Category: Speeches

  • Diana Johnson – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    Diana Johnson – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Diana Johnson on 2016-10-20.

    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, with reference to the Answer of 22 September 2016 to Question HL1788, how many outstanding family reunion applications there are for unaccompanied children from France; what steps are being taken to ensure those applications are processed quickly; and what steps she is taking to ensure that the UK remains in contact with children with outstanding applications in the event that they are moved away from Calais.

    Mr Robert Goodwill

    Home Office teams have been deployed to France to work with the French Authorities to speed up the identification and transfer of eligible cases under both the Dublin Regulation and Section 67 of the Immigration Act 2016.

    More children are arriving to join their family in the UK each day. It is therefore not possible to provide an exact number of outstanding family reunion applications.

    The UK has made clear that the remaining children, including those who do not qualify for family reunion must be looked after in safe facilities. The UK Government is ready to help fund such facilities and provide resources to aid the decision-making.

  • Danny Kinahan – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Northern Ireland Office

    Danny Kinahan – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Northern Ireland Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Danny Kinahan on 2015-11-09.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, what assessment the Government has made of the risks to the security of electricity supply in Northern Ireland posed by the failure to build and have operational by 2020 the 400kV North-South electricity interconnector between County Tyrone and County Meath.

    Mr Ben Wallace

    Non-nuclear energy policy is a devolved matter in Northern Ireland and the responsibility of Northern Ireland Executive Ministers.

  • Alan Whitehead – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Energy and Climate Change

    Alan Whitehead – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Energy and Climate Change

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Alan Whitehead on 2015-12-08.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, what recent discussions her Department has had with the Canadian Department of Natural Resources on the joint Statement of Co-operation with Canada on Carbon Capture and Storage.

    Andrea Leadsom

    Officials from the Department, as well as colleagues in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, are in regular contact with their Canadian counterparts on this and other issues related to Carbon Capture and Storage.

  • Gregory Campbell – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

    Gregory Campbell – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Gregory Campbell on 2016-01-13.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps his Department plans to take in 2016 to ensure that young people under 16 understand road safety issues from the perspectives of pedestrians, cyclists and car users.

    Andrew Jones

    THINK! supports pedestrian road safety education though engaging intermediaries – e.g. teachers, road safety professionals & parents – who are able to deliver road safety messages using free resources, to children and teenagers in a credible and impactful way. THINK! is reviewing their education offer in order to ensure materials and road safety messages are up-to-date and relevant for the current generation.

    THINK! is also working closely with partners at the RAC and the Scouts Association to develop road safety resources for out-of-school groups, to ensure road safety is continued to be taught in and outside the classroom.

    The Department is providing £50 million over the next four years to support Bikeability cycle training in schools in England (outside London). This funding will help to increase children’s road awareness, encourage active travel and improve future motorists’ empathy for more vulnerable road users.

  • Roger Godsiff – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    Roger Godsiff – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Roger Godsiff on 2016-02-05.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, pursuant to the Answer of 25 January 2016 to Question 23428, how many claimants of employment and support allowance who had a diagnosis of Parkinson’s disease were removed from the work-related activity group because they had died.

    Priti Patel

    The information requested is not readily available and to provide it would incur disproportionate cost.

  • Robert Flello – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Robert Flello – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Robert Flello on 2016-03-02.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, if he will take steps to ensure that information given to patients or donors explaining research to which they have consented on genome editing in human embryos by means of CRISPR-Cas9 will be publicly available.

    George Freeman

    The Department has not had any discussions with the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA) after its authorisation of a licence for gene editing of human embryos by means of CRISPR-Cas9 about the process of ethical approval being granted for such a licence.

    The Francis Crick Institute, which made the licence application to the HFEA, is intending to place copies of the information given to patients or donors explaining this research on its website, once the final draft has been agreed.

    There is no statutory requirement for ethical approval to be in place before an HFEA research licence can be granted. However, the HFEA has developed guidance for its licensing committee that such approval should be in place before a licence is granted and research is allowed to proceed.

    In 2012, none of the three licences granted had ethical approval in place and a condition was therefore placed on each licence that licensed research could not proceed until such approval was in place. In 2013, five research licences were granted, all of which had ethical approval in place. In 2014, seven licences were granted, all of which had ethical approval in place. In 2015, one of the 15 licences granted did not have ethical approval in place and a condition was therefore placed on the licence that licensed research could not proceed until such approval was in place.

  • Nic Dakin – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    Nic Dakin – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Nic Dakin on 2016-03-23.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps she is taking to ensure that local authorities are required to take action on education and early years settings that intentionally exclude disabled children and do not meet their legal duties to such children under the Equality Act 2010.

    Edward Timpson

    Promoting equality in education settings is a priority for this Government. In combination with our guidance to schools on managing medical conditions, the Equality Act 2010 provides a broad basis for ensuring that disabled pupils are included and supported to achieve their full potential.

    The Equality Act requires all schools (whether maintained or academy) to produce an accessibility plan. These plans ensure that all aspects of school life are accessible to disabled pupils. The Act also requires Local Authorities to produce accessibility strategies with the same aims as the school-level plan, but with different coverage. There is no evidence of schools or early years settings systematically refusing to accept disabled children. However, we do take action where individual cases are brought to our attention.

    Our Early Implementer Package for the new extended childcare offer will include testing how we can improve access for children with SEN and disabilities. This will provide critical information before the national rollout.

    Any exclusions from school must be lawful, reasonable and fair. Schools have a legal duty not to discriminate against a pupil because of a protected characteristic. The statutory guidance on exclusion emphasises the importance of early intervention to address underlying causes of disruptive behaviour, including an assessment of whether suitable provision is in place to support any SEN or disability a pupil may have. It also states that headteachers should, as far as possible, avoid excluding permanently any pupil with a statement of SEN.

    In certain circumstances, governing bodies must review head teachers’ decisions to exclude and have the power to reinstate a pupil. Where a governing body upholds a permanent exclusion, parents can request that the decision is reviewed by an independent review panel. However, the governing body has the final say on whether the pupil can return to the school. Parents can request that a SEN expert provides impartial advice to the panel.

    Parents can also make a claim to the First-tier Tribunal (SEN and Disabilities) when it is alleged that an exclusion relates to disability discrimination. The Tribunal has the power to order the pupil’s reinstatement.

    When Ofsted inspect a school and look at the behaviour management policies they can also consider whether the school is disproportionately excluding pupils with disabilities and can use this to inform their assessment.

  • Lord Myners – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    Lord Myners – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Myners on 2016-05-03.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they will review, or charge others to review, the performance of the trustees of the BHS pension schemes, and whether the current trustees are fit and proper to continue performing that role at BHS and other pension schemes.

    Baroness Altmann

    The investigation into the BHS pension schemes, including the role of the trustees, is a matter for the independent Pensions Regulator.

    The actions of the trustees and competence of the trustees are among the issues that we would expect the Regulator to be considering as part of its investigations.

  • Lord Bird – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    Lord Bird – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Bird on 2016-06-15.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government what amount and proportion of funding from their poverty prevention programmes currently in operation has been allocated to (1) preventing the underlying causes of poverty, (2) dealing with emergency effects of poverty, (3) managing the ongoing effects of poverty, and (4) alleviating the effects of poverty, in (a) each of the last five years, and (b) to date in 2016.

    Lord Freud

    This Government’s welfare reforms are focused on supporting people to find and keep work whilst ensuring that we are protecting the most vulnerable. At the end of the Parliament we will be spending over £60bn – 3% of GDP – supporting people on low incomes.

    We know that work is the best route out of poverty. Evidence shows that almost three-quarters of poor workless families who found full employment escaped poverty; and that the highest poverty exit rate of 75% was for families that moved from part to full employment. The number of children living in workless households is down by 449,000 since 2010

    Our new life chances approach to poverty and disadvantage will include a set of indicators to measure progress in tackling the root causes of poverty such as worklessness, educational attainment and family stability.

  • Lord Taylor of Warwick – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy

    Lord Taylor of Warwick – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Taylor of Warwick on 2016-09-12.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government, in the light of the EU referendum result, what action they are taking to protect workers’ rights.

    Baroness Neville-Rolfe

    There is already a range of protections for workers in UK law. It is important to get the right balance between the needs of employers and employees and that remains our position.