Asked by: Dan Carden (Labour - Liverpool, Walton)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office, how many Freedom of Information requests were (a) sent to and (b) granted in full by Government departments and agencies in each of the last five years.
Answered by Michael Ellis
The Cabinet Office publishes Freedom of Information statistics for central government bodies on a quarterly and annual basis, which are available at www.gov.uk/government/collections/government-foi-statistics.
Government Departments respond to Freedom of Information requests in line with the legislation, including applying relevant exemptions where applicable.
Asked by: Dan Carden (Labour - Liverpool, Walton)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office, what the Government's timetable is for publishing its response to its consultation on planned reforms to public procurement.
Answered by Michael Ellis
Leaving the EU provides the UK with the opportunity to overhaul the public procurement regulations that govern how contracting authorities spend some £290bn of taxpayer’s money.
We received over 600 responses as part of the consultation exercise. The process of analysis of these comments is now complete and we are finalising our response to the consultation ahead of publication in the coming weeks.
Asked by: Dan Carden (Labour - Liverpool, Walton)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office, if he will ask the relevant authorities to undertake detailed audits of the 73 Government covid-19 contracts identified by Transparency International UK as containing corruption red flags.
Answered by Michael Ellis
Intensive collaboration with the private sector specifically on procurement has been, and continues to be, both necessary and essential for Government to properly manage and handle the Covid-19 crisis. During the most challenging periods, being able to procure at speed was critical in providing that response. Despite that, the Government has always made clear that all contracts, including all those entered into as part of the Government’s Covid-19 response, must achieve value for money for taxpayers and use sound commercial judgement. The details of all awards are published in line with Government transparency guidelines.
Proper due diligence is carried out for all government contracts and Government takes these checks extremely seriously. Government Departments, as individual contracting authorities, are responsible for ensuring that they have in place robust processes for spending public money fairly and achieving value for money for the taxpayer. This includes ensuring that appropriate levels of due diligence are undertaken on the supplier prior to award of contracts.
Asked by: Dan Carden (Labour - Liverpool, Walton)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office, when the Government plans publish details of (a) companies that were awarded contracts via the high-priority lane for covid-19 procurement and (b) who referred them.
Answered by Michael Ellis
Details of Government contracts above £10,000, and £25,000 in the wider public sector, are publicly available and published on Contracts Finder: https://www.contractsfinder.service.gov.uk/Search.
We plan to publish details of companies that were awarded contracts via the high-priority lane for Covid-19 procurement, and who referred them to the high-priority lane, in due course. This commitment goes above and beyond usual transparency obligations.
Asked by: Dan Carden (Labour - Liverpool, Walton)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office, when the Government plans to publish its response to Nigel Boardman's report into the development and use of Supply Chain Finance (and associated schemes) related to Greensill Capital in government.
Answered by Michael Ellis
I refer the Honourable member to Written Statement HCWS293.
The Government notes the work of the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs and Treasury Committees, as well as the forthcoming Standards Matter 2 report from the Committee on Standards in Public Life. Once these reports have been published, we will consider their work alongside Mr Boardman’s recommendations, and set out a substantive Government policy statement to Parliament in due course.
Asked by: Dan Carden (Labour - Liverpool, Walton)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office, what recent assessment he has made of the potential merits of reducing the UK parliamentary general election spending limit.
Answered by Chloe Smith
As I announced in my written ministerial statement on 3 December 2020, it is the Government’s intention to review party and candidate spending limits for all polls within the legislative competence of the UK Government, other than local council elections in England which were uprated last year, with a view to uprating them in line with inflation since they were originally set. This will create a baseline for regular and consistent reviews of all limits in future.
In some cases, there has been a significant gap since the last time spending limits were raised - some, including those for political parties at UK parliamentary elections, haven’t changed since 2000. This impacts campaigning ability given inflationary costs of printing and communication, which is vital for parties and candidates to communicate their views with voters. Election spending limits are fixed in absolute terms. By updating for inflation, the limits remain in line with the original intent of Parliament when they were introduced.
Asked by: Dan Carden (Labour - Liverpool, Walton)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office, for what reason his Department has prevented access by the public to the full Lord and Lady Mountbatten archives at the University of Southampton; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Julia Lopez - Minister of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)
The Cabinet Office is working with the University of Southampton to support the release of the Mountbatten archive whilst ensuring sensitive information, including personal data, is handled appropriately and in line with Freedom of Information Act.
Diaries from 1918 to 1934 have already been released. Further volumes will be released in due course as necessary sensitivity work is completed. This is in line with undertakings given by Earl Mountbatten in 1969 on the publication of the archive.
Asked by: Dan Carden (Labour - Liverpool, Walton)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office, if he will publish the (a) amount and (b) breakdown of costs incurred by the Government to date in respect of preventing the release of the personal diaries and correspondence of the 1st Earl and Countess Mountbatten of Burma.
Answered by Julia Lopez - Minister of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)
The Cabinet Office is working with the University of Southampton to support the release of the Mountbatten archive whilst ensuring sensitive information, including personal data, is handled appropriately and in line with Freedom of Information Act.
Diaries from 1918 to 1934 have already been released. Further volumes will be released in due course as necessary sensitivity work is completed. This is in line with undertakings given by Earl Mountbatten in 1969 on the publication of the archive.
Asked by: Dan Carden (Labour - Liverpool, Walton)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office, with reference to his Department's news story, Statement on government procurement following this week’s NAO report, published on 19 November 2020, how and to whom the high priority mailbox was advertised.
Answered by Julia Lopez - Minister of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)
The mailbox was available across government and with Parliamentarians. This was done through email correspondence to ministerial private offices and senior officials in the PPE sourcing programme, who then onward shared as they considered appropriate.
Asked by: Dan Carden (Labour - Liverpool, Walton)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office, if he will publish the information the Government holds on communications or meetings held between (a) Ministers, (b) advisors of those Ministers and (c) senior civil servants and those companies who have been awarded Government contracts since the start of the covid-19 outbreak.
Answered by Julia Lopez - Minister of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)
This information is not held centrally.
Details of Government contracts above £10,000 are published on Contracts Finder: https://www.contractsfinder.service.gov.uk/Search