Lewis Cocking

This Government’s Safer Streets Mission will drive forward the change we need to crack down on shoplifting – a crime that is blighting our communities.

As Solicitor General, I superintend the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS), which prosecutes shoplifting and attempted shoplifting in England and Wales.

The CPS increased prosecutions for shoplifting and attempted shoplifting in 2024. In 2024, the CPS prosecuted 113,624 cases of shoplifting, up from 56,986 in 2022. In 2024, the CPS prosecuted 2,025 cases of attempted shoplifting, up from 1,074 in 2022.

However, more needs to be done.

Under the previous government, shoplifting hit a record high, with more and more offenders using appalling violence and abuse against shopworkers.

This Government will not stand for that level of lawlessness and criminality. New money will be invested in prevention, training the police and retailers on specific retail crime tactics to stop crime before it happens.

We’re also putting a stop to the effective immunity for shoplifting of goods below £200 and bringing in a new offence of assaulting a retail worker to protect those who face unacceptable abuse in their roles serving the public.

Costs for equality, diversity and inclusion in the Civil Service have recently been published on Gov.uk. See the Civil Service Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Expenditure Review and Civil Service 2024/2025 External Expenditure on Equality, Diversity and Inclusion.

The Government will publish a Small Business Strategy Paper later this year.

This will set out the Government’s vision for all small businesses, from boosting scale-ups to growing the co-operative economy, across key policy areas such as creating thriving high streets, making it easier to access finance, opening up overseas and domestic markets, building business capabilities, and providing a strong business environment.

The paper will complement the Government’s forthcoming Industrial Strategy and Trade Strategy.

Our forthcoming Small Business Strategy will reaffirm our long-term support for small businesses and outline our vision for boosting scale-ups and helping all types of business to thrive and grow. This strategy will empower business owners and entrepreneurs to innovate, export, and create jobs across their regions.

In addition, as confirmed in the autumn Budget the Government has taken steps to protect small businesses by increasing the Employment Allowance to £10,500. This measure will help small businesses in particular - in 2024 small businesses (with 0-49 employees) make up 99.2% of the total business population.

The Government understands the importance of face-to-face banking to communities and high streets and is committed to championing sufficient access for all.

We have committed to work closely with banks to roll out at least 350 banking hubs. That rollout is overseen by Cash Access UK (CAUK). LINK (the operator of the UK’s largest ATM network) assesses a community’s needs for access to cash in the event of the closure of a core cash service or if LINK receives a request directly from a community.

The net zero transition will not only be the economic opportunity of the century, but it will also support the creation of hundreds of thousands of good jobs across the UK, protect our economy from future price shocks that reliance on fossil fuels create, while delivering a range of social and health benefits. The Warm Homes Plan, for example, will transform homes across the country, from installing new insulation to rolling out solar and heat pumps, helping households make their homes cleaner and cheaper to run.

As the OBR has noted [July 2021 Fiscal Risks Report], the costs of failing to get climate change under control would be much larger than those of bringing emissions down to net zero.

I refer the hon. Member for Broxbourne to the answer of 28 February 2025 to Question 31690.

Ministers and departmental officials engage with a wide range of experts on special educational needs and disabilities (SEND). The government has established and are working with an Inclusion Expert Advisory Group and a Neurodiversity Task and Finish Group, set up by Ministers to advise on steps needed to improve mainstream education outcomes and experiences for children and young people with SEND.

In addition to regular engagement with parents across the country, my right hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Education met recently with members of the Disabled Children’s Partnership (a coalition representing more than 120 organisations who support families of children and young people with SEND) and the department continues to have ongoing conversations with parents and other key stakeholders.

Announcements on funding for the Adoption and Special Guardianship Support Fund (ASGSF) will be made as soon as possible. We will, of course, always consider the impact of decisions on vulnerable children.

ASGSF applications are generally permitted to extend up to 12 months, allowing children and families to receive continuing therapy across financial years. Where applications are agreed, therapy which starts before March 2025 may therefore continue into the next financial year, under previously agreed transitional funding arrangements.

Home-to-school travel is an integral part of the school system. It provides a valuable service on which many families rely. The department is grateful to the many transport operators for the crucial role they play in ensuring that children receive the education that they need to help them thrive.

Local authorities are responsible for arranging home-to-school travel for eligible children. It is for them to determine how best to do so, based on local circumstances and the needs of the children travelling. They might, for example, have an in-house fleet, provide passes for free travel on public transport or contract with private transport operators for the provision of buses, coaches, taxis and private hire vehicles. Where they contract with private operators, it is for the local authority and the operator to agree suitable terms.

I refer the hon. Member for Broxbourne to the answer of 29 January 2025 to Question 26397.

The Land Use Consultation published this year was underpinned by analysis of land use change for nature restoration and other objectives. This included analysis of potential spatial distributions of change to 2050, taking account of land’s suitability for food production. This analysis is set out in the Analytical Annex published alongside the consultation. We are currently analysing responses to the consultation and feedback on this analysis and will take them into account in the preparation of the Land Use Framework, the forthcoming food strategy and future UK Food Security Reports.

Section 29 of the guidance entitled “May 2025 Elections: guidance on conduct for civil servants” outlines that it is for individual public bodies to apply the guidance within their own organisations. Environment Agency staff follow all relevant sections of the guidance to ensure that their activities do not call into question their political impartiality.

The Cabinet Office publishes guidance to civil servants in UK Government departments and staff and members of non-departmental public bodies (NDPBs) and other arm’s-length bodies (ALBs) on their role and conduct during pre-election periods. The most recent guidance was updated on 20 March 2025 ahead of the May 2025 local elections.

Environment Agency (EA) staff follow this guidance to ensure that their activities do not call into question their political impartiality.

Under new proposals set out by this Government, households and businesses will be entitled to higher payments from water companies when basic services are hit in a wider range of circumstances – with payments water company customers are legally entitled to when key standards are not met at least doubling.

The Government is also expanding the list of circumstances that can trigger compensation, to include payments for boil notices when drinking water standards drop, and for failures to conduct meter readings or installations as promised. It would mean recent outages in Hastings, Brixham and Bramley earlier this year would have all automatically led to compensation at higher rates for all customers.

Defra has established a ministerially led cross-Governmental Flood Resilience Taskforce to ensure that communities are better protected from flooding, with the first meeting taking place in September. The Flood Resilience Taskforce will ensure that preparedness and resilience to flooding is reviewed regularly before the start of the main flood season; and that it is continuously improved to ensure optimum protection to people, homes and businesses.

In advance of the winter, MPs will receive advice on how to access the most up to date flood information from the EA and how to raise awareness of flooding with constituents.

The Pedicabs (London) Act 2024 conferred powers onto Transport for London (TfL) to regulate London’s pedicab industry for the first time, giving TfL the tools it needs to tackle the unsafe, anti-social and nuisance behaviours of certain pedicab operators and drivers. TfL is currently analysing responses to a public consultation in order to inform the design and implementation of future pedicab regulations. Department for Transport Ministers and officials have regular conversations with the Mayor of London and TfL on a range of matters including pedicabs.

The Pedicabs (London) Act 2024 conferred powers onto Transport for London (TfL) to regulate London’s pedicab industry for the first time, giving TfL the tools it needs to tackle the unsafe, anti-social and nuisance behaviours of certain pedicab operators and drivers. TfL is currently analysing responses to a public consultation in order to inform the design and implementation of future pedicab regulations. Department for Transport Ministers and officials have regular conversations with the Mayor of London and TfL on a range of matters including pedicabs.

Transport in London is devolved to the Mayor, and TfL is responsible for operational decisions to support reduced fare evasion. Department for Transport ministers and officials have regular conversations with Transport for London on a variety of issues including fare evasion on their network. TfL has informed the department of their activity to tackle this important issue which includes an expanded dedicated team of investigators and 500 uniformed TfL officers deployed across the TfL network with 360 offenders found guilty at court in 2024.

The Department for Transport works closely with industry stakeholders, including utility companies, as we continue to review our legislation, statutory guidance and guidance, to identify areas where the regime can be improved to minimise the impact of street works. We have recently announced to the industry that we will be clamping down on disruptive works by doubling fixed penalty notices for utility companies who fail to comply with rules and extending charges for works that overrun into weekends.

As more highway authorities are progressing with their applications to operate lane rental schemes to target the most disruptive works on our roads, my Department have been engaging with utility companies directly as part of a series of regional visits. Utility companies have also been invited, along with a range of other stakeholders, to take part in a consultation on proposals to improve and simplify the lane rental application process.

The Department have examined data from our Street Manager digital service and spoken to industry representatives and found no evidence of misuse. Emergency works are needed to deal with danger to life and urgent works are needed, for example, to repair leaks, restore customer connections, and repair dangerous potholes. The Government believes, however, that there is scope to improve how such works are managed and communicated to road users and we are working with the sector to develop proposals to address this.

DWP provides 16-24-year-olds with labour market support through an extensive range of interventions at a national and local level.

As part of the plan to Get Britain Working we will launch a Youth Guarantee for all young people aged 18-21 in England to ensure that they can access training opportunities, an apprenticeship or help to find work.

Eight Youth Guarantee Trailblazers to test and learn before further roll out of the Youth Guarantee have launched in April.

Our plan to get Britain working includes a new Youth Guarantee for all young people aged 18-21 in England to ensure that they can access quality training opportunities, an apprenticeship or help to find work.

The Department for Work and Pensions and the Department for Education are working closely with the eight Mayoral Strategic Authorities in England who will begin delivering the Youth Guarantee Trailblazers announced in the Get Britain Working White Paper from Spring 2025.

To tackle the rising number of young people who are not participating in education, employment or training, these Trailblazers will test how new local leadership, accountability structures and existing provision can be integrated into a cohesive education, training and employment support for young people. More broadly, we will work closely with mayoral authorities on a range of wider initiatives such as developing national and local partnerships to support the Youth Guarantee.

The Trailblazers will run for 12 months, and we will use the learning to inform the future design and development of the Youth Guarantee as it rolls-out across the rest of England. Additionally, Department for Education are also developing new foundation apprenticeships to give more young people a foot in the door at the start of their working lives whilst supporting the pipeline of new talent that employers will need to drive economic growth.

The Department for Work and Pensions are also working to develop proposals for reform to the system of health and disability benefits and will set them out in a Green Paper in the Spring. The Government is committed to putting the views and voices of disabled people at the heart of all that we do, so we will consult on these proposals with disabled people and representative organisations.

It is estimated that around 16,600 pensioners in Broxbourne Constituency (2024 boundaries) will be affected by the decision to amend the eligibility criteria for the Winter Fuel Payment. This is based on February 2024 Pension Credit statistics which are available via DWP Stat-Xplore and the Winter FuelPayment statistics for winter 2023 to 2024 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk).

This estimation is calculated by subtracting the number of people claiming Pension Credit in Broxbourne constituency from the number of Winter Fuel Payment recipients in Broxbourne constituency. It is possible to use the Pension Credit statistics, to give a minimum estimate of the number who may be eligible for Winter Fuel Payments. Therefore, the above estimation is essentially the number of Winter Fuel Payment recipients who are not claiming Pension Credit pre-policy change, as an estimate of those who will no longer receive the Winter Fuel Payment.

Please note that the above estimation would not take into account any potential increase in Pension Credit take-up that we might see as a result of the Government’s Pension Credit Awareness Campaign. We do not have data on those additional Pension Credit claims by Parliamentary constituencies.

The published Pension Credit figures refer to households, so the number of individuals in respect of whom Pension Credit is paid will be higher (i.e. taking account of households where a claimant has a partner and/or dependents.)

In addition, while Pension Credit claimants constitute the majority of those that will be eligible for the Winter Fuel Payment, pensioners who claim other qualifying means-tested benefits will also be eligible for the Winter Fuel Payment. It is not, however, possible to include those on other qualifying means-tested benefits in these figures.

Local integrated care boards are responsible for ensuring that mental health services are safe, effective, sustainable, and meet the needs of the population.

Long waits are being driven by increasing demand in a system in desperate need of change. We are already responding by delivering new, innovative models of care in the community. We are piloting six neighbourhood, 24/7 adult mental health centres to bring together community, crisis, and inpatient care.

NHS England uses the Oversight Framework to assess the quality and safety of all mental health inpatient services in England, including services in Broxbourne. Risks and issues are escalated nationally using the quality risk and escalation framework.

In addition, the Care Quality Commission carries out monitoring and assessments of providers in England to ensure they are providing safe and quality care to people using their services. The Care Quality Commission has a duty under the Mental Health Act 1983 to monitor how services exercise their powers and discharge their duties when patients are detained in hospital or are subject to community treatment orders or guardianship.

It is the responsibility of local commissioners and providers to work together to ensure that hospital patient transport services are meeting the needs of their populations locally. National guidance for non-emergency patient transport services, to support them in becoming consistently more responsive, fair, and sustainable, is available at the following link:

https://www.england.nhs.uk/publication/improving-non-emergency-patient-transport-services/

We know patients are struggling to contact their general practices (GP), including in the Broxbourne constituency. That is why we have committed to eliminating the 8:00am scramble for appointments by implementing a modern appointment booking system.

The most recent data from the Health Insight Survey found that between July and August 2024, 78% of people had successfully contacted their GP on the same day, in the last 28 days. Of those who tried to contact their GP practice in the last 28 days, 72.6% of adults perceived their overall experience of their GP practice as either ‘Very Good’ or ‘Good’.

99.4% of the primary care estate are now live with digital telephony and 90% have been enrolled to use online registration systems.

We are determined to reduce bureaucracy, which is why the Government has launched a red tape challenge, ensuring GPs spend less time filling in forms and more time caring for patients.

Providers must provide sufficient numbers of suitably qualified, competent, skilled, and experienced staff to meet the needs of the people using the service. Staff must receive the support, training, professional development, supervision, and appraisals that are necessary for them to carry out their role.

We now have a national career framework for adult social car, the Care Workforce Pathway, which is linked to a number of existing competency frameworks, including the dementia training standards framework.

The Department has also launched a new Level 2 Adult Social Care Certificate qualification which links to the outcomes in the Care Workforce Pathway. This contains the baseline knowledge required to provide quality care, and will make sure that those who are starting out their careers have an informed awareness of dementia.

There are currently no plans for assessing whether the responsibility of the allocation of general practice surgeries should fall to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government. Upper-tier local authorities currently have a role in improving health and influencing health and care strategies through participation in integrated care partnerships (ICPs) and integrated care boards (ICBs). ICBs are National Health Service organisations responsible for planning health services for their local population, including Primary Medical Services. ICBs are legally required to have local government representation on their board. Each integrated care system (ICS) includes an ICP, formed of NHS organisations and upper-tier local authorities, which is responsible for developing an integrated care strategy. The ICB works to deliver this through developing a joint plan with partner local authorities, managing the NHS budget, and arranging for the provision of health services in the ICS area.

The healthcare needs of local populations affect the funding which practices receive. Global sum payments for general practice contractors are based on a weighted sum for every person registered with the practice, using the Carr-Hill formula to estimate the practices’ workload.

While the Government has no current plans to amend legislation, we continue to work closely with industry to roll out 350 banking hubs across the UK. The UK banking sector has committed to deliver these hubs by the end of this Parliament. Over 220 hubs have been announced so far, and over 140 are already open.

Any decisions on changes to LINK’s independent assessment criteria are a matter for LINK, the financial services sector, and for the Financial Conduct Authority, which oversees the access to cash regime.

Banking has changed significantly in recent years with many customers benefitting from the ease and convenience of remote banking. While branch closures are commercial decisions for banks, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) guidance expects firms to carefully consider the impact of planned branch closures on their customers’ everyday banking and cash access needs and put in place alternatives where reasonable. This seeks to ensure that branch closures are implemented in a way that treats customers fairly.

Where firms fall short of expectations, the FCA may ask for closures to be paused or other options to be put in place. Where alternative services have been recommended, a branch cannot close until any recommended services are in place.

The Financial Services and Markets Act 2023 granted the FCA the responsibility and powers to seek to ensure the reasonable provision of cash withdrawal and deposit facilities. Under the FCA’s regime, LINK, the operator of the UK’s ATM network, is responsible for undertaking access to cash assessments. When a cash service such as a bank branch closes, or if LINK receives a request directly from a community, LINK assesses a community’s access to cash needs and can recommend a new service, such as a banking hub.

The Government has no powers to intervene in decisions to open new banking hubs, and the criteria for access to cash assessments is a matter for LINK, the financial services sector and the FCA. The FCA is required by law to keep its access to cash rules under review and is monitoring the impact of these rules on an ongoing basis to ensure they deliver the right outcomes for businesses and consumers.

The Government understands the importance of face-to-face banking to communities, high streets, and rural areas across the UK, and is committed to championing sufficient access for all as a priority. The Government is working closely with industry to roll out 350 banking hubs across the UK. The UK banking sector has committed to deliver these hubs by the end of this Parliament. Over 200 hubs have been announced so far, and over 100 are already open.

The locations of banking hubs are independently determined by LINK, the industry coordinating body responsible for making access to cash assessments. When a cash service such as a bank branch closes, or if LINK receives a request directly from a community, LINK assesses a community’s access to cash needs.

LINK will recommend appropriate solutions where it considers that a community requires additional cash services. Some of the criteria that LINK considers are whether there is a bank branch remaining, population size, number of shops on the high street, distance to the nearest bank branch, public transport links, and vulnerability of the population.

Based on this independent assessment and recommendation, Cash Access UK will provide a suitable shared solution, such as a deposit service, or a banking hub, for that community.