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  • Johnny Mercer – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

    Johnny Mercer – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Johnny Mercer on 2016-01-25.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps his Department is taking to ensure value for money for passengers travelling on the Cross Country rail franchise.

    Claire Perry

    I completely understand the concerns about the cost of some rail fares and the impact that this can have on people’s budgets. That is why we have capped the rail fares we regulate at inflation (RPI) for two years running, and will continue to do so for the life of this parliament. We are helping hardworking people with the cost of transport. We’ve put a stop to increases in regulated fares above inflation until 2020. This will save theaverageseason ticket holder £425 in this Parliament and meansearnings growth will outstrip rail fare increases for first time in a decade.

  • Tim Loughton – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Women and Equalities

    Tim Loughton – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Women and Equalities

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Tim Loughton on 2016-01-25.

    To ask the Minister for Women and Equalities, how many civil partnerships have been (a) conducted, (b) terminated and (c) converted to marriage status since such partnerships were established.

    Caroline Dinenage

    Based on the latest publicly available data from the Office of National Statistics, since the Civil Partnership Act came into force in December 2005, the total number of civil partnerships formed in England and Wales up to the end of 2014 is 62,621.

    From January 2007 to December 2014, there were 4,527 civil partnerships dissolutions in England and Wales.

    A total of 7,732 couples chose to convert their existing civil partnership into a marriage in the six months between 10 December 2014 and 30 June 2015 in England and Wales.

    This information is available from the Office of National Statistics: http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/taxonomy/index.html?nscl=Civil+Partnerships

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  • Luciana Berger – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    Luciana Berger – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Luciana Berger on 2016-01-25.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what support his Department makes available for people who are returning to work after a period of ill health.

    Justin Tomlinson

    The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) has developed Fit for Work to help people who are returning to work after a period of ill health. Fit for Work provides both a supportive occupational health assessment and general health and work advice to employees, employers and General Practitioners (GPs), to help individuals stay in or return to work.

    People who have been unemployed due to ill health may be also eligible for support from a number of other programmes, including:

    • Work Choice, which is a specialist disability employment programme that provides tailored support for disabled people who face barriers to finding and retaining work

    • Specialist Employability Support (SES), which was launched in 2015, is a new national provision, designed to help unemployed disabled adults with the most complex needs to secure and sustain employment or self-employment.

    • The Work Programme, which allows providers the flexibility to design an innovative and personalised approach to help participants back into sustained employment.

    Additionally, an individual who is returning to their current job or a new job after a period of ill health may be eligible for support from Access to Work, which is a discretionary grant scheme that offers financial awards for in-work support for people whose disability or health condition affects the way they work.

  • Will Quince – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    Will Quince – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Will Quince on 2016-01-25.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, when his Department plans to implement the Pension Protection Fund capping change set out in the Pension Act 2014.

    Justin Tomlinson

    The Government is committed to the implementation of the Pension Protection Fund long service cap as described in the Pensions Act 2014.

    Before the primary legislation can be brought into force, a number of changes need to be made to secondary legislation, so that it will operate as expected in all cases. Therefore we cannot, at this time, commit to a particular implementation date.

  • Christina Rees – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    Christina Rees – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Christina Rees on 2016-01-25.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, if he will make it his policy to publish statistics on national food bank usage.

    Justin Tomlinson

    The Government has no plans to collect or publish statistics on food bank usage.

  • Christina Rees – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    Christina Rees – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Christina Rees on 2016-01-25.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment he has made of the effectiveness of back-to-work programmes for people with mental health problems; and if he will take steps to change programmes judged to be ineffective.

    Justin Tomlinson

    Our ambition to halve the disability employment gap has been a key driver in establishing the Work and Health unit with the Department for Health. At least £115m of funding will go to the Work and Health Unit, including an innovation fund to test new ways to join up health and employment to help people with disabilities and health conditions to return to and stay in work.

    Our wider employment programmes provide those with mental health conditions with the appropriate support to find work. Work Choice is an employment programme is specifically for those with a disability or health condition. Of the 14,290 starters who declared either a Severe or Mild to Moderate Mental Health condition as their Primary Disability, 6,650 (over 46%) have achieved a job outcome.

    The Department conducts a monthly review of a sample of claimants from each employment contract, to assess the effectiveness of those programmes and requires providers to rectify any issues identified.

    Further support is available through the Access to Work Mental Health Support Scheme. Last year, it supported 1630 people who declared a Mental Health condition as their Primary Medical Condition – a 15% increase on 2013/14 and a record number for the scheme.

    Over the next three years, we are investing £43 million to develop an evidence base, via a range of voluntary trials, for what works to support people with mental health conditions into employment. Each of the voluntary trials will test a different approach of combined health and employment support.

  • Jim Cunningham – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    Jim Cunningham – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Cunningham on 2016-01-25.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many people received a payment from the diffuse mesothelioma payments scheme in (a) July 2012 to March 2014 and (b) 2014-15.

    Justin Tomlinson

    The Diffuse Mesothelioma Payment Scheme (DMPS) started to take applications from 6 April 2014 (although it accepted applications from individuals diagnosed with diffuse mesothelioma on or after 25 July 2012); therefore no people received payments from the Scheme between July 2012 and March 2014. 255 people received a payment from the Scheme in the financial year 2014/15.

  • Jim Cunningham – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    Jim Cunningham – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Cunningham on 2016-01-25.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what estimate his Department has made of the total compensation expected to be paid by insurers to people with mesothelioma who were exposed to asbestos by their employer negligently or in breach of statutory duty over the next (a) five, (b) 10, (c) 20 and (d) 30 years.

    Justin Tomlinson

    The Department does not make estimates of the total amount of compensation expected to be paid by insurers to people with mesothelioma who were exposed to asbestos by their employer negligently or in breach of statutory duty.

  • Jim Cunningham – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    Jim Cunningham – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Cunningham on 2016-01-25.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether his Department has made any revisions to (a) the amount his Department forecasts will be required for the diffuse mesothelioma payments scheme and (b) the number of people his Department forecasts will apply to receive payments from the scheme in the first 10 years of its operation since it last published those figures.

    Justin Tomlinson

    The Department makes revisions to the DMPS financial forecast annually for the purposes of calculating the levy. A Ministerial written statement (HCWS460) was tabled in the House of Commons on 12 January 2016 and provides details of the DMPS levy for 2015/16.

    Similarly, the Department forecasts the number of applicants annually. In 2014/15, there were 410 applicants to the DMPS. The next set of official DMPS statistics will be released 28 January 2015 and will contain six months’ worth of data on applications for 2015/16. Assumptions could be derived from those figures for the remainder of the year.

    No revisions have been made to longer term forecasts since the DMPS Impact Assessment was published 6 March 2014. This can be found at:

    https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/286525/mesothelioma-payment-scheme-ia-mar-2014.pdf

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  • Stephen Timms – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    Stephen Timms – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Stephen Timms on 2016-01-25.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment his Department has made of the effect of the implementation of universal credit on the level of rent arrears in council homes.

    Justin Tomlinson

    This information is not collected centrally.

    Statistics are published annually on the total value of local authority social housing rent arrears, broken down by Local Authority area. They were most recently published on the Government’s website for 2014-15:

    https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/local-authority-housing-data#2014-to-2015

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