Asked by: Richard Holden (Conservative - Basildon and Billericay)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what his Department's policy is on recognising for social security purposes marriages between an uncle and niece legally contracted overseas where the couple are resident in England and Wales.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Ministry of Housing Communities and Local Government) (Equalities)
A marriage between an uncle and niece falls within the prohibited degrees of relationship set out in Part 1 of Schedule 1 to the Marriage Act 1949 and, by virtue of section 1(1) of that Act, is void for all purposes in England and Wales. There is similar legislation in Scotland and Northern Ireland.
Asked by: Richard Holden (Conservative - Basildon and Billericay)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many 16-year-olds in receipt of the enhanced rate of the mobility component of Personal Independence Payment have received funding through the Motability Foundation Driving Lessons Grant in (a) 2024–25 and (b) 2025–26; and how many received funding for the maximum 40 hours of driving lessons.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Ministry of Housing Communities and Local Government) (Equalities)
Motability Foundation provides the Driving Lessons Grant to help disabled teenagers with severe mobility challenges learn to drive from age 16, as legislation allows them to hold a provisional licence. Driving can remove barriers to personal independence.
The Department does not have recorded information on how many 16-year-olds were in receipt of a vehicle or have received funding through the Motability Foundation Driving Lessons Grant. Motability Foundation is a registered charity regulated by the Charity Commission so is wholly responsible for the terms and the administration of the Motability Scheme. The Scheme is delivered by Motability Operations which is an independent commercial company under contract to the charity.
Asked by: Richard Holden (Conservative - Basildon and Billericay)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many 16-year-olds were in receipt of a vehicle through the Motability Scheme in (a) 2024–25 and (b) 2025–26 by vehicle model.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Ministry of Housing Communities and Local Government) (Equalities)
Motability Foundation provides the Driving Lessons Grant to help disabled teenagers with severe mobility challenges learn to drive from age 16, as legislation allows them to hold a provisional licence. Driving can remove barriers to personal independence.
The Department does not have recorded information on how many 16-year-olds were in receipt of a vehicle or have received funding through the Motability Foundation Driving Lessons Grant. Motability Foundation is a registered charity regulated by the Charity Commission so is wholly responsible for the terms and the administration of the Motability Scheme. The Scheme is delivered by Motability Operations which is an independent commercial company under contract to the charity.
Asked by: Richard Holden (Conservative - Basildon and Billericay)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many households have claimants recorded as being in a polygamous marriage for a) Housing Benefit and b) other benefits.
Answered by Stephen Timms - Minister of State (Ministry of Housing Communities and Local Government) (Equalities)
I refer the Rt. Hon. Member to the answer I gave on 9 June 2026 to Question UIN 4348.
Asked by: Richard Holden (Conservative - Basildon and Billericay)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what proportion of employers paying the Growth and Skills Levy recovered less than (a) 25%, (b) 50%, (c) 75% and (d) 100% of levy contributions through funded training in the latest year for which figures are available.
Answered by Andrew Western - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The UK wide apprenticeship levy, which is paid at a rate of 0.5% by employers with an annual pay bill of over £3 million, is not legally hypothecated and, as such, revenues from the levy are paid into the Consolidated Fund and not directly allocated to apprenticeships.
Separately, the annual growth and skills (previously apprenticeship) budget for England is set at each spending review. In the 2024-2025 financial year the growth and skills budget was 100% spent.
In England, levy paying employers access growth and skills funding through their employer accounts, which they must set up, with spend drawn from the growth and skills budget. The funds in employers’ accounts reflect the ‘English percentage’ of an employer’s levy contribution and currently include a 10% top up from the government.
The table below shows the breakdown of spend by levy payers from their employer accounts in the 2024/25 financial year. To note, levy funds currently accrue in employer accounts for 24 months before they expire and so it is possible for levy payers to spend more money than entered their account over a 12-month period.
Percentage spend of funds in levy paying employer account in 2024/25 (funds used by employer accounts during the year against funds that entered the account that year) | Percentage spend by proportion of employers* (figures rounded to one decimal place) |
0 – 25% | 54.2% |
26% - 50% | 14.5% |
51% - 75% | 9.7% |
76% - 100% | 12.5% |
Over 100% | 9.2% |
*Proportion is based on active levy paying employer accounts that either declared levy and/or made a payment in 2024/25 FY.
We recognise that the design of the current system can create confusion by showing large balances in levy accounts that are not consistent with the actual funding available from the annual growth and skills budget.
This is because the funds in employers accounts are notional and, at around £6.7 billion currently, far exceed the total levy paid by employers annually and are more than double the annual budget.
If all levy paying employers spent all their notional levy funds, we would far exceed the available budget, and there would be no funding available to train apprentices at non-levy paying employers which are typically SMEs. Currently, nearly 30% of apprenticeship spending is on apprentices employed by non-levy payers.
From August, we are making changes to remove the 10% government top-up and reduce the expiry period of levy funds to 12 months, which will tackle this illusion of excess funds and ensure that levy balances are more closely aligned with the actual growth and skills budget.
Despite record investment, with the growth and skills budget in England increasing to £3.3 billion for the 2026-27 financial year, these changes are needed to ensure the sustainability and affordability of the programme.
Asked by: Richard Holden (Conservative - Basildon and Billericay)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how much (a) his Department, (b) its agencies and (c) its public bodies has spent on lanyards since 4 July 2024; what designs of lanyards have been purchased; and what the cost and number of each lanyard design purchased was.
Answered by Andrew Western - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The department purchases plain lanyards as standard. There are lanyards with clip and safety release in a blue colour and come in packs of 10. Spend on these lanyards since July 2024 is £24,906.73
Spend on other lanyards is £421.23. This was for 500 DWP Data & Analytics purple lanyards.
Asked by: Richard Holden (Conservative - Basildon and Billericay)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many and what proportion of people aged (a) between 16 and 24 and (b) over 16 are unemployed in Basildon and Billericay constituency (i) in the latest period for which statistics are available and (ii) in the 21 months previously.
Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The information requested on trends in levels of unemployment is published and available at: https://www.nomisweb.co.uk/default.asp and the guidance for users can be found at:
https://www.nomisweb.co.uk/home/newuser.asp.
The estimated unemployment levels and rates can be found by selecting “Query data” on the NOMIS home page and selecting “Annual Population Survey/Labour Force Survey” and then “annual population survey (Dec 2004 to Dec 2025)” in the lists of data sources. The Geography will need to be set for the relevant Westminster constituency from the menu, and then, in the Variable menu, Category set to “Unemployment rate” from the drop-down list to access 16-24 year old unemployment. Unemployment as a proportion of people, rather than a proportion of the economically active, can be found using user defined variables.
ONS suppress results based on small samples on the Annual Population Survey. Claimant Count information by age is available from the “2024 Parliamentary Constituencies Profile” menu at the same website.
Asked by: Richard Holden (Conservative - Basildon and Billericay)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, pursuant to the Answer of 17 March 2026 to Question 117909, how many customers have been referred to DVSA Driving Examiner roles via Jobcentre Plus in each of the six priority locations.
Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
A total of 85 customers were referred by DWP to DVSA Test Centres across the six priority locations. From this number, 37 passed the assessment and have been offered roles. DVSA provided feedback on a further 26 who were unsuccessful but showed clear potential and stated it would like to support these customers with a further test if DWP can provide refresher training. The remaining 22 customers were unsuccessful.
Asked by: Richard Holden (Conservative - Basildon and Billericay)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what criteria DVSA used to designate Bedford, Bletchley, Bromley, Slough, Southampton and Tottenham as priority sites for the Driving Examiner recruitment pilot; what the average driving test waiting time and examiner vacancy rate was at each site at the time of designation; and on what date each site was selected.
Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
DVSA identified priority locations that had 5 or more live vacancies and provided the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) with a list. Following their external recruitment drive in January 2026, DVSA advised DWP that some of the locations initially identified were no longer considered high priority due to roles being filled. From the remaining sites on the list those chosen were where DVSA have managers with the flexibility to carry out assessments as part of the Driving Examiner recruitment pilot.
Asked by: Richard Holden (Conservative - Basildon and Billericay)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many referrals to DVSA Driving Examiner roles have been made via Jobcentre Plus under the pilot scheme in each of the six priority locations; how many of those referrals have resulted in (i) attendance at a one day assessment centre and (ii) appointment to a role; what performance indicators have been set to assess the success of the pilot; and when the Department expects to decide whether to expand the scheme to additional locations.
Answered by Diana Johnson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
We are currently in the process of making referrals for these roles. Each location has the capacity to have 16 customers referred. Assessments will take place on 16 March (Slough & Southampton), 17 March (Tottenham & Bletchley) and 19 March (Bedford & Bromley).