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

To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, when he plans to announce his decision on the application made in July 2016 to create a Dorset Combined Authority for economic regeneration and transport infrastructure.

Consideration of the Dorset combined authority proposal is closely interconnected with consideration of the Dorset unitary proposal, submitted on 9 February. Our intention is to announce an initial decision as to how we are minded to proceed on the unitary proposal as soon as practicable, with any such announcement including an indication of how we intend to move forward on the combined authority proposal.