Written questions by Hamilton.

Commonwealth and Development Affairs, whether there are provisions in the agreement on the future of the Chagos Islands for the United States government to contribute financially to the maintenance of the Diego Garcia military base.

The deal will be between the UK and Mauritius. The base is an essential part of the UK-US defence relationship, and the US contributes a great deal to the operating cost of the base. Once the treaty is signed it will be put before both Houses for scrutiny before ratification in the usual way. This will include costs.

Pursuant to the Answer of 31 March 2025 to Question 41000 on Energy Supplies: Radio Frequencies, what assessment he has made of the potential implications for his policies of evidence gathered from (a) Germany, (b) Ireland, (c) Spain and (d) Brazil, who have already adopted radio spectrum access for the energy system.

Ofcom is responsible for allocating and authorising radio spectrum in the United Kingdom. As part of its ongoing work, Ofcom has undertaken preparatory steps to explore the potential need for spectrum to support private communications networks in the energy sector. This included publishing a Call for Input (CFI) to help identify suitable spectrum bands, should such a solution be required in the UK. In assessing the options, Ofcom considered international spectrum harmonisation efforts as well as approaches taken by other national administrations. A brief evaluation of each identified spectrum band was also provided within the CFI.

Innovation and Technology, what steps his Department is taking to ensure that the rights of (a) authors and (b) other creators are upheld in relation to the use of their copyrighted works in the training of artificial intelligence systems; and whether he plans to introduce requirements for (i) transparency and (ii) compensation for historic use.

Copying protected material in the UK infringes copyright unless it is licensed, or a copyright exception applies. There are mechanisms for redress in cases of infringement.The Government’s consultation on copyright and AI closed on 25 February. This sought views on giving authors and other creators greater control over use of their material to train AI models, supporting their ability to be remunerated, and requiring AI developers to be more transparent about the works used in AI training.The Government’s priority now is to review all responses to the consultation. The Government will set out its proposals in due course.

What assessment she has made of the potential impact of not uprating the Local Housing Allowance on (a) poverty and (b) homelessness; and whether she plans to increase rates in line with rental costs.

No assessment has been made using current economic assumptions and methodological practices. However, the department has previously produced a poverty impact assessment using OBR economic assumptions from 30th October 2024 on an outdated version of the model. Using this methodology, the department has estimated the poverty impact of uprating the Local Housing Allowance (LHA) to the 30th percentile of rents in a Local Authority compared to freezing it. Uprating the LHA has been estimated to decrease the number of individuals in relative poverty after housing costs by 50,000 (0.1%) individuals in 25/26 and 100,000 (0.1%) individuals in 28/29 compared to freezing it. Estimates have been rounded to the nearest 50,000 and are on a UK basis. The poverty impacts are independent of the underlying trends in poverty so they are not an estimate of the total change in poverty over time. Since this version of the model, the move to UC acceleration announced at Autumn Budget has been incorporated into the model and the economic assumptions have been updated to OBR's Spring Statement 2025 Round 2 assumptions. The causes of homelessness are multi-faceted and often complex, they interact dynamically making it difficult to isolate the relative importance of individual factors. Therefore, no assessment has been made on this basis for the impact on homelessness. At last year’s Autumn Budget, the Secretary of State’s decision to maintain Local Housing Allowance (LHA) at current levels for 2025/26 was taken after a range of factors were considered, including rental data, the impacts of LHA rates, the fact that rates were increased in April 2024, and the wider fiscal context. The April 2024 one-year LHA increase cost an additional £1.2bn in 2024/25, and approximately £7bn over 5 years. Any future decisions on LHA policy will be taken in the context of the Government’s missions, goals on housing, and the fiscal context. For those who need further support, Discretionary Housing Payments (DHPs) are available from local authorities. DHPs can be paid to those entitled to Housing Benefit or Universal Credit who face a shortfall in meeting their housing costs.

Commonwealth and Development Affairs, what discussions he has had with his international counterparts on promoting education that fosters respect between different faiths and genders.

The UK champions the right to freedom of religion or belief for all through our engagement in multilateral fora and our programme funding. We are committed to empowering women and girls around the world through our international work. The UK seeks to support quality, inclusive, and safe education systems that provide the knowledge and skills children need to thrive. Key to this is inclusive education which fosters respect between genders, which we support through several of our programmes and investments. For example, the UK's Education Quality Improvement Programme in Bangladesh (2021-2027) programme is enabling adolescent girls to stay in school by integrating gender-responsive approaches in national curricula and trialling innovative methods to support girls to remain and learn in schools.

Whether she has made an assessment of the potential merits of the introduction of a Commissioner for Older People and Ageing in England.

DWP offers employment support for eligible older people through the network of Jobcentres across the UK. The White Paper published on 26 November focuses on support for people who are economically inactive, people who are looking for work or want to progress, and people who are at risk of economic inactivity despite having a desire to stay in work. This includes and goes beyond people who are claiming benefits. The new national jobs and careers service will be instrumental in achieving this objective. This service will be available for anyone, including older people, who wants to look for work, wants help to increase their earnings, or who wants help to change their career or re-train. The service will be tailored to local needs. We are committing to the establishment of ‘collaboration committees’ to further develop the reforms set out in our Pathways to Work Green Paper. These we will bring together groups of people for specific work areas, collaborating with civil servants to provide discussion, challenge, and recommendations. Each group will have a different mix of people including older people. The department also engages with employers to ensure their recruitment practises attract and support the retention of older people and encouraging employers to sign the Age-Friendly employer pledge.

What steps she is taking to reduce delays in the administration of Carer's Allowance; and what steps she is taking to inform carers about the Carer's Allowance earnings threshold.

Recruitment and deployment of additional resources is taking place to enable the Carer’s Allowance (CA) unit to meet the consistent increased demand, which should reduce the clearance times for new claims to CA. DWP has reviewed its communications to ensure the increase in the CA earnings threshold from 7 April 2025 is clearly visible. These include: Advice on GOV.UK,Annual benefit uprating notification letters. These are issued to customers over a 7-week period from the beginning of March, and include the new weekly rate of CA and the new earnings limit,Use of our advocates’ platform, such as Carers UK,Clerical claim form supporting notes,Upskilling our telephony agents who deal with inbound customer enquiries,Focussed media coverage on the CA threshold increase - press releases, Facebook etc.

Commonwealth and Development Affairs, what steps he is taking to ensure the delivery of freedom of religion or belief work in his Department's (a) diplomatic and (b) development efforts.

The UK is championing the right to freedom of religion or belief (FoRB) and promoting tolerance and mutual respect through our engagement in multilateral fora - including our position at the United Nations (UN) and Article 18 Alliance - through our important bilateral work, working collaboratively with the Special Envoy for FoRB, David Smith, and our programme funding. This includes the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office's (FCDO) designated programme for FoRB-focused projects overseas, the John Bunyan Fund (JBF).The JBF supports a range of projects aimed at protecting and promoting FoRB. The FCDO works to ensure that Official Development Assistance (ODA) is allocated to support those who are most vulnerable and most in need of this assistance irrespective of race, religion, or ethnicity. This includes minority religious or belief communities, who are assessed by our partners when determining those most in need of protection and assistance.

Commonwealth and Development Affairs, what steps his Department is taking to ensure UK aid supports women facing persecution due to both their faith and gender.

The UK remains strongly committed to freedom of religion or belief (FoRB) for all abroad. It is our firm opinion that no one should live in fear because of what they do or do not believe in. We are championing the right to FoRB and promoting tolerance and mutual respect through our engagement in multilateral fora, our bilateral work, and our programme funding.We are clear, too, that we will work to advance gender equality and empower women and girls through our international action. We focus on those with intersecting forms of disadvantage where the risks are extreme.The Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office works to ensure that Official Development Assistance (ODA) is allocated to support those who are most vulnerable and most in need of this assistance irrespective of race, religion, or ethnicity. This includes minority religious or belief communities, who are assessed by our partners when determining those most in need of protection and assistance.

Food and Rural Affairs, whether he is taking steps to introduce a closed season for hare shooting.

This is a devolved matter and the information provided therefore relates to England only, with the potential for relevant policy to extend and apply to Wales. While the Government has no immediate plan to introduce a close season for hares in England, the policy remains under consideration as part of the Government’s plans to introduce the most ambitious programme for animal welfare in a generation.

What assessment he has made of the potential impact of changes to funding for integrated care boards on local healthcare (a) planning and (b) service delivery.

As part of the necessary changes to support the National Health Service to recover, NHS England has indicated that integrated care boards (ICBs) should reduce in size. The Government is supportive of NHS England’s decision and will work with NHS England to make the necessary choices that are needed to get the NHS back on its feet. We expect ICBs to continue to deliver their responsibilities including the planning and delivery of health and care services.Ministers will work with the new transformation team at the top of NHS England, led by Sir Jim Mackey, to ensure that the expected hundreds of millions of pounds savings made will be reinvested in frontline services to deliver better care for patients.Further detail on the future of ICBs was provided in a letter issued to all ICBs and NHS trusts and foundation trusts on 1 April 2025. This letter is available at the following link:https://www.england.nhs.uk/long-read/working-together-in-2025-26-to-lay-the-foundations-for-reform/

What steps she is taking to ensure that people that are unable to work due to (a) long-term illness, (b) disability and (c) other circumstances are adequately supported following her planned reforms to the welfare system.

The social security system will always be there for those who can’t work. As part of making changes to the payment rates in Universal Credit, we will ensure that those with the most severe, lifelong conditions who will never be able to work have their incomes protected. Twinned with this, as we set out in the Pathways to Work, our ambition is to guarantee personalised employment support to anyone claiming out of work benefits (UC and contributory) with a health condition or disability who wants to work but is currently outside the labour market. We propose that this guarantee will have a particular focus on early support, by offering everyone who claims out of work benefits and has a work-limiting health condition or disability, or who has recently been in receipt of PIP, with a support conversation. The support conversation will help identify the best next steps, including a range of personalised and more intensive support for anyone who wants it. We want our offer to be flexible, personalised and built on the evidence.

What assessment she has made of the potential impact of her Department's proposed welfare reforms on levels of economic inactivity.

No estimate has yet been made. As announced in the Green Paper, we will build towards a guarantee of personalised employment, health and skills support for anyone on out of work benefits with a work-limiting health condition or disability who wants it. Catalysed by an additional £1 billion a year by 2029/2030, this will improve returns to work and prevent economic inactivity, as part of rebalancing spending towards work over welfare. A further programme of analysis to support development of the proposals in the Green Paper will be developed and undertaken in the coming months. As stated in the Office for Budget Responsibility’s Economic and Fiscal Outlook, OBR plan to work with the Treasury and DWP to further scrutinise both the direct and indirect effects of these welfare and employment support policies ahead of their next forecast, alongside the effects of any further measures from the Green Paper that have been sufficiently developed.

What steps he is taking to support the rollout of enhanced operational communications enabled by dedicated radio spectrum access for the UK's energy distribution and transmission networks.

Ofcom is responsible for the management of spectrum in the UK, including allocating spectrum. Officials are working with those in in the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology and with regulators to help establish the evidence base for the future telecommunications requirements of the energy, water and transport sectors.

What steps her Department is taking to support PIP claimants into work.

We announced in the Pathways to Work Green Paper that we would establish a new guarantee of support, backed up by £1 billion of new funding. We want this guarantee to have a particular focus on early support, by offering everyone who claims UC and has a work-limiting health condition or who has recently been in receipt of PIP, with a support conversation. This would be focused on their goals and the help they need to achieve them.

What steps she is taking to improve the PIP assessment process for (a) all claimants and (b) claimants with fluctuating conditions.

It is important that all people claiming Personal Independence Payment (PIP) are able to access our services and that they do not face obstacles in applying and communicating with the Department and its providers. In the Green Paper Pathways to Work: Reforming Benefits and Support to Get Britain Working published on 18 March we outline plans to improve the experience for people who use the health and disability benefits system, including exploring ways to use evidence from eligibility for other services to reduce the need for some people with very severe conditions to undergo a full PIP functional assessment, digitalising the transfer of information from the NHS (with consent) to speed up the process of assessment, and look at recording assessments as standard to increase trust in the process. We also announced plans to launch a process to review the PIP assessment. We will bring together a range of experts, stakeholders and people with lived experience to consider how best to do this and to start the process as part of preparing for a review. We will provide further details as plans progress. The Health Transformation Programme is also transforming the entire PIP service, including introducing the option to apply and track applications online. The transformed service will improve how we gather health information, and tailor the process to the customer’s needs and circumstances, offering a better customer experience and improving trust in our services and decisions.

What steps she plans to take to (a) reform (i) employment support and (ii) disability services and (b) support more people into work.

We announced in the Pathways to Work Green Paper that we would establish a new guarantee of support for all disabled people and people with health conditions claiming out of work benefits who want help to get into or return to work, backed up by £1 billion of new funding. As the Green Paper notes, we are keen to engage widely on the design of this guarantee and the components needed to deliver it. To get this right, we will be seeking input from a wide range of stakeholders including devolved governments, local health systems, local government and Mayoral Strategic Authorities, private and voluntary sector providers, employers and potential users. We will confirm further details in due course after we have completed our consultation process.

What steps she is taking to ensure that changes to (a) Universal Credit taper rates and (b) other benefits (i) encourage more people into work and (ii) support people in work.

As the Chancellor has set out, this Government is reforming the social security system to support people into work, while protecting people who will never be able to – making the system sustainable so that it is there to help those of us that need it now and long into the future.These changes come on top of our Get Britain Working White Paper which set out the biggest reforms to employment support for a generation, and the increase in the Universal Credit work allowance to £684 per month for those without housing costs or £411 per month for those with housing costs.In addition, Universal Credit withdraws financial support at a steady rate allowing those on low incomes to keep more of what they earn. It does this by applying a single taper rate of 55% to net earnings before reducing the amount of Universal Credit someone is eligible for. This means claimants still benefit from their income as 45 pence in every pound earned would be kept. In some cases, claimants may also benefit from a work allowance, which is the amount someone can earn before the 55% taper is applied to their net earnings.These policies are kept under regular review to ensure they continue to make work pay and provide the correct incentives to allow those receiving Universal Credit to move into and progress in work.

What steps she is taking to provide personalised support to jobseekers.

We are ending the one-size-fits-all approach by reforming both the welfare and employment support systems to Get Britain Working, opening-up employment opportunities in a fair and more sustainable way to boost economic growth. We announced in the Pathways to Work Green Paper that we would establish a new guarantee of personalised support for all disabled people and people with health conditions claiming out of work benefits who want help to get into or return to work, backed up by £1 billion of new funding. This is alongside our Connect to Work and WorkWell programmes that provide support to disabled people, those with health conditions, and those with complex barriers to employment. Our new jobs and careers service will help more people into work and to progress in their careers with an enhanced digital offer and self-serve options whilst our Youth Guarantee will ensure that all young people aged 18-21 in England have access to quality training opportunities, apprenticeships, or employment support. Through our local Get Britain Working plans we are asking local government and Jobcentre Plus leaders to work collaboratively to join up the local work, health, and skills provision and tailor this to local needs because places, like people, need tailored support.

Innovation and Technology, what assessment he has made of the potential impact of the Online Safety Act 2023 on (a) small websites, (b) online services, (c) personal blogs and (d) community-run platforms; and whether he is taking steps to prevent (i) the closure of safe online spaces and (ii) blocking of UK users by overseas services, in the context of the implementation of the Online Safety Act 2023.

Under the Online Safety Act, in-scope user-to-user and search services must assess for risks of illegal content and harm to children. Ofcom is the independent regulator for this regime. It sets out what steps small low-risk providers need to take to fulfil their duties following their risk assessment. When implementing these duties, Ofcom is legally required to ensure burdens on providers are proportionate to their risk factors, size, and capacity. Ofcom recently launched an online digital toolkit, aimed at helping smaller services with compliance (https://www.ofcom.org.uk/online-safety/illegal-and-harmful-content/ofcom-launches-digital-safety-toolkit-for-online-services/).