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European Energy Markets
27JUL

HC 62 deadline passes with no department

2 min read
09:24UTC

The 7 September deadline for a government response to the Commons committee's science diplomacy report passed with nothing published against it, thirteen days after the department that would have drafted it was abolished.

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EconomicAssessed
Key takeaway

The HC 62 response fell due on 7 September and no department has been established as owing it.

The Commons Science, Innovation and Technology Committee published HC 62 (House of Commons paper 62), "Science diplomacy: Sovereignty, strategy, and the global race", on 7 July 2026 . Under the two-month convention the government reply fell due on 7 September. As of 8 September 2026 no government response to HC 62 appears on the committee's publications page. 1

Thirteen days after the report was published, the UK abolished DSIT (the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology), splitting its functions across the Cabinet Office and two new departments . Committee chair Chi Onwurah warned on 24 July that the closure would fragment oversight, and this briefing logged the response as due with no indication of which successor body would draft it . No department can be named as having missed this deadline, because none has been established as owing it. The gov.uk content API today returns no ministers at all for DSIT, while the Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade returns a full ministerial team under Jonathan Reynolds. 2

A late reply on its own would carry little weight. This committee's three most recent government responses arrived 95, 98 and 227 days after the report they answered, so a day past the convention would be unremarkable on that record. 3 A response can also be received before it is published, and the government can still send one. What the published record shows is a dated obligation that came due against a counterparty that no longer exists, rather than a refusal to answer.

Machinery-of-government changes normally move an obligation from one letterhead to another. The gap here is that no letterhead has been identified in public, seven weeks after the department closed, on a report about the UK's ability to hold its own in international Science and technology.

Deep Analysis

In plain English

In July, a House of Commons committee published a report criticising the UK's AI strategy. Government departments normally have two months to formally reply to such reports. That two-month deadline fell on 7 September, and no reply has been published. The department that would have owed the reply, DSIT, was abolished in the meantime and split across three other bodies. Nobody has been named as responsible for answering in its place, so the deadline has simply passed unanswered.

Deep Analysis
Root Causes

DSIT was abolished on 20 July, thirteen days after HC 62 published on 7 July, but the two-month reply clock kept running through the reorganisation.

No machinery-of-government document names a successor department for this specific obligation, so the deadline lapsed 49 days after DSIT ceased to exist with no body clearly accountable for filing a reply.

Sources:Hansard, House of Commons·ASML
Mentions:House of Commons Science, Innovation and Technology Committee →DSIT →Cabinet Office →Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade →Chi Onwurah →Lisa Nandy →Commons Science, Innovation and Technology Committee →Science →
First Reported In

Update #15 · Mistral closes EUR 3bn; Luxembourg buys in

Hansard, House of Commons· 8 Sept 2026
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Causes and effects
Caused by
Britain abolishes DSIT, splits its remit three ways
DSIT's abolition on 20 July removed the department that owed the HC 62 response due 7 September.
Occurred 19 Jul 2026
Read story →
MPs name the UK's sovereignty gap
The HC 62 report of 7 July created the response deadline that passed unanswered.
Occurred 7 Jul 2026
Read story →
Committee chair warns on DSIT closure
Onwurah's July warning that DSIT's closure would fragment oversight anticipated the missed deadline.
Occurred 24 Jul 2026
Read story →
This Event
HC 62 deadline passes with no department
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