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  • Lord Beecham – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

    Lord Beecham – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Beecham on 2014-05-06.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the impact of the closure of the court cells at Newcastle Magistrates’ Court since December 2013.

    Lord Faulks

    The cell accommodation at Newcastle Magistrates’ Court is housed within the interconnected Pilgrim Street Police Station which is due to close in summer 2014 and belongs to Northumbria Police.

    The cells have not been in use since 7April, 2014 when a temporary arrangement was put in place to enable urgent fire safety works to be undertaken. Whilst five of the 13 cells are unlikely to be used again due to safety concerns, the remaining eight are now available for use as the fire safety work has been completed.

    The current temporary closure has been extended until 30 May, 2014 to enable conclusion of discussions with the Northumbria Police and Crime Commissioner over future use and maintenance of the cells once the Police Station closes.

    The temporary arrangement, comprising a daily remand court at North Tyneside and the listing of other custody work in available courtrooms across the court estate in Northumbria, is not wholly satisfactory and the impact is being assessed on a daily basis, in particular the impact on victims and witnesses. HM Courts & Tribunals Service is seeking to conclude the discussions with the Northumbria Police and Crime Commissioner as quickly as possible and currently intends to resume use of the cells on 2 June, 2014.

  • Lord Beecham – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

    Lord Beecham – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Beecham on 2014-05-06.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government on how many occasions in the last two years parcels sent to prisoners have been found to contain drugs, extremist materials, mobile phones, SIM cards or pornography.

    Lord Faulks

    Details of illicit items found in post or packages are recorded on the prison incident reporting system, and collated in a central database. However, to identify the number of parcels containing drugs, illicit materials, mobile phones, SIM cards or pornography would require a manual search of over 34,000 individual records, which could only be done at disproportionate cost.

  • Lord Barnett – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

    Lord Barnett – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Barnett on 2014-05-06.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government what is (1) the total sum, and (2) the percentage, of student loans that have been written off as bad debt.

    Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon

    Information on the repayment status of student loans is available in the Student Loans Company (SLC) publication‘Student Loans for Higher Education in England, Financial Year 2012-13′.

    The Amount of Total Public Debt outstanding (including loans not yet due for repayment) at the start of Financial Year 2012-13 including interest was £40,271.5m, rising to £46,590.4m by the end of Financial Year 2012-13.

    The amount of debt written off or cancelled during the Financial Year 2012-13 was £27.0m. This figure is 0.07% of the Total Public Debt outstanding at the start of Financial Year 2012-13 and 0.06% of the Total Public Debt outstanding at the end of Financial Year 2012-13.

    Write offs occur for policy reasons; when borrowers die, become permanently disabled or when their loan reaches age thresholds. An estimate of ‘bad debt’ has not been provided in the answer as there is no standard definition for this.

    Statistics referring to the Financial Year 2013-14 will be published in June 2014.

  • Lord Barnett – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

    Lord Barnett – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Barnett on 2014-05-06.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government, further to the Written Answer by Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon on 9 April (WA 302), what is the amount of student loan debt still available for sale, including the first tranche referred to.

    Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon

    The total amount of pre-2012 income contingent repayment student loan debt that Government intends to sell has not yet been determined. However, over a five year period, as announced at Autumn Statement 2013, sales are expected to generate between £10 billion and £15 billion in revenues, with a central estimate of around £12 billion.

  • Lord Barnett – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

    Lord Barnett – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Barnett on 2014-05-06.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government, further to the Written Answer by Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon on 9 April (WA 302), what are the current terms of income contingent repayment loans.

    Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon

    The Education (Student Loans) (Repayment) Regulations set out the terms and conditions of income contingent student loans. This is also set out in the booklet Student Loans – a Guide to Terms and Conditions, the latest copy of which can be accessed at http://www.sfengland.slc.co.uk/media/666045/sfe_t_c_guide_1415_d.pdf . Students are informed at the time of taking out their student loan that the regulations may change from time to time and this means that the terms of their loan may also change.

  • Jim Shannon – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Defence

    Jim Shannon – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Defence

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Shannon on 2014-05-06.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what steps he is taking to increase the number of Apache helicopter pilots for deployment in Helmand Province, Afghanistan.

    Mr Mark Francois

    The final deployment of Apache helicopters to Helmand has sufficient pilots and crews to undertake the required tasks.

    Sufficient personnel will continue to be trained to ensure future tasks can be met.

  • Lord Barnett – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

    Lord Barnett – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Barnett on 2014-05-06.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government, further to the answer by Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon on 26 March (HL Deb, col 528), what was the basis on which he described the sale of the student loan book for £160 million as value for money for the taxpayer”; and what was the original value of the loans.”

    Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon

    The Mortgage Style loans offered for sale had a face value of around £890 million.

    The sale of the Mortgage Style Loan Book was value for money as the purchase price exceeded the value of retention to Government.

    The real value of the book is below the face value of the loans because of the subsidised nature of the loans and their age. These loans attract low interest rates and have an earnings threshold for repayment. The age-related write off combined with the earnings threshold means some borrowers never repay.

    The sale of Mortgage style Loans also allowed the Student Loans Company to focus on its core business of supplying income contingent loans (ICR) to current students and collecting repayments from those loans.

  • Jim Shannon – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

    Jim Shannon – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Shannon on 2014-05-06.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, what economic links there are with Burma; and what the value of (a) exports to and (b) imports from Burma was in the last year for which figures are available.

    Mr Hugo Swire

    Building a sustainable economy in Burma, including increased responsible international investment, is key to economic growth, alleviating poverty, improving livelihoods and improving stability. As set out in the ‘UK Activities in Burma’ document published on 8 April alongside a Written Ministerial Statement, the Government is working to encourage and support Burma to remove barriers to becoming a stable, prosperous and democratic country with a sustainable economy that benefits all its people and created a positive climate for domestic, international and UK trade and investment.

    We are active in several areas including:
    – establishing a UK Trade and Investment office in Burma to provide practical support to British companies;
    – establishing a UK Financial Services Task Force to support the development of sound financial structures and products;
    – funding two specialist economists from the International Growth Centre to support the Myanmar Development Resource Institute in providing high quality advice to government;
    – providing £1.1m to support Burma’s application to the Extractives Industries Transparency Initiative which will help improve the transparency and accountability of the revenues from Burma’s natural resources.
    – supporting work to strengthen Burma’s accountancy profession, to tackle financial crime and to increase local community involvement in investment decisions.

    UK exports of goods to Burma in 2013 were worth £44m (a 243% year on year increase) and imports from Burma were worth £65m (a 44% year on year increase). The top UK exports were transport equipment and road vehicles whilst the top imports were clothing.

    In 2012, the last year for which total goods and services figures are available, UK exports of goods and services to Burma were worth £20.8m and imports from Burma were worth £46m.

  • Jim Shannon – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

    Jim Shannon – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Shannon on 2014-05-06.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what recent assessment his Department has made of the prevalence of ticks in deer; and what steps he is taking to tackle ticks in deer.

    George Eustice

    Defra has not made an assessment of the prevalence of ticks in deer but I am aware that they are widespread. The Deer Initiative, which is part funded by Defra, provides advice on ticks on its website.

  • – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Cabinet Office

    – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Cabinet Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by on 2014-05-06.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government what estimate they have made of the value of the grey economy”

    Lord Wallace of Saltaire

    The information requested falls within the responsibility of the UK Statistics Authority. I have asked the Authority to reply.