Question to the Department for Business and Trade:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, what assessment she has made of the implications for her policies of changes in the level of the availability of workers.

The recent Budget sought to address the barriers to participation in the Labour Market through a wide-reaching support package.

For the Department for Business and Trade, this included measures on flexible working where we are reforming the statutory framework to provide all employees with the right to request flexible working from their first day of employment. These changes will significantly improve employees’ ability to request flexible working and bring an estimated additional 2.2 million people into scope of the entitlement. Evidence shows flexible working can help people stay in and return to work.