Question to the Cabinet Office:

To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, what assessment he has made of the potential merits of including data for a Latin American ethnic group in national statistics.

Answered by Josh Simons - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)

The information requested falls under the remit of the UK Statistics Authority.

A response to the Hon gentleman’s Parliamentary Question of 8th of December is attached.

Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many people her Department’s Homelessness escalation service has helped move from No Recourse to Public Funds to having access to public funds in the latest period for which data is available.

Answered by Mike Tapp - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)

The requested information is not currently included in published migration data, so we are unable to provide this.

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

To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, if he will take legislative steps to ensure that no future election in the UK will be subject to outside interference.

Answered by Samantha Dixon - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Housing, Communities and Local Government)

The Government takes any attempts to intervene in democratic processes very seriously. It is, and always will be, an absolute priority to protect our democratic and electoral processes, including from foreign interference.

On the 16^th of December, the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government announced an independent review into countering foreign financial influence and interference in UK politics. The review will report at the end of March and will inform the forthcoming Elections Bill. This builds on the major reforms announced in the Elections Strategy in July, and the launch last month of the Counter Political Interference and Espionage Action Plan to disrupt and deter spying from states.

The Government’s strategy for modern, secure and inclusive elections, published in July, sets out our plan to strengthen oversight of and safeguards against known and emerging threats, including foreign interference through covert political funding. We will deliver a robust and proportionate response to known risks, protecting the integrity of our system and reinforcing public trust in democracy.

This sits alongside the government’s robust toolkit of measures to investigate and disrupt the threat from foreign interference in UK politics. This includes the National Security Act 2023, the Defending Democracy Taskforce, which coordinates work to protect UK political parties, elected officials and the electoral infrastructure, and the Joint Election Security and Preparedness unit, which coordinates work across government to protect UK elections and referendums, and the Online Safety Act which requires services to take steps to remove illegal disinformation content including illegal state-sponsored disinformation in scope of the Foreign Interference Offence.

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

To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, whether he has met with his French counterparts to consider parallel legislation to prevent outside interference in domestic elections.

Answered by Samantha Dixon - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Housing, Communities and Local Government)

The Government takes any attempts to intervene in democratic processes very seriously. It is, and always will be, an absolute priority to protect our democratic and electoral processes, including from foreign interference.

We have a robust toolkit of measures including the foreign interference offence and foreign influence registration scheme introduced under the National Security Act 2023, the Defending Democracy Taskforce, which coordinates work to protect UK political parties, elected officials and electoral infrastructure from threats including foreign interference, the Joint Election Security and Preparedness unit, which coordinates work to protect UK elections and referendums, and the Counter Political Interference and Espionage Action Plan launched last month to disrupt and deter spying from states.

Additionally, on 16 December the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government announced an independent review into countering foreign financial influence and interference in UK politics, led by Philip Rycroft. We will consider how to take forward any recommendations from the review, including through the upcoming Elections Bill.

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to her Department's press notice entitled £740 million allocated for 10,000 new places for pupils with SEND, published on 27 March 2025, what data she holds on how the additional funding was spent by Local Education Authorities.

Answered by Georgia Gould - Minister of State (Education)

The £740 million high needs capital investment in 2025/26 is on track to create around 10,000 new specialist places, in both special and mainstream schools.

Local authorities share plans for their HNPCA with the department as part of grant assurance checks. We do not publish these due to the potential commercial sensitivities, but we encourage local authorities to publish where possible to aid transparency.