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

To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what (a) information his Department has and (b) what research his Department has commissioned on the amount of retail, hospitality and leisure hereditaments or business space which are empty or vacant.

The Department does not collect such data and has not commissioned research to quantify vacancies nationally. It sometimes purchases commercial property market data, including vacancy information, from external providers to support internal policy development. The government continues to engage regularly with local authorities on high street regeneration and related issues.