Written questions by Hollinrake.

Representing the Speaker's Committee on the Electoral Commission, whether the Electoral Commission has given guidance to (a) political parties and (b) Reform UK Ltd on whether the provision of research is a donation in kind.

The Electoral Commission provides guidance for all political parties. The guidance states that any service – including research – provided to a party for free or on non-commercial terms is a donation. If the market value is above £500, the donor must be permissible, and if the value is above the reporting threshold (£11,180 for donations to central parties, or £2,230 for donations to accounting units or subsequent donations from the same source), it must also be reported to the Commission.If the party pays for the service, it would not be a donation.

Communities and Local Government, with reference to her Department's transparency data entitled MHCLG: spending over £25,000, March 2025, published on 28 April 2025, what the spending to Livewire Consultancy Limited on Research Services was for.

I refer the hon. Member to the answer given to Question UIN 59139 on 16 June 2025.

Communities and Local Government, with reference to the transparency data entitled MHCLG: spending over £25,000, March 2025, published on 28 April 2025, what the full specification was of the research commissioned from Ipsos on the spending items entitled (a) research and (b) place level case studies evaluation.

The payments for research commissioned from IPSOS comprised: a) Research: work conducted as part of the Domestic Abuse Duty Evaluation, a three year independent evaluation of Part 4 of the Domestic Abuse Act 2021. b) Place level case studies: delivery of interim reports from the place-level evaluation of the UK Shared Prosperity Fund. Further details are published on gov.uk here.

Communities and Local Government, pursuant to the Answer of 9 June 2025 to Question 54882 on Elections: Fraud, if she will take steps to improve (a) transparency and (b) accountability in local government.

The government is taking steps to strengthen both. I refer the Hon. member to the answer given to Question UIN 54882 on 9 June 2025. Statutory guidance on overview and scrutiny was updated in April 2024. We are also working to strengthen standards, governance, financial management, and local audit to fix the foundations of local government to ensure that it is fit, legal and decent.

Communities and Local Government, pursuant to the Answer of 5 June 2025 to Question 55454 on Local Government: Surrey, whether the Local Government Boundary Commission will be formally commissioned to undertake a full boundary review for the new unitaries.

My department is liaising closely with the Local Government Boundary Commission for England (LGBCE) so that they are involved at the appropriate time to ensure fair electoral arrangements across the area of any new unitary local authority.The LGBCE is responsible for electoral reviews for local government, reviewing wards, and setting the council size in terms of number of councillors. When a full electoral review of a newly established authority is carried out, the LGBCE will follow its guidance (which is available on its website). The LGBCE have recently published FAQ on their website to support councils going through Local Government Reorganisation and have set out as part of this that they expect to carry out an electoral review of all newly established local authorities after their first elections and before their subsequent elections.

Communities and Local Government, what guidance her Department has issued on considering downstream carbon emissions in planning applications.

The National Planning Policy Framework makes clear that the need to mitigate and adapt to climate change should be considered in preparing and assessing planning applications.The government provides guidance on how carbon impacts can be taken into account in the planning process through its Planning Practice Guidance on Climate Change, the National Design Guide, and the National Model Design Code.While these do not deal with downstream emissions specifically, the government keeps guidance under review and intends to update the Climate Change guidance to provide additional advice on taking carbon emissions into account.

Pursuant to the Answer of 12 May 2025 to Question 49771 on Parking: Fines, if she will publish the (a) correspondence and (b) research.

The research into the effectiveness of current civil parking penalty charge levels was carried out by the Parking and Traffic Regulations Outside London organisation in concert with the British Parking Association, and with the support of the Local Government Association. Dissemination of this research, which was not commissioned by the Department for Transport, and associated correspondence with the Department, is a matter for those organisations.

Communities and Local Government, pursuant to the Answer of 16 May 2025 to Question 50850 on Local Government: Israel, whether the (a) Local Government Ombudsman, (b) Local Auditor and (c) Parliamentary and Health Ombudsman has powers over breaches of procurement guidance by local authorities.

There are no specific legal powers invested in independent, external bodies to take action over breaches of procurement guidance.

Communities and Local Government, with reference to her Department's transparency data entitled MHCLG: spending over £25,000, March 2025, published on 28 April 2025, what the spending to LOCAL PARTNERSHIPS LLP entitled Consultancy was for.

This spend related to the Local Partnerships’ programme management of the Contract Management Pioneer Programme (CMPP). The CMPP was a capability-building initiative designed to strengthen contract management across local government. It aimed to equip councils with the skills, tools, and confidence needed to manage complex contracts more effectively, improve service outcomes, and deliver better value for money.

Communities and Local Government, with reference to her Department's publication entitled Plan for Neighbourhoods: Regeneration Plan guidance, published on 9 June 2025, what estimate she has made of the (a) quantity and (b) length of the total paperwork required for participants to receive Plan for Neighbourhoods funding.

On 9th June, the government published the Plan for Neighbourhoods Regeneration Plan Guidance which re-iterates our commitment for a light touch assessment process. The Plan for Neighbourhoods represents a break from the competitive bidding process and micromanaging of previous regeneration funds. Instead, this is a model whereby Neighbourhood Boards are provided with a list of pre-approved interventions and given the autonomy such that, if that activity can be evidenced as a clear priority of the community, it can be pursued without the need to provide a lengthy business case. The activities listed range from eye-catching new developments to the bread-and-butter issues raised by people on the doorstep. The Plan for Neighbourhoods will transform “left behind” areas to deliver meaningful change in the day-to-day lives of local people.

If she will list the policies she has adopted from the previous Government's document entitled Plan for Drivers, published 2 October 2023.

“The Plan for Drivers” was published by the previous government; the Department is focused on actions that will make a positive difference for drivers in the light of this Government’s priorities. These include providing £1.6bn enabling councils to fill 7 million potholes and collaborating with the British Parking Association to make paying for parking easier. In addition, we are delivering those measures in the Plan that help ensure smoother journeys, including incentivising roadworks to be finished promptly by extending overrun charges to weekends, and supporting the transition to electric vehicles by streamlining the approval process for works to install public chargepoints.

What powers local authorities have to object to the housing of asylum seekers in (a) hostel and hotels and (b) private rented sector accommodation in their locality.

The Asylum Accommodation Services Contracts set out a number of principles in relation to working with Local Authorities, and other stakeholders including consultation and liaison regarding the location of accommodation and other issues, ranging from security controls to the impact on local amenities.It is through this consultation and liaison that local authorities may raise any objection to specific properties being used as asylum accommodation, including on behalf of the local people they represent.

Food and Rural Affairs, whether expenditure on (a) swift bricks and (b) bee houses and biomes for new-build homes can be counted towards biodiversity net gain units.

No, expenditure on swift bricks, bee houses and bee biomes cannot be counted towards biodiversity net gain (BNG) units which must be calculated using the main Statutory BNG metric or the small sites version of it.

Whether she plans to introduce a National Parking Platform.

On 21 May the Government announced that, following successful collaboration with the industry sector, the British Parking Association will now take forward the development and running of the National Parking Platform (NPP).

Communities and Local Government, with reference to her Department's transparency data entitled MHCLG: spending over £25,000, March 2025, published on 28 April 2025, what the spending to CENTRE FOR HOMELESSNESS IMPACT on Research Services was for.

The Centre for Homelessness were commissioned to undertake a programme of ‘Test and Learn’ trials and a systems-wide evaluation of homelessness and rough sleeping.The principles guiding the government’s publication and release of social research can be found on gov.uk here. An interim report was published in February this year, available on gov.uk here.

Communities and Local Government, with reference to the document entitled MHCLG: spending over £25,000, March 2025, published on 28 April 2025, if she will publish the full specification of the research commissioned from Verian Group UK Limited on (a) Private Rented Sector - Research work and (b) Leasehold Programme Evaluation Scoping.

The Private Rented Sector research carried out by Verian forms part of the Department’s wider monitoring and evaluation work in relation to the Renters’ Rights Bill (further details can be found in its Impact Assessment here). Specifically, my Department commissioned Verian to carry out a longitudinal survey of private renters, to help inform, baseline, and monitor the private rented sector reforms. The findings, which will set out the requirement for the work commissioned, will be published in due course, in line with the our research and analysis evaluation strategy which can be found on gov.uk here.My Department has also commissioned Verian to conduct an evaluation scoping project to ensure effective monitoring and evaluation of the government’s leasehold and commonhold reforms. Again, we will publish the evaluation findings, which will set out the requirements of the work commissioned for the scoping study, in due course, in line with the above evaluation strategy.

Communities and Local Government, with reference to her Department's publication entitled MHCLG: spending over £25,000, March 2025, published on 28 April 2025, what the goods or services were commissioned from Livewire Consultancy Limited on revolution Priority Programme.

I refer the hon. Member to my answer to UIN 58018 on 12 June 2025.

When the Prime Minister’s Independent Adviser on Ministerial Standards plans to respond to the correspondence of 27 April 2025 from the hon. Member for Thirsk and Malton on the Prime Minister’s visit to Cambridgeshire.

The Independent Adviser on Ministerial Standards is independent of government. A response will be provided in due course.

Communities and Local Government, pursuant to the Answer of 9 June 2025 to Question 54904 on Tony Blair, whether she has held any discussions on government policy with Tony Blair.

As per Question UIN 54904 answered on 9 June 2025, the Deputy Prime Minister attended a Q&A event with Tony Blair. There have been no further official engagements between the Deputy Prime Minister and Tony Blair.

Communities and Local Government, pursuant to the Answer of 9 June 2025 to Question 54889 on Homes England, if she will publish the new target operating model for Homes England.

Homes England publishes details of its organisational structure in its annual report and accounts and framework document.The Agency will also publish a new Strategic Plan in due course, setting out how it will work with partners across England to support delivery of the government’s housing ambitions.