Written questions by Hayes.

How many police officers are employed in neighbourhood policing in Lincolnshire.

The Home Office collects and publishes data annually on the primary function of police officers, as at 31 March each year, in the ‘Police workforce, England and Wales’ statistical bulletin which can be accessed here: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/police-workforce-england-and-wales.Table F1 of the data tables accompanying the publication provides the number of officers in “Neighbourhood Policing” roles, by Police Force Area, as at 31 March 2024.

If he will set up a cross-departmental working group to discuss how to increase the fertility rate.

We currently have no plans to set up any working groups to discuss how to increase the fertility rate.

Media and Sport, if she will make an assessment of the potential merits of providing funding for the Spalding Flower Parade.

I think of floristry as one of the great unsung British creative industries, with florists providing imaginative joy for vital family and civic occasions and for private happiness in every constituency in the land. The reinstatement of the Spalding Flower Parade in 2023 ensures that there is once again a great opportunity to celebrate Lincolnshire’s flower industry .As part of DCMS’ restructuring of destination management in England, VisitEngland have recently accredited Destination Lincolnshire as the Local Visitor Economy Partnership with the skills and experience to grow visitor numbers and spend in the region. Destination Lincolnshire would be best placed to make an assessment of the value of the parade to future tourism in the region.

Communities and Local Government, what external bodies her Department consulted before calculating revised housing targets.

The government’s proposed reforms to the National Planning Policy Framework, including the proposed new standard method for assessing housing needs, were informed by engagement with a wide range of stakeholders from across local government, the planning profession, and the development industry.

If she will list which external organisations her Department consulted before the change in policy on inheritance tax for agricultural properties.

The Government has published information about the reforms to agricultural property relief and business property relief at www.gov.uk/government/publications/agricultural-property-relief-and-business-property-relief-reforms. The Government takes into account all representations made ahead of the Budget, and meets with stakeholders on a regular basis.

Whether her Department has provided funding to Hope Not Hate since 5 July 2024.

I refer the Hon Member to my response to PQ 10945.

What estimate her Department has made of the number of farmers who will be affected by the withdrawal of agricultural property relief in (a) Lincolnshire and (b) South Holland and the Deepings constituency.

The Government has published information about the reforms to agricultural property relief and business property relief at https://www.gov.uk/government/news/what-are-the-changes-to-agricultural-property-relief. Around 500 estates across the UK are expected to be affected each year from 2026-27.

Food and Rural Affairs, what steps he is taking to protect the coastline of the Wash from erosion.

Protecting all communities around the country from flooding is one of the Secretary of State’s five core priorities and we will work closely with the new Flood Resilience Taskforce to improve resilience and preparation across government and local authorities, providing oversight of UK flood and coastal resilience. The Wash has a Shoreline Management Plan (SMP4) to manage coastal erosion and flood risk sustainably. In January 2025, a new National Coastal Erosion Risk Map will be released. It will guide the Environment Agency and coastal authorities in making investment and planning decisions. We are committed to supporting coastal communities and ensuring flood and coastal erosion risk management is fit for the challenges we face now and in the future.

Communities and Local Government, what steps she is taking to reduce the number of unoccupied shops in town centres in South Holland and the Deepings constituency.

This Government is committed to supporting our high-street businesses. At Autumn Budget, the Government announced that it is retaining and reforming the Long-Term Plan for Towns, with Spalding being one of 75 towns to receive up to £20 million in extra support for local growth.High Street Rental Auctions (HSRA), a new power for English local authorities, introduced through the Levelling Up and Regeneration Act 2023 (LURA), will provide local authorities with a tool to tackle vacancy, promote minimum letting standards for commercial units and flexible rents.More generally, the English Devolution Bill will introduce a strong new ‘right to buy’ for valued community assets which will help safeguard our high streets. More details will be announced in due course.

What steps his Department is taking to improve maternity services in Lincolnshire.

The Department is supporting the National Health Service to deliver the three-year delivery plan for maternity and neonatal services across England, to make care safer, more personalised, and more equitable for women and babies.In Lincolnshire, there have been recent improvements to perinatal pelvic health services, as well as implementation of the updated Saving Babies Lives Care Bundle, a package of interventions to reduce stillbirths, neonatal brain injury, neonatal deaths, and preterm birth.The Midlands Heatmap Data, a tool for assessing maternity and neonatal care safety and quality, has shown a significant improvement, with Lincolnshire being the best performing in the region in August 2024.

What steps his Department is taking to improve the dementia diagnosis rate in (a) South Holland and the Deepings constituency and (b) Lincolnshire.

The national target for dementia diagnosis is that 66.7% of the prevalent population has a diagnosis of dementia. Lincolnshire is at 67.8% because of prioritising improvements in diagnosis rates.Lincolnshire Partnership NHS Foundation Trust (LPFT) have set up a Dementia Diagnosis Rate (DDR) working group established with action plan to drive forward DDR recovery. This includes improving LPFT data and using the Population Health Management tool to identify any discrepancies with practice dementia registers.To support recovery of the dementia diagnosis rates and implementation of the Dementia Care Pathway, NHS England has developed a dashboard for management information purposes. The aim is to support commissioners and providers of memory services with appropriate data.

If he will make an assessment of the impact of proposed pylons in the Grimsby to Walpole scheme on the Wash National Nature Reserve.

Developers of transmission projects and all nationally significant infrastructure projects in England and Wales must assess the impacts of their proposals. This includes conducting assessments of projects’ impacts on the environment and habitats through Environmental Impact Assessments and Habitats Regulations Assessments. Additionally, developers engage with statutory and non-statutory stakeholders through consultations to ensure their feedback is considered and incorporated into project proposals. All of this is considered in the project consenting process.

What steps she has taken with relevant authorities to reduce shop lifting in (a) South Holland and the Deepings constituency and (b) Lincolnshire.

Shoplifting increased at an unacceptable level under the previous government, and we have seen more and more offenders using violence and abuse against shopworkers. We will not stand for this. Everybody has a right to feel safe on the job.To that end, this Government will end the effective immunity, introduced by the previous Government, granted to low level shoplifting of goods under £200, and introduce a new offence of assaulting a retail worker to protect the hardworking and dedicated staff that work in stores.

What the total (a) amount and (b) value was of Class A drugs coming into the UK that were seized at the borders in the last five years.

The latest transparency data showing the total amount of Class A drugs seized by Border Force across the last five years is available at the following pages:Seizures of drugs in England and Wales statistics - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)Border Force transparency data: Q1 2024 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)Border Force transparency data: Q2 2024 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk). The statistics below are taken from the Q2 2024 transparency data. These cannot be combined into a single figure due to the different units of measurement, so a breakdown of each drug is provided. Class A Drugs by Year2018/192019/202020/212021/222022/232023/24TotalCocaine (KG8,886.733,757.519,475.4917,096.7215,222.726,692.5281,131.67Crack (KG)0.0334.80.060.413.426.4345.15Heroin (KG)428.462,210.621,812.281,117.22659.94327.056555.57LSD (Dose 000s)52.720.76105.8630.4129.554.68243.96MDMA (Dose 000s)1,912.111,390.221,025.98453.811,390.171,227.086,172.29Methadone (Dose 000s)N/AN/A0.181.280.20.392.05Morphine (Dose 000s)0.351.072.520.421.132.938.42Fentanyl (KG)N/AN/AN/AN/AN/A0.020.02 Border Force does not estimate, disclose, or publish the value of drugs seized.

How many registrations have been made with the Infected Blood Interim Compensation Payment Scheme in (a) Lincolnshire and (b) the East Midlands.

As of July 2024, 3,698 interim compensation payments have been paid to living infected persons and bereaved partners. This information is not made available on a regional basis. The process under which estates can apply for interim compensation payments opened on 24th October. We will provide an update on the number of applications in due course.

What steps she has taken to reduce work-related injuries in the agricultural sector.

The safety and health of people at work in agriculture is a concern to the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) and the industry. HSE uses a blend of approaches to influence and improve the health and safety record of the industry, reduce work-related injuries and to drive up industry ownership of the challenge and influence farmer behaviour. HSE produces guidance for farmers which is freely available on its website. The guidance covers a range of topics including those that cause the most serious and fatal accidents and ill health. Between 2018 and 2024 there was an annual programme of delivering training to farmers in advance of targeted proactive inspection: they also investigate incidents and reports of risks not being managed properly, where duty holders fall below the standards required by health and safety legislation. HSE take appropriate enforcement action including prosecutions. A recent two-year HSE campaign focused on two of the main causes of fatal and serious injury in farming, namely workplace transport and cattle Work Right Agriculture – “Your Farm, Your Future”. The campaign provided guidance and direction to farmers about their legal duties. The campaign also included well-respected industry voices providing help and advice on how to control risk associated with workplace transport, vehicles, and cattle. The communications campaign reached 8.25m people in 2023/24. HSE remains committed to working with the agricultural industry and putting its resource to best use to have maximum affect in helping the farming industry to control risk and stay safe and well.

Food and Rural Affairs, how many trees were planted in (a) South Holland district and (b) South Kesteven district in the last ten years.

The Forestry Commission publishes statistics on new planting of woodland, and trees outside woodland, in England. These can be found in Forestry Commission Key Performance Indicators . These statistics are reported for each financial year in thousands of hectares. This Government has not set specific targets for individual districts and the reporting statistic the hon. Member has requested is not currently available. The England Trees Action Plan has kickstarted tree planting, with nearly 16 million trees planted over the past 3 years. We reported 5,529 hectares of new woodland and trees outside of woodland planted in 2023-24. The figures for planting in 2024-25 will be published as part of Official Statistics in June 2025.

What recent assessment she has made of the adequacy of levels of neighbourhood policing in (a) South Holland and the Deepings constituency and (b) Lincolnshire.

As part of the Government’s Safer Streets mission, the Home Secretary has made a clear commitment to strengthen neighbourhood policing through the introduction of a Neighbourhood Policing Guarantee.This includes getting thousands of neighbourhood police personnel back on the beat, ensuring local people have a named officer who they can turn to when things go wrong, and cracking down on the street crime, shop theft and anti-social behaviour which has made communities feel less safe for far too long.

What steps she is taking to reduce the backlog of court cases in Lincolnshire.

We have interpreted this question as in reference to the Crown Court outstanding caseload in Lincolnshire. We inherited a record and rising Crown Court backlog from the previous Government and we are committed to tackling it.We are pursuing a number of measures at a national level that will contribute to the reduction of outstanding cases in Lincolnshire.The Crown Court outstanding caseload remains one of the biggest challenges facing the Criminal Justice System. We have already shown we are committed to bearing down on the caseload and bringing waiting times down.This Government has increased the number of Crown Court sitting days to 106,500, more than in six out of the last seven years. We will soon extend magistrates’ court sentencing powers from 6 to 12 months, freeing up 2,000 days in the Crown Court to handle the most serious cases.Judges have been prioritising rape cases that have been waiting for over two years to go to trial. Despite this, there are some cases in the outstanding caseload which are taking far too long to progress through the system. We want to make sure every victim has the swift access to justice they deserve. This is why we have committed to fast-tracking rape cases through the courts, to deliver swift and effective justice to some of the most vulnerable victims in the criminal justice system, and will say more on this in due course.Alongside this, we consistently invest in the recruitment of c.1,000 judges and tribunal members across all jurisdictions annually alongside continuing to use 18 Nightingale courtrooms across eight venues to hear more cases.At Lincoln Crown Court specifically, we have expanded physical capacity of the HMCTS estate by creating a permanent fourth Crown Courtroom based in Lincoln Magistrates Court. As a result, we also plan to sit 903 sitting days this financial year at Lincoln Crown Court, this is an increase from 885 sitting days in the last financial year (FY23/24). An uplift in sitting days has taken place across East Midlands in response to growing Crown Court caseload pressures.

Whether (a) Ministers and (b) officials in her Department have met the Runnymede Trust charity since July 5 2024.

All relevant meetings attended by ministers, special advisers and senior officials are declared in the normal way in the department’s quarterly transparency releases.