Asked by: Mike Wood (Conservative - Kingswinford and South Staffordshire)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, with reference to page 107 of the Cabinet Office Annual report and accounts 2024-2025, HC1372, published on 23 October 2025, how many staff were excluded from the Cabinet Office workforce figures as at 31 March 2025 as a result of the decision to omit Government Commercial and Fast Stream personnel from the Department’s data.
Answered by Anna Turley - Minister without Portfolio (Cabinet Office)
The statement on page 107 of the Cabinet Office Annual Report and Accounts 2024-2025 only refers to the staff included in ‘Section 2.12 - Diversity and inclusion’ and does not refer to data provided in earlier sections on departmental headcount. These individuals are included in the departmental headcount on Page 99 under the 4,370 Cabinet Office staff recharged to other government departments.
Asked by: Mike Wood (Conservative - Kingswinford and South Staffordshire)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, with reference to pages 107 and 110 of the Cabinet Office Annual report and accounts 2024-2025, HC1372, 23 October 2025, whether the facility time data published under the Trade Union (Facility Time Publication Requirements) Regulations 2017 includes Government Commercial Function and Fast Stream staff who were on the Cabinet Office payroll as at 31 March 2025.
Answered by Anna Turley - Minister without Portfolio (Cabinet Office)
The facility time data published under the Trade Union (Facility Time Publication Requirements) Regulations 2017 does include the Government Commercial Function and Fast Stream staff who were on the Cabinet Office payroll as at 31 March 2025
Asked by: Jim McMahon (Labour (Co-op) - Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, how many employer provided payment cards were held by government employees in each year since 2015; and what the average credit limit is of those cards.
Answered by Chris Ward - Parliamentary Secretary (Cabinet Office)
This information is not held centrally by the Cabinet Office. However, in April this year, departments and their agencies were instructed to freeze all procurement cards, with a tough new application process to cut the numbers in circulation by at least 50%. Figures announced on 23rd November 2025 show that these measures have successfully reduced expenditure, saving approximately £6 million per month in the initial months.
Asked by: Mike Wood (Conservative - Kingswinford and South Staffordshire)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, whether any of Goaco Group Ltd's subcontractor (a) resources and (b) delivery partners were offshore before the publication of the variation of the Cabinet Office's contract with the company in October 2025.
Answered by Chris Ward - Parliamentary Secretary (Cabinet Office)
The Cabinet Office can confirm that in relation to the Provision of Support and Maintenance for the Central Digital Platform contract with Goaco Group Ltd, no subcontractor (a) resources or (b) delivery partners were working offshore before the publication of the variation in October 2025.
The Cabinet Office does not hold information on any other contracts or subcontracting arrangements which Goaco Group Ltd may have in place.
Asked by: Mims Davies (Conservative - East Grinstead and Uckfield)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, which Government Departments use a ministerial car.
Answered by Dan Jarvis - Minister of State (Cabinet Office)
The Government Car Service (GCS) provides Departmental Pool Cars (DPC) to the following Government departments:
Attorney General’s Office
Cabinet Office
Department for Business and Trade
Department for Culture, Media and Sport
Department for Education
Department for Energy Security and Net Zero
Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
Department for Health and Social Care
Department for Science, Innovation and Technology
Department for Transport
Department for Work and Pensions
HM Treasury
Home Office
Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government
Ministry of Justice
Scotland Office
Asked by: Mike Wood (Conservative - Kingswinford and South Staffordshire)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, with reference to page 70 of the Cabinet Office Annual report and accounts 2024-2025, HC1372, 23 October 2025, if he will publish the Business Rules document.
Answered by Chris Ward - Parliamentary Secretary (Cabinet Office)
The business rules and corporate management statement represent internal documents that support the internal governance and assurance of the department. These documents are not routinely published for external audiences. It is a long-standing practice of successive Governments not to routinely publish internal documents.
Asked by: Mike Wood (Conservative - Kingswinford and South Staffordshire)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, with reference to the Cabinet Office Annual report and accounts 2024-2025, HC1372, 23 October 2025, whether he will publish the corporate management statement for 2024–25.
Answered by Chris Ward - Parliamentary Secretary (Cabinet Office)
The business rules and corporate management statement represent internal documents that support the internal governance and assurance of the department. These documents are not routinely published for external audiences. It is a long-standing practice of successive Governments not to routinely publish internal documents.
Asked by: Mike Wood (Conservative - Kingswinford and South Staffordshire)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, with reference to page 8 of his Department's corporate report entitled Integrated Security Fund Annual Report 2024–25 published on 30 October 2025, what proportion of the £965 million was classified as having a (a) principal, (b) significant and (c) not targeted gender equality objective under OECD GESI markers.
Answered by Dan Jarvis - Minister of State (Cabinet Office)
The Cabinet Office remains committed to supporting delivery of the UK’s Women, Peace and Security (WPS) agenda, and the Integrated Security Fund (ISF) supports work to tackle Gender Equality and Social Inclusion (GESI).
The ISF funds a variety of ‘programmes’, each of which is designed to achieve a specific national security objective. Each programme can then be broken down into individual ‘projects’ which work towards the programme’s objective. There is a requirement whereby all programmes should include at least one project where gender is a primary objective (an ‘E’ rating under OECD GESI markers, which is the highest rating), and all projects must have met, or be working towards meeting, a minimum standard whereby gender equality is part of the project’s objectives, but not the principal reason for undertaking the project (a ‘C’ rating).
However, the Cabinet Office does not specifically track expenditure allocated to GESI markers (principal, significant or not targeted).
In addition, during Financial Year 2024/25 the ISF operated a dedicated Gender, Peace and Security Portfolio (£5.39m).
Asked by: Alex Mayer (Labour - Dunstable and Leighton Buzzard)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, what measures the Government will take to hold contracting authorities accountable in delivering procurement strategies that support domestic supply chains, particularly within the UK bus manufacturing sector.
Answered by Chris Ward - Parliamentary Secretary (Cabinet Office)
This Government is committed to ensuring procurement strategies do everything possible to support UK jobs and industry. Since coming to office, we have consulted on procurement reforms to boost domestic supply chains and create more opportunities for businesses including across the UK bus manufacturing sector.
We are supporting Combined Mayoral Authorities to coordinate the procurement of buses through a Crown Commercial Service commercial agreement. This will be supplemented by the soon to be published ten-year pipeline of future bus orders, which will provide much needed certainty to the sector.
Asked by: Mike Wood (Conservative - Kingswinford and South Staffordshire)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, with reference to the Integrated Security Fund Annual Report 2024–25, 30 October 2025, whether he will publish the raw Gender Equality and Social Inclusion (GESI) scoring data for all ISF programmes in 2024–25, including departmental lead, delivery partner, and spend.
Answered by Dan Jarvis - Minister of State (Cabinet Office)
I refer the Honourable Member to my answer given to Parliamentary Question 91383. Whilst the Integrated Security Fund (ISF) does not track or disaggregate reporting or expenditure by Gender Equality and Social Inclusion (GESI) scoring specifically, the ISF meets its transparency obligations and programme details are published where possible. However, data for some ISF programmes cannot be released publicly due to national security sensitivities.
The ISF funds a variety of ‘programmes’, each of which is designed to achieve a specific national security objective. Each programme can then be broken down into individual ‘projects’ which work towards the programme’s objective. There is a requirement whereby all programmes should include at least one project where gender is a primary objective (an ‘E’ rating under OECD GESI markers, which is the highest rating), and all projects must have met, or be working towards meeting, a minimum standard whereby gender equality is part of the project’s objectives, but not the principal reason for undertaking the project (a ‘C’ rating).