Written Statements

Wednesday 14th October 2026 Written Statements

Wednesday 14 October 2026

“Make Work Pay” Plan

Wednesday 14th October 2026 Written Statements

[The Minister for the Future of Work (Kate Dearden)]

The world of work has fundamentally changed in recent years. It is no longer the norm for employees to stay in one company, or even a single sector, for their whole career. New technology continues to rapidly transform how we work, where we work, and when we work, and the rise of the gig economy has changed the certainty and stability that employment used to provide.

The Government’s plan to make work pay is bringing employment rights legislation into the 21st century, extending to all the protections that many British companies already offer their workers. Yesterday, the Government updated Parliament on the further progress that we have made on implementing the Employment Rights Act 2025, and published responses to consultations on bereavement leave, flexible working, and the employer duty to inform workers of their right to join a trade union. The Government also published consultations on whistleblowing and tipping.

Today, the UK Government are publishing our consultation on employment status and protections for the self-employed. As part of the plan to make work pay, the Government are committed to ensuring that working people can access the rights and protections to which they are entitled, while supporting a fair, flexible and dynamic labour market.

However, the current employment status framework can be difficult to navigate, requiring individuals and businesses to understand complex legislation and case law. This uncertainty can give rise to bogus self-employment. Evidence suggests that up to 900,000 people may be denied access to core workplace protections, despite working in highly controlled working arrangements. The uncertainty allows some businesses to gain an unfair competitive advantage by failing to meet their legal obligations.

The Government believe that the current framework is not fit for purpose, and there is a strong case for reform. As working practices and business models evolve, the framework must adapt to support our ambition to improve job security, raise living standards and tackle exploitative working practices.

The Government have been clear about their ambition to reform the employment status framework to provide greater certainty and fairness for workers and businesses. Today, we are publishing a consultation on targeted reforms to tackle the most pressing issues in the employment status framework that enable worker exploitation and leave vulnerable workers without core employment protections that they are entitled to.

The Government also committed, in the plan to make work pay, to strengthening rights and protections for the self-employed, recognising the crucial role that they play in our economy. In this consultation, we are seeking views on how the Government can support the self-employed to thrive in good-quality self-employment.

This consultation seeks views on proposals to:

Rebalance the employment status test so that personal service, including the right to substitution, is less decisive and factors such as control are given greater weight when determining worker status. This would help to ensure that individuals under significant control are not denied core employment rights.

Introduce a presumption of worker status and consider the future role of the Fair Work Agency in enforcement to improve compliance with the framework. Presumption of worker status would shift the burden of proof to the engager of an individual to demonstrate that they are genuinely self-employed. This would empower workers, their representatives and agencies seeking to protect them, most notably the Fair Work Agency.

Consider how measures such as a new right to a written statement and the extension of blacklisting and health and safety protections could improve transparency, protections and fairness for the self-employed.

This consultation, and the measures within it, are concerned with the employment status framework for employment rights only, not the framework for tax. The consultation closes on 8 January 2027.

Next steps for consultation

The UK Government have committed to delivering their employment rights reforms in partnership with businesses, trade unions, public sector employers, and civil society. That is why we are undertaking full and comprehensive consultation with these groups on key changes. By delivering these reforms together, we are backing businesses who do the right thing and giving hard-working people the job security and opportunities they deserve. The Government will continue to keep Parliament updated on the implementation of the Employment Rights Act and the plan to make work pay.

[HCWS380]

Independent Football Regulator: Draft Report

Wednesday 14th October 2026 Written Statements

[The Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Lisa Nandy)]

Today I am pleased to draw to the attention of the House the fact that the Independent Football Regulator has now published its “State of the Game” draft report, providing an unprecedented review of the finances of our national game. The report can be found here:

https://sotg.footballregulator.org.uk

For years, football fans across the country have lived with the constant anxiety that their club, the bedrock of their local community, could be just one bad owner or one bad month away from ruin. This report provides stark, undeniable proof that their anxiety was entirely justified. It uncovers the true financial reality of English football today and underlines why the fight to pass the Football Governance Act 2025 and establish an independent football regulator was so vital.

Thanks to the action that this Government have taken, we now have an independent regulator with teeth and equipped with statutory powers to protect a club’s financial future. This report provides a deeper understanding of the financial pressures, governance gaps, and structural risks facing the football pyramid as a whole, as well as those of its individual clubs. Crucially, the report will inform the IFR’s regulatory approach and future decision making, so it can return our national game to health for the benefit of the communities that depend on it.

The work of the IFR to produce this report has been extensive. The analysis is based on club financial data, club ownership and transaction data, and league financial information. This has allowed the IFR to examine key trends in the wider football ecosystem, including income streams, owner funding and the market for players. Systemic risks have been identified, providing a comprehensive, independent perspective on areas such as the broadcast market and the role of debt and financing.

The report’s findings are extremely serious. Seventeen clubs in the English football league and national league would be loss making even if their players played for free. More than a quarter of clubs could not last a month if their owners withdrew support. Nearly two thirds of clubs in the English football league and national league are technically insolvent, as are a fifth of premier league clubs. Questions must be asked about how we got to this point, at a time when English football is now a record £9 billion industry.

The game must be more sustainable than this. It has now been three years since the premier league and the English football league failed to come to an agreement over how revenue should be distributed between the leagues to protect the health of the pyramid. English football has carried on in limbo, leaving fans of all clubs, and investors, uncertain of any future stability. This Government had to step in, delivering the Football Governance Act 2025 and establishing the IFR with powers to ensure fair distribution between the leagues.

This report should be a wake-up call to those who govern our domestic game that impasse, delays and uncertainty are a thing of the past. It should also firmly put to bed any debates over the need for an Independent Football Regulator.

We urge everyone in football to look carefully at the report and consider its findings for the good of the game as a whole.

We now need a financial distributions deal to be agreed. Using the key findings of the report to focus minds, we need all sides to come together and do a deal—for clubs and for the communities they serve up and down the country, and to give confidence to fans that the role football plays in our way of life will be protected.

This Government continue to deliver on our promises to put fans back at the heart of English football, and we will always stand on the side of the fans. They deserve better than the picture this report paints. We remain fully committed to delivering on our promise to put supporters at the heart of English football and secure the future of our national game for generations to come.

[HCWS378]

Extremism: Consultation on Charity Commission Powers

Wednesday 14th October 2026 Written Statements

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Vicky Foxcroft)]

Today I am publishing a consultation on strengthening the Charity Commission for England and Wales’s ability to tackle extremist and other abuse of charities.

As part of the Government’s efforts to tackle extremism, the Government intend to enhance the powers available to the Charity Commission to disqualify individuals from acting as a trustee and senior manager of a charity and extend the situations in which an individual is automatically disqualified from acting in those roles.

The Charity Commission already has a range of powers and takes robust action in cases of extremist abuse. Such instances cause significant harm to the charitable sector, so it is vital that the Charity Commission has all the tools it needs to tackle the abuse of charities, including by those who promote extremist ideologies. During 2025-26, the commission’s specialist team dealing with terrorism, extremism and state-threat issues made a total of 656 disclosures to police and other agencies, issued seven disqualification orders—suspending a further seven trustees pending consideration of their removal or disqualification—and issued 29 official warnings.

These draft regulations will help protect charities from malign influence by:

Automatically disqualifying individuals with unspent hate crime convictions.

Automatically disqualifying individuals with unspent convictions for national security offences.

Automatically disqualifying individuals with unspent convictions for providing false information to the Charity Commission.

The draft regulations will also strengthen the Charity Commission’s power to tackle extremist abuse of the charity sector by:

Strengthening the Charity Commission’s ability to disqualify individuals who promote or encourage violence or racial and religious hatred.

Strengthening the Charity Commission’s ability to disqualify individuals who have been deprived of their British citizenship or excluded from the UK.

The consultation will be open for a total of 10 weeks and will close on 23 December 2026. We are publishing draft regulations and a draft impact assessment alongside this consultation. I will place a copy of these documents in the Libraries of both Houses. We are seeking views from a wide range of stakeholders, including individuals in the charity sector and those with lived experience of convictions; responses will be critical to informing what final decisions are taken with regards to the Charity Commission’s powers. These final decisions will be outlined in a response, which we will publish once analysis of responses to the consultation is complete.

We hope that many people will take the time to respond to the consultation. I will provide an update to the House on the response to the consultation in due course.

[HCWS375]

Integrated Care Board Boundary Changes

Wednesday 14th October 2026 Written Statements

[The Minister for Secondary Care (Karin Smyth)]

On 22 September, the NHS England executive formally decided three changes to integrated care board boundaries. These have been approved by Ministers and will take place on 1 April 2027:

An area of Buckinghamshire, covering Newton Longville, will transfer from Central East ICB to Thames Valley ICB which covers the rest of Buckinghamshire country council;

An area of North Yorkshire adjacent to Lancashire, including Ingleton and Bentham, will transfer from Lancashire and South Cumbria ICB to Humber and North Yorkshire ICB;

The Craven area of North Yorkshire will transfer from West Yorkshire ICB to Humber and North Yorkshire ICB.

These changes will deliver alignment between those ICBs and local and strategic authorities, and progress delivery of our intention to align ICBs with strategic authorities by the end of the Parliament.

Further decisions on ICB boundary changes and mergers will be taken alongside other decisions regarding public service boundaries and strategic authorities, with any further changes expected on 1 April 2028. The Government and NHS England will continue working with local partners to ensure that all changes achieve the best outcomes for patients and citizens.

[HCWS379]

Counter-terrorism Disruptive Powers Report

Wednesday 14th October 2026 Written Statements

[The Minister for Security (Dan Jarvis)]

I have today published the “Counter-terrorism disruptive powers report 2025”—(CP 1702). The report has been laid before Parliament and copies will be available in the Vote Office and online at www.gov.uk.

It is important that there is transparency in the use of our counter-terrorism tools. Publishing this report ensures that the public are able to access a guide to the range of powers used to combat terrorist threats to the United Kingdom, the extent of their use, and the safeguards and oversight in place to ensure that they are used properly.

[HCWS377]

Legal Aid Agency Cyber-Security Incident

Wednesday 14th October 2026 Written Statements

[The Minister for Courts and Legal Services (Sarah Sackman)]

In my previous statements to the House, I have provided updates on the 2025 criminal cyber-attack against the Legal Aid Agency’s digital services and the steps that the Ministry of Justice and the Legal Aid Agency have taken in response.

I have been clear throughout that this was a significant and complex incident and that our understanding of the information affected would continue to develop as detailed technical and data analysis progressed. The Government committed from the outset to being transparent with Parliament as that understanding improved.

I am therefore writing to update the House on further information identified through that work.

The cyber-attack happened because criminals were able to exploit vulnerabilities in the LAA’s IT systems and gain access to systems containing personal information. They then copied and exfiltrated some data held by the Department.

Our previous public information stated that the attackers had accessed and exfiltrated a significant amount of personal data relating to people who had applied for legal aid, or interacted with its services, between 2007 and 16 May 2025.

Specialist technical and data teams have continued detailed analysis of the information exfiltrated during the attack. That work has enabled us to develop a more complete understanding of that information, which I outline below.

It remains true that the vast majority of the exfiltrated LAA data dates between 2007 and 16 May 2025. However, we have now confirmed that a small proportion of the affected LAA records predate 2007. The majority of these pre-2007 records date from the 1990s and 2000s, with only a very small number extending further back than this. The earliest record currently verified dates from 1978.

Exfiltrated data from the relevant period varies from person to person but may include basic personal details such as names, addresses and dates of birth, as well as information relating to legal aid applications and cases, including in some instances financial or other sensitive personal information. In some cases, the information is limited to a single document or record about an individual, such as a letter sent by the LAA to an individual or their solicitor about their case, or a record of a payment made. In other cases, more complete information relating to an application or bill submitted to the LAA was affected. However, in no case was a complete record relating to a legal aid case affected.

Our analysis has also established that some information relating to HM Prison and Probation Service—specifically, limited probation data, which our analysis indicates does not include information about victims of crimes—was contained within material exfiltrated during the same cyber-attack.

It is important to emphasise that affected data subjects constitute only a fraction of those who have had interactions with the LAA or HMPPS in the relevant period. The MOJ is working at pace and will, where data allows, be able to identify whether any specific individual’s data was exfiltrated in the cyber-attack.

We are updating the public information on www.gov.uk alongside this statement, to provide more detailed information to help individuals understand the data that was exfiltrated. It is important to remember that much of the exfiltrated information was unstructured, fragmented and incomplete, meaning that in many instances the identification of specific individuals will not be straightforward for the criminals who stole it.

The nature and amount of information exfiltrated varies considerably between individuals. Being within one of the periods or groups described in our public information does not, of itself, mean that an individual’s information was exfiltrated or, in the event that it was, that the hackers exfiltrated every category of data itemised for each individual.

We have provided the Information Commissioner’s Office with an update on the exfiltrated information and continue to co-operate fully with it.

As I reported to the House in January, substantial work has taken place since the criminal cyber-attack on the LAA to restore services safely and to strengthen the resilience of its technology. The Department’s objective is not simply to recover from the attack, but to emerge stronger, more resilient and better prepared for the future. We have allocated £200 million for transformation, recovery, and moving legacy systems to a modern and safe technology platform. We are also strengthening security monitoring, technical checks and the way risks are managed, to make LAA services more secure and resilient in future.

Finally, but importantly, we have no indication that the stolen data has been published or shared.

I recognise the concern that this incident has caused, particularly given the sensitive circumstances in which many people engage with the legal aid system. We will continue to be transparent as our work progresses and will ensure that the public information available reflects our best and most accurate understanding of the incident.

[HCWS376]