Written questions by Stainbank.

What assessment her Department has made of the potential impact of compensatory funding to further education institutions for the increase in Employer National Insurance contributions on colleges.

Education is a devolved matter, and the response outlines the information for England only. To recognise the increase to employers’ National Insurance contributions, we made approximately £155 million available in 2025/26 to support further education institutions and other mainstream settings that receive annual funding allocations from the department for the provision of post-16 education. This funding was made available via the Post-16 National Insurance contributions grant in September 2025. All decisions related to the 2026/27 financial year are being considered and information will be provided in due course.

What discussions his Department has had with the Scottish Government on ensuring economic and skills impacts for communities in Scotland hosting nationally significant energy infrastructure, including grid reinforcement and subsea transmission projects.

The department engages regularly with the Scottish Government to maximise the positive impacts from energy infrastructure investments on local economies and skills. Engagement is both at the ministerial and official level through formal fora such as the Interministerial Group on Net Zero, Energy & Climate Change, Grangemouth Investment Taskforce and ad-hoc when useful. This includes coordinated work on workforce needs such as our joint approach and funding on reskilling Grangemouth employees; coordinating work between the governments on ensuring developers provide community benefits and discussions on network connections.

What assessment his Department has made of the level of the gender pension gap within the civil service pension scheme.

The gender pension gap can be measured in different ways. In order to answer this question, we have used the difference in average pension in payment for men and women, expressed as a percentage of the average pension for men. Based on the latest data available, from 2024, the gap has reduced from 47% in 2016 to 42%. We fully expect this position to continue to improve as the equality employment legislation reduces historical differences in both the gap in pay and pensions accruing. The Cabinet Office will be commissioning the Government Actuary’s Department to carry out further analysis of the current position and will then consider next steps.

If he will publish the dates on which the joint UK Government and Scottish Government taskforce met to discuss the consultation on Alexander Dennis closing their Falkirk and Larbert sites.

The Scotland Office has priorisited securing the future of Alexander Dennis in Falkirk and Larbert from the moment we were made aware that those sites were at risk.The previous Secretary of State for Scotland, the Rt Hon Ian Murray MP, had discussions with the Deputy First Minister on 5 June and 21 July 2025, and my officials participated in numerous cross-government meetings throughout summer 2025. The Secretary of State for Scotland has continued this dialogue - most recently on 11 November with the Deputy First Minister - and we will continue to engage closely with the Scottish Government to safeguard these skilled jobs.

What estimate she has made of the potential increased revenue due to recent changes to the tax classification of double cap pickups in 2026-27 financial year.

The estimated amount of tax in 2026/27 that will be raised from double cab pick-up vehicles being treated as cars, comprised of increased Company Car Tax revenue and reduced Capital Allowances, has been estimated as follows:Exchequer Impact (£m)2026-27 235 This figure is based on Autumn Budget 2024 basis and is subject to uncertainty typically around the behavioural response.

What percentage of asylum seekers received initial decisions in quarter 4 of 2025 (October to December) compared to quarter 2 2024 (April to June).

The Home Office publishes data on asylum in the ‘Immigration System Statistics Quarterly Release’. Data on initial decisions of asylum claims is published in table Asy_D02 of the ‘Asylum claims and initial decisions datasets’. The latest data relates to the year ending September 2025.Data for the year ending December 2025, which will include Quarter 4 of 2025, will be published on 26 February 2026.

What estimate she has made of the average compliance cost to sole traders of the transition to digital income tax in the 2026-27 financial year.

HMRC’s latest published assessment of the potential impact of MTD for Income Tax across different taxpayer groups is available at: Extension of Making Tax Digital for Income Tax Self Assessment to sole traders and landlords - GOV.UK The government has worked with stakeholders to understand costs and benefits impacts, and with the software industry to ensure a wide range of low cost and free software is available for those with the simplest affairs.

What steps HMRC is taking to improve the responsiveness and consistency of its telephone customer service.

Improving day-to-day performance is a key priority for HMRC. HMRC are investing in new technology to improve their telephony services. Last year, they launched procurement for a new Contact Centre as a Service (CCaaS) platform which will significantly enhance the customer experience. They are also expanding their digital services. HMRC online services and the HMRC app are convenient to access and receive high customer satisfaction ratings. As more people use HMRC digital services, HMRC’s customer service advisers are freed up to support those who are digitally excluded, have complex tax affairs, or find themselves in vulnerable circumstances. HMRC’s Transformation Roadmap sets out further steps to improve the customer experience for taxpayers, agents, and businesses. The Roadmap can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/hmrc-transformation-roadmap

What assessment his Department has made of the impact of the Defence Industrial Strategy on employment and skills in Scotland; and what steps are being taken to ensure defence procurement supports jobs and economic growth across all parts of the United Kingdom.

The Defence Industrial Strategy is already having a significant impact on employment and skills in Scotland. The Ministry of Defence (MOD) spent more than £2.1 billion with industry in Scotland in the last financial year alone, backing almost 12,000 skilled jobs and highlighting Scotland as a backbone for defence of the UK - from the home to our nuclear deterrent, to boasting a long-term pipeline of major international military shipbuilding. This is illustrated by the deal to supply Norway with Type 26 frigates, the biggest ever warship export deal by value, that will support 4,000 jobs across the UK supply chain, including more than 2,000 at BAE Systems’ Glasgow shipyards. The Scotland Defence Growth Deal and the defence industry skills package that was also announced in the Defence Industrial Strategy will support even more employment and skills opportunities in Scotland. The Defence Industrial Strategy sets out our commitment to revamp our procurement framework, delivering a comprehensive review of defence contracting to incentivise productivity and improve delivery. This includes our new segmented approach to procurement that is enabling the MOD to tailor its acquisition processes to the type of capability, supplier and risk involved, as well as measures aimed at making it easier for SMEs to do business with the MOD. All of these initiatives will have benefits for jobs and economic growth across the UK, including in Scotland.

What discussions his Department has had with the Scottish Government regarding the availability and UK-wide supply of flu and RSV vaccines this winter; and what steps are being taken at a UK level to support devolved administrations in managing winter pressures related to respiratory illness.

The UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) works closely with flu vaccine manufacturers and suppliers to maintain high level oversight of the overall United Kingdom supply of flu vaccine for adults. This enables early identification and mitigation of potential risks to programme delivery, such as constraints in dose availability or delays to deliveries.The UKHSA procures the respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) vaccine and the live attenuated influenza vaccine (LAIV), which is the primary vaccine used in the children’s flu programme, on a UK wide basis. As such, the UKHSA liaises regularly with all devolved nations, including the Scottish administration, on procurement activities and supply arrangements for these vaccines.Both the RSV vaccine and LAIV are available for Scottish Health Boards to order via the UKHSA’s online ordering platform, ImmForm, ensuring consistent access across the UK.Ensuring timely and reliable access to flu and RSV vaccines is a key part of reducing the burden of respiratory illness over the winter period, helping to limit avoidable hospital admissions and support health systems, including those in devolved administrations, in managing winter pressures.

What progress her Department has made on the development of the new Violence Against Women and Girls Strategy; and how her Department is working with devolved governments, including the Scottish Government, to ensure effective coordination on prevention, perpetrator interventions and data sharing.

“Freedom from Violence and Abuse: a cross-government strategy to build a safer society for women and girls”, was published on 18 December 2025. It sets out the strategic direction and concrete actions to prevent violence and abuse, pursue perpetrators, and support victims, and to deliver our unprecedented commitment to halve violence against women and girls (VAWG) in a decade.We have engaged with the Welsh Government, Scottish Government, and Northern Ireland Executive in the development of the Strategy.Each Devolved Government has its own strategy, and ours has been informed by best practices drawn from the approaches of all three jurisdictions, including Equally Safe, Scotland’s strategy to prevent and eradicate VAWG, the Northern Ireland Ending VAWG Strategic Framework, and Wales’s Strategy for Violence against Women, Domestic Abuse and Sexual Violence. We are committed to sharing learning and best practice to make our work complementary, and this includes sharing data. VAWG is a national and international emergency, and we will continue working with all devolved governments to ensure a coordinated UK-wide response.

What assessment his Department has made of the impact of UK Government measures to reduce child poverty on children in Scotland; and how he is working with the Scottish Government to complement devolved policies and support progress towards Scotland’s statutory child poverty targets.

We estimate that removing the two-child limit alongside other measures in the Child Poverty Strategy, published on 5 December, will lift 550,000 children out of poverty across the whole of the UK, leading to the largest expected reduction in child poverty over a Parliament since comparable records began.Removing the two-child limit from April 2026 will alone reduce child poverty across the UK by 450,000 in the final year of parliament and could benefit 95,000 children living in households in Scotland impacted by the policy. We have published the UK wide impacts for the Child Poverty Strategy here: Child Poverty Strategy: Impact on low income poverty levels and children gaining in the UK: December 2025. We are committed to continued collaboration with the Devolved Governments to tackle child poverty across the UK. As set out in our Monitoring and Evaluation Framework, published alongside the Child Poverty Strategy, we will continue to work closely with them to consider how best to feed into their own findings to track progress at both the local and national level.

What steps Civil Service Pensions is taking to improve the process for the provision of the death in service benefit pay-out to bereaved families.

The Scheme Manager and the Scheme Administrator work in close partnership to ensure that all death in service cases are treated as a matter of the highest priority.To improve the provision of benefits to bereaved families, the new Civil Service Pensions Scheme Contract has been strategically designed with enhanced performance metrics and more rigorous key performance measures. These improved indicators allow the Scheme Manager to exert greater leverage over the Administrator, ensuring that service delivery meets strict standards and that any delays are met with robust financial penalties.Furthermore, the Cabinet Office has implemented a standardised contract management policy to provide consistent, high-level oversight. This ensures that the administration of death in service benefits is not only closely monitored but held to a level of accountability that directly supports a more efficient and responsive process for claimants.

Whether the exemption for basic or new state pension to not have to pay small amounts of tax through simple assessment from April 2027 will apply to recipients of the State Earning Related Pension Scheme.

The State Pension is taxable income along with other pension income. As the State Earnings-Related Pension Scheme (SERPS) is extra money on top of the basic State Pension, it is also taxable. The Budget has confirmed that the basic and new State Pension will be uprated by 4.8% in 2026-27, in line with our commitment to the Triple Lock. This means pensioners whose sole income is the basic or new State Pension without any increments will not pay income tax in 2026-27. The Budget also announced that the Government will ease the administrative burden for pensioners whose sole income is the basic or new State Pension without any increments so that they do not have to pay small amounts of tax via Simple Assessment from 2027-28. The Government will set out more detail next year.

What assessment he has made of the impact of the Scottish Government's real terms reduction in College Funding since 2021 to the delivery of the industrial strategy in Scotland.

Colleges have a critical role in ensuring the young people of Scotland can access secure, skilled jobs, and in fostering innovation, developing a skilled workforce, and driving economic growth. This is why we have committed to hundreds of millions of additional funding for colleges in the Industrial Strategy. However, the funding of colleges in Scotland is a matter for the Scottish Government. Scotland’s colleges have had their funding cut by 20% between 2021/22 and 2025/26. The Spending Review was historic for Scotland and delivered the largest real terms settlement for the Scottish Government since devolution, with an average £50.9 billion per year between 2026-27 and 2028-29. Last week’s Budget has boosted this by a further £820m. As the UK Government has delivered a record funding settlement to the Scottish Government, it is up to them to ensure that young people will benefit from these investments.

Whether she intends to conduct a review of technical service arrangements involving non-European vehicle manufacturing and regulatory entities to ensure alignment with UK/EU regulatory standards.

I am satisfied that that the current type approval regime ensures that only reputable and trustworthy entities are involved in the certification process.

What assessment he has made of the potential merits of requiring a) all certification bodies involved in vehicle approvals to be formally listed as designated Technical Services under UN ECE regulations and b) introducing penalties for misrepresentation by certification bodies or manufacturers of vehicles on UK roads.

I am satisfied that that the current type approval regime ensures that only reputable and trustworthy entities are involved in the certification process.

What assessment she has made of the potential for accelerating asylum hotel closures in the nations and regions of the United Kingdom that will be hosting large military site accommodation for Asylum seekers.

Hotel closure will be prioritised based on a wide range of criteria. The hotel exit plan will continue to be carefully managed to ensure that all supported asylum seekers are accommodated in suitable alternative accommodation, including large sites, elsewhere in the estate.

Whether she has made an assessment of the potential merits of requiring vehicle manufacturers to disclose the role of entities involved in vehicle certification processes.

I am satisfied that that the current type approval regime ensures that only reputable and trustworthy entities are involved in the certification process.

What steps she has taken to establish an independent audit mechanism for ISO/SAE 21434 and UN R155/156 compliance.

Approval certificates for UN Regulations 155 and 156 can be issued by an applicable national approval authority, which is the Vehicle Certification Agency (VCA) in the UK, and are mutually recognised internationally. Any country’s approval authority must have its methods and criteria used for assessment of compliance to the regulations scrutinised by other approval authorities before it can issue any approvals. ISO/SAE 21434 is not part of the legislative requirement but provides useful guidance for compliance with R.155 and R156.