Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many meetings the Minister for Mental Health has had with the Chief Executive of Mind since her appointment; and what the dates were of those meetings.

Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

Ministerial meetings with external organisations are routinely published on the GOV.UK website on a quarterly basis.

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what meetings the Minister for Mental Health has had with external bodies since her appointment.

Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

Ministerial meetings with external organisations are routinely published on the GOV.UK website on a quarterly basis.

Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what criteria her Department uses to determine which illegal immigrants will be tagged.

Answered by Angela Eagle - Minister of State (Home Office)

When granted immigration bail, an individual may have specific conditions attached to their bail, such as electronic monitoring, a residence restriction or other conditions appropriate to the individual. A breach of any of the bail conditions that are set is an offence under s.24(1) of the Immigration Act 1971.

The Immigration Act 2016 Schedule 10 Part 1 paragraphs 2(2) and 2(3) place a duty on the Secretary of State, where appropriate and practical, to electronically monitor those on immigration bail who could be detained because they are subject to either deportation proceedings or a Deportation Order. There is a discretion to apply electronic monitoring (EM) more broadly and this is considered on a case by case basis.

Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many (a) fingerprints, (b) photos and (c) DNA samples have been collected from illegal immigrants housed in Cheshire in each of the last five years.

Answered by Angela Eagle - Minister of State (Home Office)

Obtaining the specific information requested would involve collating and verifying information from multiple systems owned by multiple teams across the Home Office and, therefore, could only be obtained at disproportionate cost.

Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many (a) fingerprints, (b) photos and (c) DNA samples have been collected from illegal immigrants arriving in the UK in each of the last five years.

Answered by Angela Eagle - Minister of State (Home Office)

Obtaining the specific information requested would involve collating and verifying information from multiple systems owned by multiple teams across the Home Office and, therefore, could only be obtained at disproportionate cost.

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment he has made of the potential impact of the increase in National Insurance Contributions on the (a) financial viability and (b) capacity of the third sector in the health sector.

Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

The Government recognises the vital work carried out by voluntary organisations, including in the heath sector, and is committed to supporting small businesses and charities. That is why the Employment Allowance has been more than doubled to £10,500. As a result, over half of the businesses with National Insurance contribution (NIC) liabilities will either benefit or see no increase in their contributions. In addition, eligible businesses and charities will continue to be able to claim reliefs on employer NICs, including those for employees under 21 years old and apprentices under 25 years old. Integrated care boards have developed plans to commission services in 2025/26 from providers, both National Health Service and third sector, to best meet the needs of their local populations, in response to national planning guidance.

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what estimate he has made of the proportion of government health expenditure that will be spent on mental health in each year of this parliament.

Answered by Stephen Kinnock - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

The Written Ministerial Statement was published on 27 March 2025. This contained information on Government health expenditure in 2024/25 and 2025/26.

No estimate has been made for the remaining years of Parliament beyond this. However, mental health remains a priority for the Government, and this is backed by our commitment to the Mental Health Investment Standard in 2025/26.

Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many foreign national offenders have breached the conditions of their tag in each of the last five years.

Answered by Angela Eagle - Minister of State (Home Office)

Available information on the number of individuals electronically monitored (EM) in each of the last five years is available here: Electronic Monitoring Statistics Annual Publication, March 2024 - GOV.UK, but is not broken down by nationality.

When an FNO breaches the conditions of their EM, the action taken will consider the nature and frequency of breach, the level of harm posed by the person and any previous history of non-compliance, including potential prosecution where the breach relates to refusal to comply with induction onto electronic monitoring (EM), deliberate attempts to remove or damage a device, or tampering with the device so that it fails to operate correctly.

Further details of potential sanctions for non-compliance with EM are set out on Page 93 of the Immigration bail guidance, available at Immigration bail.docx.

Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many foreign national offenders have been tagged in each of the last five years.

Answered by Angela Eagle - Minister of State (Home Office)

Available information on the number of individuals electronically monitored (EM) in each of the last five years is available here: Electronic Monitoring Statistics Annual Publication, March 2024 - GOV.UK, but is not broken down by nationality.

When an FNO breaches the conditions of their EM, the action taken will consider the nature and frequency of breach, the level of harm posed by the person and any previous history of non-compliance, including potential prosecution where the breach relates to refusal to comply with induction onto electronic monitoring (EM), deliberate attempts to remove or damage a device, or tampering with the device so that it fails to operate correctly.

Further details of potential sanctions for non-compliance with EM are set out on Page 93 of the Immigration bail guidance, available at Immigration bail.docx.

Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what the penalty is for foreign national offenders who breach the conditions of their tag.

Answered by Angela Eagle - Minister of State (Home Office)

Available information on the number of individuals electronically monitored (EM) in each of the last five years is available here: Electronic Monitoring Statistics Annual Publication, March 2024 - GOV.UK, but is not broken down by nationality.

When an FNO breaches the conditions of their EM, the action taken will consider the nature and frequency of breach, the level of harm posed by the person and any previous history of non-compliance, including potential prosecution where the breach relates to refusal to comply with induction onto electronic monitoring (EM), deliberate attempts to remove or damage a device, or tampering with the device so that it fails to operate correctly.

Further details of potential sanctions for non-compliance with EM are set out on Page 93 of the Immigration bail guidance, available at Immigration bail.docx.

Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:

To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, how much funding was awarded to Knutsford Town Council via the Shared Prosperity Fund.

Answered by Alex Norris - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Housing, Communities and Local Government)

The UK Shared Prosperity Fund (UKSPF) is allocated to lead local authorities (LLAs). Details of full funding allocations for LLAs can be found here for 2022-25 and here for 2025-26.

Knutsford Town Council did not directly receive a UKSPF allocation for 2022-25 or 2025-26. However, Knutsford has benefited from UKSPF allocations made to Cheshire East Council who are the LLA for this area.

Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many times were drugs were found in (a) men's and (b) women's prisons in each year between 2015 and 2024.

Answered by Nicholas Dakin - Government Whip, Lord Commissioner of HM Treasury

The information requested can be found via the following link: 08_Finds_drug_type_data_tool.ods.

In the pivot table, “Prison Name” should be entered in the rows and “Month” in columns to find the number of incidents by prison.

Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:

To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, what investigations his Department has carried out on the condition of copper telecommunications cabling in rural areas.

Answered by Chris Bryant - Minister of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport)

The Department has not investigated the condition of copper telecommunications cabling in rural areas. However, we are aware that the overall condition of the copper networks is aging and deteriorating: the number of major incidents on the copper-based PSTN has been rising, with a 45% increase in 2024 compared to the previous year. Between April 2024 and March 2025, there were over 2,600 major incidents on the PSTN, each affecting 500 or more customers. The Government is committed to ensuring that any risks arising from the industry-led migration of the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN) to Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) are mitigated for all customers across the UK.

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, pursuant to the Answer of 13 March 2025 to Question 35647 on Coronavirus: Research, if he will make an assessment of the potential impact of the Prescription Medicines Code of Practice Authority case rulings with reference to (a) AUTH/3835/10/23 and (b) 0316/10/24 on the governance of the Government’s mRNA research and development partnership with Moderna.

Answered by Ashley Dalton - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)

In April 2025, the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) was made aware that Moderna was to be issued a public reprimand by the Prescription Medicines Code of Practice Authority (PMCPA) appeal board. Moderna would be subject to an audit following two recent cases where they had been ruled to have breached the Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry Code.

The Government has conducted an initial assessment of the PMCPA’s ruling, and has determined that it will not impact the delivery of the Moderna-United Kingdom Strategic Partnership.

The UKHSA will work with Moderna to ensure any recommendations from the report are duly considered and implemented, and to obtain assurance that these will be upheld for the duration of the partnership.

Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, what the total expenditure by his Department is on overseas (a) road repairs, (b) waterways, (c) bridges, (d) highways and (e) canals in each of the last five years.

Answered by Stephen Doughty - Minister of State (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)

Source: Statistics on International Development

NB Figures prior to the 2020 Department For International Development (DFID) - Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) merger were for DFID, as FCO at that time was focussed on the Prosperity Fund that was closed soon after the merger.

Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment her Department has made of the potential merits of abolishing non-crime hate incidents.

Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Home Office)

The Home Secretary has been clear about the priorities that she wants police forces across the country to focus on, and she has also been clear that a consistent and common-sense approach must be taken in relation to non-crime hate incidents.

As agreed with the Home Secretary, the National Police Chiefs’ Council and College of Policing are currently conducting a review of non-crime hate incidents, and we will update Parliament in due course on the findings of that review, and any changes that may be required to the current code of practice introduced by the Shadow Home Secretary in March 2023.

Found: Chairs: Dawn Butler, Esther McVey, Karl Turner and Sir Jeremy Wright Clerks: Kevin Maddison and Aaron

Found: Chairs: Dawn Butler, Esther McVey, Karl Turner and Sir Jeremy Wright Clerks: Kevin Maddison and Aaron