Asked by: Jonathan Ashworth (Labour (Co-op) - Leicester South)
Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:
To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, how much funding her Department and the predecessor Department (a) allocated for and (b) spent on magazine subscriptions in each of the last three financial years.
Answered by Andrew Griffith - Minister of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)
I refer the Honourable Member to the answer given in response to PQ 15898.
Asked by: Jonathan Ashworth (Labour (Co-op) - Leicester South)
Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:
To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, what subscriptions to (a) newspapers, (b) magazines and (c) online journals her Department has paid for in each of the last three financial years.
Answered by Andrew Griffith - Minister of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)
As the Hon Member will know, the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) was only created in February 2023 so did not exist three years ago.
Analysis of transactions shows that £157,441 has been spent to date in DSIT on subscriptions of all types.
Asked by: Jonathan Ashworth (Labour (Co-op) - Leicester South)
Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:
To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, how many and what proportion of digital posts in her Department are vacant.
Answered by Andrew Griffith - Minister of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)
There are 19 vacancies in the digital directorate among 178 posts. We do not centrally hold information on Digital posts and vacancies around the department.
Asked by: Jonathan Ashworth (Labour (Co-op) - Leicester South)
Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:
To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, how much funding her Department and the predecessor Department has (a) budgeted for and (b) spent on software updates to legacy computer systems in each of the last three financial years.
Answered by Andrew Griffith - Minister of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)
The accounting systems track IT spend, but do not capture the level of detail to readily identify spend on Infrastructure or legacy systems. Determination of legacy IT will require more work, the Legacy Risk Assessment will be prepared and submitted to Cabinet by the end of the current Financial year. Currently, within our centrally managed Digital function, there is no legacy IT of any material size or value so spend in the last 3 years for legacy software patching would be zero.
Asked by: Jonathan Ashworth (Labour (Co-op) - Leicester South)
Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:
To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, how much her Department spent on external recruitment consultants in the (a) 2020-21, (b) 2021-22 and (c) 2022-23 financial year.
Answered by Andrew Griffith - Minister of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)
External recruitment agencies and search firms are an important resource which support the Civil Service's ability to recruit - to find talented people, in the right places, with the right capabilities to deliver for the people of the United Kingdom. The Civil Service has developed a number of commercial frameworks which provide transparency, high quality services and value for money.
As the Hon member may recall, the Prime Minister announced the creation of DSIT on 7 Feb 2023. For the time periods specified in this request the Department therefore did not exist or systems had not yet been put in place to separate the new departments and the parliamentary supply was not disaggregated.
As such the answer for DSIT is nil.