Andrew - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport)
The Government is committed to delivering top class sports facilities across the country, so that everyone can take part in sport and physical activity. As part of this commitment, the Government is delivering an historic level of direct investment to build or upgrade thousands of grassroots sport facilities across the UK.
Between 2021 and 2025, the UK Government is delivering investment of over £400 million to build or upgrade thousands of grassroots facilities across the UK. The largest component of this funding is the Multi-Sport Grassroots Facilities Programme, which is investing over £320 million in, among other things, new third generation playing surfaces.
Government recognises the importance of levelling up grassroots facilities across the country and as part of the delivery of the Multi-Sport Grassroots Facilities Programme, we are analysing the need for future funding and how this will be delivered, taking into account the upcoming Spending Review.
Government has been clear that the Football Association plays an integral role in the funding of grassroots facilities, and investment in both 3G and grass pitches remains a key priority. Government will continue to work with the Football Association to encourage future investment into facilities through the Football Foundation.
Asked by: Nia Griffith (Labour - Llanelli)
Question to the Northern Ireland Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, what steps he has taken to reduce the cost of fraud in his Department in the last three financial years.
Answered by Steve Baker - Minister of State (Northern Ireland Office)
The Northern Ireland Office reported no cases of fraud or amounts lost due to fraud or error in any of the last three financial years. This is disclosed as part of the Annual Report and Accounts available on GOV.UK.
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 £180m 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.
The Northern Ireland Office has also recently launched a counter Fraud, Bribery and Corruption Policy and Response Plan.
Asked by: Kerry McCarthy (Labour - Bristol East)
Question to the Department for Energy Security & Net Zero:
To ask the Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero, with reference to the minutes of the meeting of the Net Zero Council on 9 November 2023, which member of the Net Zero Council has been nominated to lead its public engagement workstream; and what steps the Council has taken to encourage consumer engagement.
Answered by Justin Tomlinson - Minister of State (Department for Energy Security and Net Zero)
A public engagement working group has been convened under the Net Zero Council, meeting an ask from businesses for consumer-facing information on net zero to support their own engagement. The group is chaired by Council member Chris Hulatt, Co-founder of Octopus Investments, and includes representatives from key business sectors, behaviour change experts and public engagement specialists. The group is working with trade bodies to develop resources to support businesses to communicate effectively on the net zero transition, and advising the UK Government as it delivers on the public engagement commitments set out in Powering Up Britain: Net Zero Growth Plan.
Asked by: Kerry McCarthy (Labour - Bristol East)
Question to the Department for Energy Security & Net Zero:
To ask the Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero, with reference to the minutes of the Net Zero Council's meeting on 9 November 2023, what steps her Department is taking to support the first pillar of the Net Zero Council's SME workstream on net zero messaging.
Answered by Justin Tomlinson - Minister of State (Department for Energy Security and Net Zero)
Delivery of net zero relies on strong business action. The Council supported the re-launch of the UK Business Climate Hub, which provides information and resources to SMEs. The Hub highlights the benefits of reducing carbon emissions, setting out the opportunities offered by net zero and empowering businesses to act. The Council remains committed to further developing the UK Business Climate Hub.
The Council is also supporting SMEs through its Public Engagement workstream, which is developing resources to support businesses when communicating with staff, customers and supply chains on both the broader net zero transition and decarbonisation within their sector.
Asked by: Kerry McCarthy (Labour - Bristol East)
Question to the Department for Energy Security & Net Zero:
To ask the Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero, whether the Net Zero Council has consulted (a) industry associations and (b) sector-wide bodies during the development of business sector roadmaps.
Answered by Justin Tomlinson - Minister of State (Department for Energy Security and Net Zero)
The Net Zero Council developed guidelines to help businesses create tailored action plans to reduce emissions across their sector. These were published last year and provide a robust, credible and consistent set of criteria for business sector roadmaps.
Industry-led roadmaps have been developed in line with this guidance for priority sectors of the economy, with input from both industry associations and sector-wide bodies.
Asked by: Jim Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party - Strangford)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many and what proportion of secondary school trainee teachers of (a) physics, (b) chemistry, (c) foreign languages, (d) religious education, (e) mathematics and (f) computing have been recruited to begin training in Autumn 2024.
Answered by Damian Hinds - Minister of State (Education)
Departmental targets for 2024/25 postgraduate initial teacher training (PGITT) were calculated by the Teacher Workforce Model (TWM) and include recruitment to High Potential ITT (HPITT) which is a two year employment-based ITT programme attracting high performing graduates and career changers who are unlikely to have otherwise joined the profession. The targets are calculated to replace all teachers expected to leave the workforce in 2025/26, and the working hours lost from teachers that will reduce their teaching hours between years. PGITT is only one of many routes into the teacher workforce, all of which are considered when calculating targets. Other routes include undergraduate university courses, Assessment Only (AO), the upcoming teacher degree apprenticeship, returners, new to the state-funded sector entrants, and newly qualified entrants that defer entry into the profession (deferrers).
Further information may be found in the following publication: https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/find-statistics/postgraduate-initial-teacher-training-targets.
Departmental targets are for 23,955 secondary teacher trainees to start their initial teacher training (ITT) in autumn 2024, including HPITT trainees. As of last month, there have been 7,618 acceptances to postgraduate secondary courses in England (excluding HPITT acceptances).
Acceptance figures exclude HPITT acceptances as this data is not published. It is expected that more candidates will be recruited in the final four months of the cycle. Therefore, although acceptance figures provide a better indication of the number of teacher trainees starting training in Autumn 2024, they are not directly comparable to TWM trainee targets.
The physics TWM trainee target is 2,250 (incl. HPITT) and currently there have been 554 acceptances (excl. HPITT).
The chemistry TWM trainee target is 1,220 (incl. HPITT) and currently there have been 314 acceptances (excl. HPITT).
The modern foreign languages TWM trainee target is 2,540 (incl. HPITT) and currently there have been 622 acceptances (excl. HPITT).
The religious education TWM trainee target is 580 (incl. HPITT) and currently there have been 198 acceptances (excl. HPITT).
The mathematics TWM trainee target is 3,065 (incl. HPITT) and currently there have been 1,001 acceptances (excl. HPITT).
The computing TWM trainee target is 1,330 (incl. HPITT) and currently there have been 202 acceptances (excl. HPITT).
One of the department’s top priorities is to ensure that it continues to attract and retain high-quality teachers. The department is investing in attracting the best teachers where they are needed the most, through its teaching marketing campaign, support services for prospective trainees, and financial incentives package including bursaries worth up to £28,000 and scholarships worth up to £30,000. The department’s in-house teacher recruitment journey and associated digital services are generating new real-time data and insight to drive innovation. For example, the department has now rolled out an ITT course specifically designed to support more engineers to teach physics.
Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps he is taking with Cabinet colleagues to enhance cybersecurity infrastructure to help tackle phishing scams through (a) text messaging and (b) fake payment websites.
Answered by Tom Tugendhat - Minister of State (Home Office) (Security)
The Criminal Justice Bill will introduce a new offence of supplying or possessing “SIM farm” devices, which allow criminals to send scam texts to thousands of people at the same time, without good reason or undertaking adequate due diligence.
In addition, the Government and Industry have signed the Telecommunications Fraud Sector Charter, a voluntary agreement to improve counter-fraud efforts. Under the Telecommunications Charter, the sector has introduced firewalls that detect and stop scam texts from reaching customers. The firewalls have stopped 960million scam text messages since January 2022.
Furthermore, domain registrars, Internet infrastructure (IIPs) and service providers (ISPs) operate robust voluntary arrangements for filtering, blocking and takedown of malicious websites, which is supported by the operational work of our agencies and law enforcement. NCSC also works in collaboration with industry partners to present ISPs with real-time threat data that enables them to instantly block access to known fraudulent or malicious websites. This has a major impact in protecting citizens from cyber- and cyber-facilitated crimes.
Where voluntary arrangements prove unsuccessful, we are introducing a new legislative power will provide law enforcement and investigative agencies with a formal process to suspend IP addresses and domain names that are being used to facilitate serious crime. This power will also be introduced as part of the Criminal Justice Bill.
Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what estimate he has made of the financial loss to UK residents due to (a) fraudulent text messages and (b) fake payment websites.
Answered by Tom Tugendhat - Minister of State (Home Office) (Security)
The Fraud strategy estimates that in 2019/20 the financial loss from fraud offences was £3.1bn.
A link to the Fraud strategy can be found here: Fraud Strategy 2023