Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, what steps the Gambling Commission has taken to ensure compliance with the Growth Duty under Section 108 of the Deregulation Act 2015; and whether she has made an assessment of the potential impact of the Commission's (a) policies and (b) regulatory activities on economic growth.

Answered by Stephanie Peacock - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport)

The Gambling Commission is required by its statutory functions to strike a balance between supporting the growth of regulated businesses and providing protection for consumers and society. The Commission’s statement of principles for licensing and regulation includes ensuring that unnecessary regulatory burdens are not placed on businesses, prioritising the least intrusive regulatory tools to achieve compliance and ensuring that any regulatory action is proportionate. It also states that the Commission will have regard to promoting economic growth, insofar as it thinks it is consistent with pursuit of the licensing objectives.

Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, with reference to the oral contribution of the Minister for Border Security and Asylum of 13 January 2025 on Asylum Hotels, Official Report, column 13, what progress his Department has made on closing nine asylum hotels by end of March 2025.

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

It remains our absolute commitment to end the use of hotels over time, as part of our reduction in overall asylum accommodation costs.  We do not provide a running commentary on hotel numbers, but by the end of March there will be fewer hotels open than when this Government took office.

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to encourage transparency from the Office for Health Improvement and Disparities when allocating funds for the Horse Race Betting Levy.

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

The Office for Health Improvement and Disparities is not involved in the allocation of funds from the Horserace Betting Levy (HBL). The HBL is administered by the Horserace Betting Levy Board, an executive non-departmental public body, sponsored by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport.

Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps he is taking to (a) help ensure food is not contaminated with horsemeat and (b) improve the traceability of horses in Great Britain.

Answered by Daniel Zeichner - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)

The Food Standards Agency (FSA) is the national authority responsible for food safety and food hygiene across England, Wales and Northern Ireland.

The FSA ensures that official controls and legislation for meat safety and traceability are met by deploying staff in every slaughterhouse. The FSA also conducts risk-based, intelligence driven surveillance to monitor food safety and authenticity. It also has a National Food Crime Unit to prevent, detect and investigate food crime.

The Government recognises the importance of improving equine traceability. Defra is engaging with industry to consider improvements to this.

Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment his Department has made of the potential impact of the closure of the Border Inspection Post at Stansted Airport on the British horseracing industry; and whether he plans to take steps to ensure horses are able to continue travelling to and from the UK by air.

Answered by Daniel Zeichner - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)

Defra is aware that Stansted has signalled an intention to relocate its Border Inspection Post to another site and that the timing of this remains uncertain. This is a commercial decision for the airport’s owners. No application to de-designate the existing site or designate a new site has been received. The Department stands ready to help progress such applications when received.

Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what plans he has to implement a national Digital Equine ID system to ensure the traceability of all horses.

Answered by Daniel Zeichner - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)

This is a devolved matter, and the information provided therefore relates to England only.

The Government recognises the importance of the equine sector to the UK economy and to improving equine identification and traceability. We have no current plans to implement mandatory digital identification, but we remain in close touch with the industry to look at potential improvements.

Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, what steps her Department is taking to ensure that the Office for Health Improvement and Disparities avoids conflicts of interest in the allocation of funds under the statutory levy.

Answered by Stephanie Peacock - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport)

The government’s priority is to ensure funding is being directed where it is needed most to deliver on our objective to reduce gambling-related harms. The Gambling Act 2005 is clear that DCMS and HM Treasury have powers to approve levy spending. To guarantee sufficient accountability and transparency within the new system, we will ensure robust governance arrangements are in place for the levy, including a Levy Board for central government oversight. Governance arrangements will be designed to manage conflicts of interest, while recognising that a wide spectrum of views and insights will be needed to shape our objectives and monitor the outcomes of the levy system.

Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, whether her Department holds data on noise readings from Heathrow Airport on (a) 21 March 2025 and (b) average on other days.

Answered by Mike Kane - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)

The Department does not hold data on individual noise readings from Heathrow Airport.

We expect airports to help local communities understand their noise impacts through monitoring, provision of information and communication. Heathrow publishes a wide range of noise data on its website including real time data from its noise monitors and annual reports which detail its noise impacts.

Question

To ask the hon. Member for Blaenau Gwent and Rhymney, representing the House of Commons Commission, if the Commission will make an estimate of the costs of (a) staff time, (b) facilities and (c) any other costs required to host the Youth Select Committee in the House of Commons in the most recent year for which information is available.

Answered by Nick Smith

To support the running of the Youth Select Committee (YSC), £10k is provided to an external delivery partner. Staff from the House of Commons support the YSC in addition to their existing responsibilities so it is not possible to disaggregate staff time in this way. Facilities used for the YSC were on the parliamentary estate so no additional costs were incurred.

Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what progress his Department has made on reducing barriers to cross-border travel without physical checks for thoroughbred horses since 6 February 2025.

Answered by Daniel Zeichner - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)

There have been no changes to the rules for importing thoroughbred horses into Great Britain since 6 February 2025. Imports of thoroughbred horses from the European Union do not currently need to enter Great Britain via a Border Control Post and are not subject to physical checks at the border. Guidance on importing horses into Great Britain is available on gov.uk

Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps her Department is taking to increase the availability of driving tests in Windsor.

Answered by Lilian Greenwood - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)

The Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency’s (DVSA) main priority is upholding road safety standards while it works hard to reduce car practical driving test waiting times.

On the 18 December 2024, DVSA set out further plans to reduce driving test waiting times across the country. These steps include recruiting 450 driving examiners (DEs). Full details of these steps can be found on GOV.UK.

DVSA continues recruitment for DEs at driving test centres (DTCs) that serve customers in the Windsor constituency and is currently working through the recruitment process from recent campaigns.

As part of this, DVSA has had four candidates successfully pass training, with a further four potential new DEs booked-on training programmes. There are also another four potential new DEs currently undergoing checks as part of the recruitment process.

DVSA has also been running a recruitment campaign in March and has fourteen vacancies for the area as part of this.

Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, pursuant to the Answer of 31 March 2025 to Question 41380 on Asylum: Hotels, how many hotels used for the housing of asylum seekers have closed between 21 January 2025 and 31 March 2025.

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

I refer the Honourable Member to the Answer he received on the 31 March 2025 to UIN 41380.

Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, pursuant to the Answer of 31 March 2025 to Question 41380, how many asylum hotels have closed between 4 July 2024 and 31 March 2025.

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

I refer the Honourable Member to the Answer he received on the 31 March 2025 to UIN 41380.

Mass deportation of illegal migrants

150th anniversary of Wokingham Town Football Club

Found: Maureen Burke Harriet Cross Lillian Jones Mr Angus MacDonald Douglas McAllister Susan Murray Jack Rankin

Found: education premises, or places with significant risk of second-hand smoke, as smoke-free areas104 Jack Rankin

Found: _51 Jack Rankin .

Found: education premises, or places with significant risk of second-hand smoke, as smoke-free areas104 Jack Rankin

Found: _51 Jack Rankin ★.

Found: Jack Rankin MP, Member of Parliament for Windsor, United Kingdom 2033. Prof.