Asked by: Callum Anderson (Labour - Buckingham and Bletchley)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps he has taken to support young people in (a) Buckinghamshire and (b) Milton Keynes into employment, education or training.
Answered by Andrew Western - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Work and Pensions)
This Government is investing in young people’s futures. At the Budget, we announced more than £1.5 billion of investment over the next three years, funding £820 million for the Youth Guarantee to support young people to earn or learn, and an additional £725 million for the Growth and Skills Levy.
Through the expanded Youth Guarantee, young people aged 16-24 across Great Britain are set to benefit from further support into employment and learning, including:
The Growth and Skills Levy’s £725 million investment will deliver more apprenticeships for young people and help match skills training with local job opportunities. Young people will benefit from:
50,000 young people across the country will be better equipped for jobs of the future through a major investment to create more apprenticeships and training courses.
As this programme is across Great Britian, my hon. Friend will be assured that it will have an effect on his constituency.
Asked by: Callum Anderson (Labour - Buckingham and Bletchley)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps he is taking to increase (a) skills and (b) employment support for people in Buckingham and Bletchley constituency who are in receipt of sickness benefits.
Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Get Britain Working White Paper, published in autumn 2024, and Pathways to Work Green Paper, published in spring 2025, set out the Government’s plan on skills and employment support, including for those in receipt of sickness benefits.
Our Pathways to Work Guarantee offer of personalised employment, health and skills support for all disabled people and those with health conditions on out of work benefits is backed by £1 billion a year of new funding by the end of the decade. Once fully rolled out, we anticipate this will include a support conversation to identify next steps, one-to-one caseworker support, periodic engagement and an offer of specialist long-term work health and skills support.
In addition, Connect to Work is being made available across all of England and Wales. This is a voluntary, locally commissioned, Supported Employment programme for individuals that are disabled, have a health condition or experiencing non-health related barriers to work to find and sustain employment. There is no benefit-related requirement for this programme. DWP has agreed up to £7.2m in funding to Buckinghamshire County Council to deliver Connect to Work support across Buckinghamshire to around 1650 people by the end of the decade. We understand that Buckinghamshire County Council expect to open their service to participants at the start of April 2026.
Through the Adult Skills Fund in the 2025/26 academic year, we are spending £1.4 billion for eligible adults aged 19 and above from pre-entry to level 3, to support adults to gain the skills they need for work, an apprenticeship or further learning. In Buckingham and Bletchley, the Adult Skills Fund fully funds learners who are unemployed or earn less than £25,750 (annual gross salary).
Asked by: Callum Anderson (Labour - Buckingham and Bletchley)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps his Department is taking to reduce youth economic inactivity in rural communities.
Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
This Government is investing in all young people’s futures irrespective of where they live in Great Britain. At Budget, we announced more than £1.5 billion of investment over the next three years, funding £820 million for the Youth Guarantee to support young people to earn or learn, and an additional £725 million for the Growth and Skills Levy. Through the expanded Youth Guarantee, young people aged 16-24 across Great Britain are set to benefit from further support into employment and learning, including:
Support to find a job: For young people on Universal Credit who are looking for work, we are introducing a new Youth Guarantee Gateway, which over the next three years will offer nearly 900,000 16–24-year-olds a dedicated session, followed by four weeks of additional intensive support with a Work Coach. This new support will identify specific work, training, or learning opportunities locally for each young person and ensure they are supported to take those up. This support could be delivered at a Youth Hub.
Further expansion of Youth Hubs: We are expanding our network of Youth Hubs to over 360 locations so that all young people – including those not on benefits – can access opportunities and wider support in every local area of Great Britain. Youth Hubs will bring together partners from health, skills and the voluntary sector, working closely with Mayors and local authorities to deliver joined-up community-based support.
c300,000 additional opportunities for workplace experience and training: For young people on Universal Credit who are looking for work, we will create up to 150,000 additional work experience placements and up to 145,000 additional bespoke training opportunities designed in partnership with employers – Sector-based Work Academy Programmes (SWAPs). At the end of each SWAP, employers offer a guaranteed job interview to participants.
The Youth Guarantee ensures paid work for eligible 18–21-year-olds in Great Britain who have been on Universal Credit and seeking work for 18 months. Through the Jobs Guarantee scheme, participants get six months of government-funded employment at minimum wage for 25 hours weekly, plus extra support to build skills and experience. The program aims for an 80% employment rate and includes safeguards for quality and fairness. It will benefit about 55,000 young people over three years.
Prevention: We are improving support for young people at risk of becoming NEET by enhancing data sharing, monitoring further education attendance, and using new tools to help local areas target assistance effectively. We are also funding work experience opportunities for high-risk pupils in state-funded Alternative Provision settings. These efforts build on measures from the Post-16 Education and Skills White Paper announced earlier this autumn.
The Department for Work and Pensions and the Department for Education are also working closely with the seven Mayoral Strategic Authorities in England who are delivering the eight Youth Trailblazers announced in the Get Britain Working white paper.
The West of England Combined Authority is running a Rural Access Pilot as part of its Youth Guarantee Trailblazer. This pilot focuses on supporting young people in rural areas by providing tailored employment coaching and practical transport solutions, alongside bursaries to cover work-related costs. A free travel pass is designed to remove transport barriers for young people in these areas, enabling them to access employment opportunities, training, and support services.
Asked by: Callum Anderson (Labour - Buckingham and Bletchley)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what data his Department holds on the expected uptake of family financial resilience programmes in Buckingham and Bletchley constituency under the Child Poverty Strategy.
Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
We do not hold data on the expected uptake of family financial resilience programmes, and have not made any assessment of the number of children in households newly eligible for debt-prevention or money-management support in Buckingham and Bletchley constituency under the Child Poverty Strategy.
The Strategy recognises the important role that financial resilience must play in supporting families in poverty. The new £1 billion (including Barnett consequential) Crisis and Resilience Fund, launching in April 2026, will invest in local financial resilience to enable communities to better deal with crises in the long-term, reducing dependence and repeat need.
Alongside this, the government is boosting financial resilience through helping low-income families to save, increasing debt advice provision and providing financial education and money management tools. The Government’s Financial Inclusion Strategy, published on 5 November 2025, brings together the foundations of financial resilience in support of the Child Poverty Strategy.
Alongside the Child Poverty Strategy, we have set out our initial plans for monitoring and evaluation to ensure our strategy is on track to tackle child poverty. We will work with departments and policy owners to complement existing monitoring and evaluation plans, and support them to further assess the delivery and impact of their policies on child poverty, particularly for policies where it is important to capture wider benefits. Further details on our approach to monitoring and evaluation will follow in a baseline report in Summer 2026.
Asked by: Callum Anderson (Labour - Buckingham and Bletchley)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what estimate his Department has made of the number of children in Buckingham and Bletchley constituency in households newly eligible for debt-prevention or money-management support under the Child Poverty Strategy.
Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
We do not hold data on the expected uptake of family financial resilience programmes, and have not made any assessment of the number of children in households newly eligible for debt-prevention or money-management support in Buckingham and Bletchley constituency under the Child Poverty Strategy.
The Strategy recognises the important role that financial resilience must play in supporting families in poverty. The new £1 billion (including Barnett consequential) Crisis and Resilience Fund, launching in April 2026, will invest in local financial resilience to enable communities to better deal with crises in the long-term, reducing dependence and repeat need.
Alongside this, the government is boosting financial resilience through helping low-income families to save, increasing debt advice provision and providing financial education and money management tools. The Government’s Financial Inclusion Strategy, published on 5 November 2025, brings together the foundations of financial resilience in support of the Child Poverty Strategy.
Alongside the Child Poverty Strategy, we have set out our initial plans for monitoring and evaluation to ensure our strategy is on track to tackle child poverty. We will work with departments and policy owners to complement existing monitoring and evaluation plans, and support them to further assess the delivery and impact of their policies on child poverty, particularly for policies where it is important to capture wider benefits. Further details on our approach to monitoring and evaluation will follow in a baseline report in Summer 2026.
Asked by: Callum Anderson (Labour - Buckingham and Bletchley)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what plans his Department has to publish annual constituency-level child poverty indicators in relation to the Child Poverty Strategy.
Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Details of new statistics currently under development are also set out in the DWP Statistical Work Programme, available at: Statistical work programme - GOV.UK. This includes proposals for a new measure of low income for families in receipt of Universal Credit (UC) and new local area Official Statistics on children in low-income families on an after housing costs (AHC) basis, which will provide additional local area level insights.
The Monitoring and Evaluation Framework, published alongside the Strategy, sets out how we will track progress and evaluate success as part of our ongoing commitment to transparency, accountability and continued learning. We will use two complementary headline metrics, relative poverty (after housing costs) and deep material poverty, as well as a comprehensive programme of analysis focussing on the drivers of child poverty and the impact of specific interventions. We will publish a baseline report next summer with further details, which will set out the latest statistics and identify what further indicators and wider evidence will be used to monitor and evaluate the Child Poverty Strategy at both a national and local level.
Asked by: Callum Anderson (Labour - Buckingham and Bletchley)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what estimate his Department has made of the number of local voluntary sector organisations in Buckingham and Bletchley constituency expected to deliver services linked to the Child Poverty Strategy.
Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
We are strengthening our partnership with the voluntary, community and social enterprise sector (VCSE) with our Civil Society Covenant. We recognise that the VCSE sector has a strong record of supporting families and is the bedrock of our communities.
We are putting tackling child poverty at the heart of local government by including child poverty in the new Outcomes Framework for local government as a contextual outcome. The Framework also includes wider priority outcomes that will help tackle child poverty such as preventing and reducing homelessness and rough sleeping; access to a decent, safe and affordable home; local growth; and promoting health and wellbeing in children.
Alongside the Strategy, we have set out our initial plans for monitoring and evaluation to ensure our strategy is on track to tackle child poverty as part of our ongoing commitment to transparency, accountability, and continued learning.
Asked by: Callum Anderson (Labour - Buckingham and Bletchley)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what plans his Department has to issue guidance to councils covering Buckingham and Bletchley constituency on monitoring local outcomes of the Child Poverty Strategy.
Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
We are strengthening our partnership with the voluntary, community and social enterprise sector (VCSE) with our Civil Society Covenant. We recognise that the VCSE sector has a strong record of supporting families and is the bedrock of our communities.
We are putting tackling child poverty at the heart of local government by including child poverty in the new Outcomes Framework for local government as a contextual outcome. The Framework also includes wider priority outcomes that will help tackle child poverty such as preventing and reducing homelessness and rough sleeping; access to a decent, safe and affordable home; local growth; and promoting health and wellbeing in children.
Alongside the Strategy, we have set out our initial plans for monitoring and evaluation to ensure our strategy is on track to tackle child poverty as part of our ongoing commitment to transparency, accountability, and continued learning.
Asked by: Callum Anderson (Labour - Buckingham and Bletchley)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what estimate his Department has made of the projected number of children in the Buckingham and Bletchley constituency who will become newly eligible for support measures introduced under the Child Poverty Strategy.
Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Department does not have an estimate of the projected number of children in the Buckingham and Bletchley constituency who will become newly eligible for support measures introduced under the Child Poverty Strategy or hold data on the proportion of low-income households in the Buckingham and Bletchley constituency expected to benefit from changes to income-related thresholds outlined in the Child Poverty Strategy. Estimates are available for the number of children and households that are expected to gain from the removal of two-child limit at constituency level here Poverty impacts of social security changes at Budget 2025 - GOV.UK.
Asked by: Callum Anderson (Labour - Buckingham and Bletchley)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what data his Department holds on the proportion of low-income households in the Buckingham and Bletchley constituency expected to benefit from changes to income-related thresholds outlined in the Child Poverty Strategy.
Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Department does not have an estimate of the projected number of children in the Buckingham and Bletchley constituency who will become newly eligible for support measures introduced under the Child Poverty Strategy or hold data on the proportion of low-income households in the Buckingham and Bletchley constituency expected to benefit from changes to income-related thresholds outlined in the Child Poverty Strategy. Estimates are available for the number of children and households that are expected to gain from the removal of two-child limit at constituency level here Poverty impacts of social security changes at Budget 2025 - GOV.UK.