Category: Speeches

Gregory Campbell – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Gregory Campbell on 2016-03-08.

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how he plans to assess the effectiveness of the recent campaign to encourage people to make a will.

Dominic Raab

My Department has evaluated the Choice not Chance campaign which ran in England and Wales during March 2015 with the aim of promoting the use of wills, lasting powers of attorney and organ donation. We consider the campaign was successful in promoting the making of wills. We were unable to obtain figures for wills made during the campaign but the campaign page on gov.uk received 3,515 views and 19 campaign tweets resulted in 1,268 “click throughs” for more information. Further, the question of making a will is often considered at the same time as the question of making a lasting power of attorney. During the campaign 35,525 lasting powers were made (a 42% increase over the corresponding period in 2014) and 85,743 people accessed the online LPA tool (a 66% increase in average page views compared to the previous 6 months). A further success is that our campaign materials continue to be used by practitioners.

The law of succession in Northern Ireland is devolved.

01/01/2023
Lord Stoddart of Swindon – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Stoddart of Swindon on 2016-04-11.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government, further to the Written Answer by Lord Freud on 22 March (HL6812) about state benefits, why they have not made an assessment of the percentage of food poverty or insecurity that is caused by state benefits being used for purposes other than to provide necessities; and whether they will now carry one out.

Lord Freud

Food poverty is the inability of individuals and households to obtain an adequate and nutritious diet, often because they cannot afford healthy food or there is a lack of shops in their area that are easy to reach. There is no single commonly agreed method for accurately measuring the extent of food poverty. Given these challenges we do not think that it would be worth the Department commissioning such research.

01/01/2023
Andrew Gwynne – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andrew Gwynne on 2016-05-18.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, for what statutory reasons (a) a resident of a care home may be evicted and (b) a relative of a person in a care home may be banned from visiting; and what evidence must be provided in each such case.

Alistair Burt

It is for providers of care to decide if they are no longer able to meet a person’s needs, or whether, for example for reasons of safety, it might be appropriate for a person to be prevented from visiting a care home.

Such decisions should be taken according to individual circumstances and with regard to the terms of agreements and/or contracts between providers and purchasers or commissioners of care.

01/01/2023
Tulip Siddiq – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the HM Treasury

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Tulip Siddiq on 2016-07-07.

To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, with reference to the Answer of 12 May 2016 to Question 36723 on Revenue and Customs, if he will list all the teams within each of the five HM Revenue and Customs’ business areas.

Mr David Gauke

The teams within each of the five HM Revenue and Customs’ business areas are in the table attached..

01/01/2023

Catherine West – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Catherine West on 2016-10-07.

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what level of funding his Department has allocated to schemes that encourage investment in tidal energy in each of the last five years.

Jesse Norman

Over the past five years, solar photovoltaic (PV), wind, wave and tidal electricity projects have received support from either the Renewables Obligation (RO) or the Feed-in Tariff (FITs).

Expenditure through the Renewables Obligation in 2011/12 to 2015/16 can be broken down by power generation technology shown in the table (£million in nominal prices). Solar PV and some small-scale onshore wind are also supported by the Feed In Tariff scheme, but costs are not available disaggregated by technology. Total support is shown below (£million).

RO (£million)	11/12	12/13	13/14	14/15	15/16
Onshore wind	£482.6	£557.1	£755.6	£786.8	£803.0
Offshore wind	£371.1	£698.5	£988.7	£1,108.0	£1,429.7
Solar PV	£0.1	£0.9	£34.9	£133.9	£264.8
Wave & Tidal	£0.1	£0.4	£0.4	£0.1	£0.2
TOTAL RO	£1,457.7	£1,991.3	£2,599.3	£3,114.2	£3,743.2
TOTAL FITs	£151	£506	£691	£866	£1,110

Renewables Obligations: Source Ofgem:

www.ofgem.gov.uk/environmental-programmes/ro/contacts-publications-and-data/publications-library-renewables-obligation

www.ofgem.gov.uk/publication-and-updates/renewables-obligation-ro-annual-report-2014-15

www.renewablesandchp.ofgem.gov.uk/Public/ReportManager.aspx?ReportVisibility=1&ReportCategory=0

FITs: Source Ofgem:

https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/environmental-programmes/fit/contacts-guidance-and-resources/public-reports-and-data-fit/levelisation-reports

The Contracts for Difference Scheme opened for delivery from 2015/16 onwards. No projects started deploying in 2015/16 so no payments were made.

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01/01/2023

Margaret Ritchie – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Margaret Ritchie on 2015-11-19.

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what the outcomes were of her visit to China in November 2015; and if she will make a statement.

George Eustice

During her visit the Secretary of State met a number of her counterparts, supported the two week long Food is GREAT Campaign in China and took with her the largest ever UK delegation to the Food and Hotel China trade show. She signed agreements to open the markets for UK barley and pigs trotters worth up to £190m over 5 years and discussed the forward plan for opening up the markets for poultry, beef and lamb. She discussed shared priorities with the Minister of Agriculture and the Minister of Water Resources and agreed programmes of closer collaboration.

01/01/2023
Louise Haigh – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Cabinet Office

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Louise Haigh on 2015-12-14.

To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, how many cyber attacks have been prevented on government systems in each year from 2010 to date.

Matthew Hancock

For security reasons we do not comment on specific details of cyber security attacks but we are continuously monitoring and managing the security risks to all HMG systems.

We take cyber security very seriously; since 2011 we have invested £860 million in a National Cyber Security Programme to protect the UK from cyber attack.We will invest £1.9b in cyber security over the next five years to protect the UK from cyber attacks. This ambitious level of investment will include: a programme of active cyber defence; creation of a National Cyber Centre and an ambitious skills programme.

01/01/2023
Grahame Morris – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Grahame Morris on 2016-01-19.

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what his policy is on the EU initiative at the International Maritime Organisation for new regulations to require mechanically operated water-tight doors on passenger ships to have an inbuilt safety feature which avoids death or serious injury whilst automatically closing in an emergency to ensure the safety of the vessel.

Mr Robert Goodwill

The UK delegation at the International Maritime Organization fully supports the initiative to introduce protection against crushing of people during the daily operation of watertight doors while retaining the requirements that they close firmly in case of an emergency.

01/01/2023
Jim Shannon – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Shannon on 2016-02-10.

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what plans the Government has to implement the EU Convention on preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence.

Karen Bradley

We are committed to ending Violence Against Women and Girls. The previous Government signed the Istanbul Convention (the Council Of Europe Convention on Preventing and Combating Violence Against Women and Domestic Violence) and this Government remains committed to ratifying it but have made it clear that we will not do so until we are absolutely satisfied that we fully comply with all articles but amendments to domestic law, to take extra-territorial jurisdiction over a range of offences (as required by Article 44), are necessary before the Convention can be ratified.

The Ministry of Justice is currently considering the approach to implementing the extra-territorial jurisdiction requirements in England and Wales and will seek to legislate when the approach is agreed and Parliamentary time allows. The Ministry of Justice will be consulting Ministers in the devolved administrations formally about whether legislative changes on extra-territorial jurisdiction in England and Wales should extend to Scotland and Northern Ireland.

The Convention applies to the whole of the UK so any changes necessary to the criminal law in Scotland and Northern Ireland prior to ratification are matters for the devolved administrations.

01/01/2023
Daniel Zeichner – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Daniel Zeichner on 2016-03-08.

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, pursuant to the Answer of 3 March 2016 to Question 28284, how much the Business Rate Retention Scheme has raised for the Greater London Authority in each year since the scheme’s introduction.

Mr Robert Goodwill

The income available to the Greater London Authority through the Business Rates Retention Scheme was £863.2 million in 2013/2014 and £936.2 million in 2014/2015. The income is forecast to be £1.0396 billion in 2015/2016.

01/01/2023