Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what funding he has allocated to support employers to conduct pilot programmes on flexible working.

The Government is committed to supporting employers with their flexible working practices across all sectors of the economy. While we do not currently fund flexible working pilot programmes, we are providing employers with the support they need to make informed decisions on their future approach to flexible working. Through reconvening the Flexible Working Taskforce – a partnership across business groups, trade unions, charities, and government departments – we are bringing together the necessary expertise to provide this support.

The Taskforce has been asked to help take forward the best of what we have learned through the pandemic about more flexible ways of working as the economy starts to fully open up. In the immediate phase, the Taskforce will consider the essential practical and legal issues associated with a return to a workplace and an increase in hybrid working.

The Taskforce will move on to provide wider advice on best practice, so that employers are better able to support all forms of flexible working – whether the flexibility relates to the amount, timing or location of work.