Category: Speeches

  • Tim Loughton – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    Tim Loughton – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Tim Loughton on 2015-10-27.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Education, when she expects to report on her review into the use of special guardianship orders; and which experts will assess submissions to that review.

    Edward Timpson

    The Department for Education expects to report on the review into the use of special guardianship orders by the end of the year.

    The findings of the review have been discussed extensively with an expert advisory group whose membership includes representatives from voluntary agencies for adoption, fostering and kinship care, local authorities, academics, ADCS and CAFCASS.

  • Lord Stoddart of Swindon – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Lord Stoddart of Swindon – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Stoddart of Swindon on 2015-11-23.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government what is their assessment of the joint investigation by the British Medical Journal and The Times which found that contracts made by the Clinical Commissioning Groups with providers could financially benefit board members of the group.

    Lord Prior of Brampton

    Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs) have legal duties under the Health and Social Care Act 2012 to manage conflicts of interests when deciding which health services to procure. CCGs must manage any actual or perceived conflicts in a way that is transparent, fair, and protects the integrity of their decision making.

    NHS England publishes guidance for CCGs on their responsibility to manage conflicts of interest. CCGs must have regard to this.

    Monitor must ensure that CCGs follow National Health Service regulations on procurement, patient choice and competition, and have powers of investigation if these are not followed.

    In their recent report ‘Managing conflicts of interest in NHS clinical commissioning groups’ (a copy of which is attached) the National Audit Office found that CCGs generally had arrangements in place to manage conflicts of interest to reduce the risk of commissioners’ decisions being improperly influenced.

    The NAO made recommendations to the Department, NHS England, Monitor and CCGs to strengthen current arrangements and we would expect the bodies concerned to consider these carefully and take appropriate action in response.

    Action is already being taken by NHS England including:

    ‒ strengthening its CCG assurance processes;

    ‒ commissioning an independent audit of conflicts of interest management in ten primary care co-commissioning arrangements, with a review to using the learning to strengthen current arrangements;

    ‒ providing training to CCG lay members on management of conflicts of interest in 2015, with more training planned for next year; and

    ‒ reviewing its own internal rules on conflicts of interest and the statutory guidance it issues to CCGs on management of conflicts of interest to ensure that arrangements are robust.

  • John Spellar – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

    John Spellar – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by John Spellar on 2016-01-06.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what recent estimate his Department has made of the number of new HGV drivers who will be required in each of the next five years.

    Andrew Jones

    The Department is working with other parts of Government to encourage and enable more people to become lorry drivers, including via apprenticeships and action related to Jobcentre Plus.

    The Department is taking steps to ensure that the increased demand for driving tests is accommodated through recruiting driving examiners and providing increased numbers of test appointments.

  • Laurence Robertson – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

    Laurence Robertson – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Laurence Robertson on 2016-01-26.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what recent estimate she has made of the number of part-carcasses that are imported from New Zealand.

    George Eustice

    The attached table provides imports of meat from New Zealand for January to November 2015, according to HMRC trade statistics, broken down by 8 digit commodity code. This represents the most detailed level of data available.

  • Emily Thornberry – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Defence

    Emily Thornberry – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Defence

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Emily Thornberry on 2016-02-23.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, pursuant to the Answer of 9 February 2016 to Question 25153, on which Type 45 Destroyers all 16 recommendations of the Independent Power and Propulsion System Performance Review have been implemented in full; when he expects the implementation of all 16 recommendations to be completed across the class; and if he will publish the recommendations made by the review.

    Mr Philip Dunne

    Fourteen of the recommendations involved a modification to the Power and Propulsion system and all fourteen have been completed across all six ships in the class.

    The remaining two recommendations, involving changes to existing training procedures and documentation, have also been adopted. As these two recommendations are administrative in nature, they do not require physical modification of the ships.

    With regard to the request to publish the recommendations made by the Independent Power and Propulsion System Performance Review, dated March 2011, I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave to the hon. Member for Dunfermline and West Fife (Douglas Chapman) to question 25234 on 8 February 2016.

  • Baroness Morgan of Huyton – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    Baroness Morgan of Huyton – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Baroness Morgan of Huyton on 2016-03-21.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they are planning to promote higher apprenticeships to inform pupils currently in key stage 3 of their future options.

    Lord Nash

    Higher apprenticeships are widening access to the professions, providing the higher level technical skills employers need to improve productivity and giving young people who do not go to university an equally valid career route.

    The government is taking a number of steps to ensure that apprenticeship opportunities at all levels are widely understood by young people from a young age so that they can make better informed decisions at key transition points. Schools have a legal duty to secure independent careers guidance for all pupils from year 8 onwards. This must include information on apprenticeships. Statutory guidance which underpins the duty is clear that schools should cooperate with other providers to ensure that young people are aware of the full range of education and training options available to them. The government will be launching a new apprenticeships campaign in May aimed at young people, their influencers and employers – it builds on the previous successful Get In Go Far campaign.

    The government is funding The Careers & Enterprise Company to roll out and manage its Enterprise Adviser Network, which was launched in September 2015. This is a network of employer volunteers coordinated by Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEPs) who are working in schools and colleges to support their careers and enterprise strategies and increase the number and effectiveness of employer-school interactions.

    Apprenticeships take-up is one of the criteria that LEPs are using to prioritise this support and advisers will be helping schools with their activity to provide well-informed information on apprenticeships. However, the range of information that young people receive remains too narrow and we want to go further. The government intends to bring forward legislation at the earliest opportunity that will require schools to allow other education and training providers the opportunity to talk to pupils about their offer on school premises. Schools will be required by law to collaborate with colleges, university technical colleges and other training providers, including apprenticeship providers, in putting those arrangements in place. This will ensure that young people hear much more consistently about the merits of alternatives to academic and school-based routes and are aware of all the routes to higher skills and into the workplace.

  • David Anderson – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    David Anderson – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by David Anderson on 2016-04-18.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many people her Department employs as statisticians.

    Nick Gibb

    As of 31st March 2016, the Department employs 129 people as statisticians.

  • Justin Madders – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Justin Madders – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Justin Madders on 2016-05-25.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what his Department’s policy is on the use of the NHS logo by organisations and people outside the NHS.

    George Freeman

    The National Health Service logo should only be used by NHS organisations, or on services and information that the NHS is involved with. This is to protect the NHS from being seen as the source of materials that have not originated from the NHS, nor had any involvement from the NHS.

  • Tania Mathias – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

    Tania Mathias – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Tania Mathias on 2016-07-21.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, in which month he plans to make an announcement on airport expansion.

    Mr John Hayes

    The Government remains fully committed to delivering the important infrastructure projects it has set out, including delivering runway capacity on the timetable set out by Sir Howard Davies.

    The Government will carefully consider all the evidence before reaching a view on its preferred scheme.

  • Chi Onwurah – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy

    Chi Onwurah – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Chi Onwurah on 2016-10-12.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what assessment he has made of the future role of open source software in industrial strategy (a) for the digital economy and (b) as an enabling platform; and what steps he is taking to support that software in relation to public sector procurement.

    Mr Nick Hurd

    The Government’s Open Standards Principles are helping to level the playing field for open source and proprietary software, and disaggregating government IT into smaller, more manageable components.

    The Government IT Strategy states ‘Where appropriate, government will procure open source solutions. When used in conjunction with compulsory open standards, open source presents significant opportunities for the design and delivery of interoperable solutions.’

    To support interoperability in the public sector, we have a preference for royalty-free software generated in an open and transparent manner, which is often open source.