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Lord Roberts of Llandudno – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Cabinet Office

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Roberts of Llandudno on 2015-10-22.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to ensure that the electoral register is as complete as possible by the end of March 2016.

Lord Bridges of Headley

We are working with Local Authorities, the Electoral Commission and Civil Society groups to find better ways of reaching and encouraging under registered groups to register, as the Minister for Constitutional Reform set out in his recent speech on voter engagement. This can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/vision-for-electoral-registration-speech-by-john-penrose.

Online registration is making the process notably quicker, easier and more convenient for everybody, but particularly for under-registered groups like young people; 2.9 million 16-24 year olds have applied since June 2014. Completing the implementation of Individual Electoral Registration will also help, by giving an accurate picture of registration levels that isn’t artificially inflated or flattered by people who have either died or moved away.

01/12/2022
Lord Rogan – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Rogan on 2015-10-22.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what priority the NHS England Clinical Priorities Advisory Group gives to advice it receives from the Rare Diseases Advisory Group.

Lord Prior of Brampton

Given the range of specialised services that the NHS England Clinical Priorities Advisory Group (CPAG) needs to consider for prioritisation, CPAG draws strongly on the expertise that Rare Diseases Advisory Group is able to provide on highly specialised services.

01/12/2022
Lord Rogan – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Rogan on 2015-10-22.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what criteria the NHS England Clinical Priorities Advisory Group uses in making commissioning decisions.

Lord Prior of Brampton

The criteria against which NHS England’s Clinical Priorities Advisory Group considers proposed investments for specialised services are as follows:

– There must be adequate and clinically reliable evidence to demonstrate clinical effectiveness;

– There must be measurable benefits to patients;

– The intervention should offer equal or greater benefit than other forms of care routinely commissioned by the NHS;

– While considering the benefit of stimulating innovation, NHS England will not confer higher priority to a treatment or intervention solely on the basis that it is the only one available;

– NHS England may agree to fund interventions for rare conditions where there is limited published evidence on clinical effectiveness;

– The intervention must be available to all patients within the same patient group (other than for clinical contra-indication);

– The intervention should be likely to reduce health inequalities and will have regard to any relevant broader equality issues;

– The intervention should benefit the wider health and care system;

– The intervention should advance parity between mental and physical health; and

– The intervention should demonstrate value for money.

The criteria are set out in NHS England’s response to a public consultation, Investing in Specialised Services, of June 2015, a copy of which is attached.

01/12/2022
Lord Soley – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Soley on 2015-10-22.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what steps they have taken to encourage research into sustainable aviation fuels and advanced fuels technologies.

Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon

The Department for Transport ran an Advanced Fuels Call for Evidence in 2013/14 to examine the potential of advanced fuels in aviation and other transport sectors that cannot be easily decarbonised without low-carbon fuels. A summary of the evidence received was published with the Department’s response to the consultation on the post-implementation review of the Renewable Transport Fuel Obligation (RTFO) in April 2014. Amendments to the RTFO earlier this year increased rewards for gaseous fuels, such as biomethane used in freight, to better reflect their energy content.

The Department also commissioned an independent feasibility study to examine the economic benefits and potential of advanced biofuels in the UK, published in February 2014, the study informed the design of the Advanced Biofuels Demonstration Plant Competition for £25m of matched grant funding. Winning projects were announced on 7^thSeptember 2015.

Following the report of the Transport Energy Task Force in March 2015, we are assessing the benefits of making aviation biofuels eligible for certificates under the Renewable Transport Fuel Obligation (RTFO) and support under that scheme for synthetic fuels from renewable electricity. We aim to include proposals in a public consultation next year on potential amendments to the RTFO scheme.

01/12/2022
Lord Storey – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Storey on 2015-10-22.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government which City Region bids have been (1) successful, and (2) unsuccessful.

Baroness Neville-Rolfe

In response to the Government’s invitation we have received 38 proposals from places seeking Devolution Deals with the Government.We have secured deals with Greater Manchester, Cornwall, Sheffield City Region, the North East and Tees Valley. The Government will continue to work with the other places to develop their proposals, and will continue to consider any new proposals

01/12/2022
Lord Storey – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Storey on 2015-10-22.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what criteria are used to judge City Region bids.

Baroness Neville-Rolfe

There are no prescriptive criteria in place to assess bids from local areas. All deals are bespoke and based on proposals brought forward by local areas which then form the basis for negotiation. The Government will consider submissions from all places that have strong, credible devolution proposals, including governance.

01/12/2022

Lord Storey – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the The Lord Chairman of Committees

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Storey on 2015-10-22.

To ask the Chairman of Committees how many consultants have been employed in the House of Lords in the last three years; and what has been the cost of each firm or independent consultant.

Lord Laming

Payments for the last three financial years are as follows:

Firm	2012-13 £	2013-14 £	2014-15 £	Work undertaken
Beamans Ltd	–	–	31,050	Costs related to a pay and grading review
BHBi Consultancy Ltd	14,800	–	–	Audit of an ongoing capital project
Bostock Marketing Group	23,025	–	20,238	Costs of the independently-managed Member and staff surveys
Capita Business Services	–	6,913	–	Support for an equal pay audit
Catering Consultancy Bureau	–	6,128	13,662	Branding project for Catering and Retail Services (CRS) outlets and delivery of communications workshops
Chartered Institute of Procurement and Supply	–	23,118	–	Support for a review of procurement services
Government Actuary’s Department	5,400	5,000	7,500	Annual accounting valuation of the House of Lords staff pension scheme
Helena Bayler	275	–	825	Design and amendment of specialist forms
Information Accreditor	2,125	13,770	24,735	Proportion of costs to provide the two Houses with assurance on the security of new IT systems
JM HR Solutions Limited	15,000	7,750	–	Human resource review support
Panache Consultancy Limited	2,952	–	–	Review of staffing requirements for certain CRS outlets
Sage Food Design and Development	–	10,761	8,269	CRS consultancy regarding food covering: menus, kitchen production, kitchen organisations and structure
Stern Consultancy	–	3,468	–	Income generation project support
The Litmus Partnership Limited	–	7,982	18,400	CRS smarter procurement support and related services including supplier price challenge
The Mystery Dining Company	–	555	395	Mystery shopping of catering venues
Turpin Smale	–	4,400	–	CRS outlet-specific consultancy to support the Change Programme
University of Portsmouth Ltd	4,157	–	–	Specialist support to develop a facility to search for records from the Parliament Archives online catalogue by place
TOTAL	68,775	90,720	125,074	N/A

The House seeks only to engage external consultant support when it is more economical to engage specialist services on a fixed term basis than to embed capacity in-House, when specific external advice is beneficial, or when capacity issues necessitate it.

Most of the spending on consultancy in Catering and Retail Services has been to support an ambitious Change Programme which is seeking to deliver a step change in food quality and service by empowering individuals in order to provide better value for money to both the Member and the taxpayer. This investment should help the House reduce the cost of catering provision.

01/12/2022

Lord Kennedy of Southwark – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Kennedy of Southwark on 2015-10-22.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what representations they have made to the authorities in Eritrea regarding the detention of Aster Fissehatsion.

Baroness Anelay of St Johns

I refer the Noble Lord to my response of 24 June 2015 (HL533). We continue to press the Government of Eritrea to fulfil its international human rights obligations. The UK made clear in our statement at the UN Human Rights Council on 23 June that this must include the release of all those arbitrarily detained, including Aster Fissehasion.

01/12/2022
Lord Kennedy of Southwark – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Kennedy of Southwark on 2015-10-22.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what representations they have made to the authorities in Egypt regarding the detention of Mahmoud Hussein.

Baroness Anelay of St Johns

We are aware of the case of Mahmoud Hussein, who has been detained in Egypt since 25 January 2014. The Foreign and Commonwealth Office Ministers have asked the Egyptian authorities to take action to release journalists and political detainees who remain imprisoned, to review mass judicial decisions, and to remove restrictions on civil society.

In January this year, I personally raised concerns over reports of mistreatment of detainees and the importance of due process with the Egyptian Deputy Assistant Minister for Human Rights, Dr Mahy Abdel Latif. Our Ambassador and officials in Cairo, regularly raise these issues with the Egyptian authorities, most recently in September 2015.

During the UN Human Rights Council’s Universal Periodic Review in November 2014, we expressed our concern on a number of issues relating to detainees, including the number of detainees in pre-trial detention and reports of mistreatment or torture. The UK also raised the issue of torture and inhumane treatment in detention in Egypt at the UN Human Rights Council in June 2015.

01/12/2022
Lord Kennedy of Southwark – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Communities and Local Government

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Kennedy of Southwark on 2015-10-22.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government how many council homes have been built each year since 2010 in each of the 32 London boroughs.

Baroness Williams of Trafford

The numbers of local authority dwellings built ineach London borough from 2010/11 are shown in the attached table. For context I have also provided figures going back to 2001/2. These figures show that under Labour, from 2001/02-2009/10, there were 170 council homes built across the 32 London boroughs, whereas from 2010/11 to 2014/15 we have built 1,510 council homes across London.

01/12/2022