Category: Speeches

Andy Slaughter – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andy Slaughter on 2015-12-15.

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, pursuant to the Answer of 14 December 2015 to Questions 19129, prisons: locks and keys, which prisons had to be relocked; and what the cost was of each such incident.

Andrew Selous

When a key/lock incident is reported an immediate investigation is undertaken to assess the risk and unless it is clear that security has not been compromised, locking mechanisms and keys will be replaced and/or other necessary remedial action will be taken.

In the five years from May 2005 to May 2010 there were 16 relocks at a cost of £1,280,234 to the taxpayer. Since May 2010 this has fallen to 8 relocks at a total cost of £529,973 to the taxpayer. Further to my answer of 14 December, the table below shows the location of the 8 relocks since May 2010.

The cost of a re-lock will depend the size of the prison establishment and on which keys have been lost or compromised. If a complete set of keys are lost, a full re-lock of the prison will be undertaken, whereas if a single key is lost only a partial re-lock will be needed, incurring a lower cost.

Time Frame	Location/Date	Total Cost (excluding VAT)
1 May 2010 – 1 May 2011	HMP Swaleside; HMYOI Glen Parva; HMP Warren Hill	£79,526; £173,608; £84,419
2 May 2011 – 1 May 2012	HMP Birmingham	£415,277 ¹
2 May 2012 – 1 May 2013	None	0
2 May 2013 – 1 May 2014	HMP Lindholme	£28,812
2 May 2014 – 1 May 2015	HMP Haverigg; HMP Highpoint	£30,540; £15,856
2 May 2015 – 9 December	HMYOI Portland	£117,212

Notes:

1.The cost of the re-lock at HMP Birmingham was met by the private contractor operating the prison.

2.Prisons are also responsible for re-locks of crown court cells. Figures exclude re-lock of cells in two crown courts during the period.

3.The figures quoted have been drawn from live administrative databases and may subsequently be amended. Due care is taken during processing and analysis, but the detail is subject to inaccuracies inherent in any large scale recording system.

01/01/2023

Baroness Howe of Idlicote – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Baroness Howe of Idlicote on 2016-01-26.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government, further to the Written Answer by Lord Faulks on 22 December 2015 (HL4639), what recent discussions they have had with the National Offender Management Service about bringing the guidance on Incentives and Earned Privileges schemes for men’s prisons in line with the guidance for women’s prisons set out in issue 297 of Prison Service Order 4800, which states that incentive schemes should never be linked to any access to family visits”.”

Lord Faulks

Men and women prisoners have the same entitlements to visits. Both are eligible to family days where relevant, in addition to the normal visits entitlement. Prisons should not treat men and women prisoners differently with respect to visits solely on the basis of their gender.

01/01/2023
Lord Hylton – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Hylton on 2016-02-23.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what representations they are making to the government of Bahrain concerning (1) the Bahrainis who have already been deprived of citizenship, (2) the 260 persons who may lose citizenship following alleged acts of terror, and (3) possible discrimination against members of the Shia Scholars Council and of Al Wefaq party; and whether they have had satisfactory replies.

Baroness Anelay of St Johns

We condemn all acts of terrorism and support Bahrain’s right to bring to justice those who commit terrorist acts. We also continue to encourage the Government of Bahrain to meets its human rights obligations and honour all conventions to which it is a party – including on citizenship rights. We regularly discuss human rights with the Government of Bahrain – including at the biannual UK-Bahrain Joint Working Group meeting which was most recently held in November 2015. The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, my right hon. Friend the Member for Runnymede and Weybridge (Mr Hammond), most recently raised human rights with his Bahraini counterpart, Sheikh Khalid Bin Ahmad Al Khalifa, on 4 February 2016.

We believe that governance is a matter for all political parties in Bahrain. That is why we urge all political parties, including Al Wefaq who boycotted elections in November 2014, to engage constructively in the electoral process.

01/01/2023

Catherine West – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Energy and Climate Change

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Catherine West on 2016-03-10.

To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, how much funding the Government allocated to incentivising installation of (a) solar panels and (b) home insulation in each year since 2010.

Andrea Leadsom

Solar panels have primarily been incentivised to date through two schemes: the Renewables Obligation, which typically supports larger installations, and the Feed-in Tariff, which supports smaller projects.

The value of the Renewables Obligation for solar PV in each year since 2010 is show in the following table:

Financial Year	Renewables Obligation PV scheme value, £m (nominal)
2010-11	£0.2
2011-12	£0.1
2012-13	£0.9
2013-14	£34.9
2014-15	£133.9

A proxy for the total spend each year on all eligible technologies is given by the size of the Levelisation fund. The size of this fund and solar PV’s share of total FiTs capacity is shown in the following table:

Financial Year	Levelisation fund (nominal)	% solar PV share of total FIT capacity
2010-11	£14,435,325	69.7
2011-12	£150,756,064	90.0
2012-13	£506,328,139	86.4
2013-14	£690,991,283	84.3
2014-15	£865,553,975	81.6

It should be noted that the percentage share of capacity does not necessarily equate to the percentage share of total spend under the scheme.

No payments have yet been made to solar PV generating stations under Contracts for Difference (CfDs), although three solar PV projects signed CfDs following the first allocation round.

01/01/2023

Tom Blenkinsop – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Communities and Local Government

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Tom Blenkinsop on 2016-04-15.

To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, what the cost to the public purse was of the promotional film for the Northern Powerhouse project, Gunning for growth.

Mr Mark Francois

The Northern Powerhouse is GREAT investment film, paid for by GREAT, was created to promote investment into all parts of the Northern Powerhouse. It has already been shown in Europe, North America, Latin America, Africa, Asia and Australasia. It was produced by Leeds agency Motiv Productions at a one off cost of just over £20,000.

01/01/2023
Jonathan Reynolds – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jonathan Reynolds on 2016-05-24.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many patients discharged from assessment and treatment units were re-admitted to such units in each of the last five years.

Alistair Burt

The data on patients discharged from assessment and treatment units and re-admitted to a hospital setting or an assessment and treatment unit in each of the last five years is not available.

Health and Social Care Information Centre has been collecting data through the Learning Disability Assuring Transformation data collection since February 2015. Between March 2015 and February 2016, 1,835 patients were admitted to inpatient settings, of these, 250 patients were re-admitted within a year, including 75 patients who were re-admitted in the last 30 days.¹ Data on discharge has also been collected since February 2015 but readmission and discharge data are not linked and therefore may not relate to the same person.

Note:

¹ To note for those readmitted, Health and Social Care Information Centre can only consider the data they have from February 2015 onwards. Therefore if a patient was discharged in January 2015 and then readmitted in March 2015 they would not be counted as a readmission. The readmission figures may currently be under counting; however this will improve over time as the data set grows.

01/01/2023
The Earl of Listowel – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

The below Parliamentary question was asked by The Earl of Listowel on 2016-07-11.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what proportion of Discretionary Housing Payments made in each local authority area in England in 2015–16 were paid to care leavers up to the age of 25.

Lord Freud

The information requested is not available.

01/01/2023
Charlotte Leslie – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Charlotte Leslie on 2016-10-07.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what steps his Department is taking to ensure that medicines distributed within the UK on European Medicines Agency licence continue to be distributed once the UK leaves the EU.

David Mowat

The Government is very aware of the need to ensure that medicines already on the United Kingdom market, and which were licensed through the European Medicines Agency’s centralised procedure, remain approved for use across the UK after our exit from the European Union. This is not an issue which needs to form part of any negotiation, but will be within the UK’s own competence.

01/01/2023
Madeleine Moon – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for International Development

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Madeleine Moon on 2015-11-18.

To ask the Secretary of State for International Development, what assessment she has made of the relationship between clean water and sanitation in schools and girls’ school attendance in developing countries; and if she will make a statement.

Grant Shapps

Clean water and adequate sanitation in schools ensure safe and hygienic environments for learning. The UK Government supports the view that providing toilets at schools for girls is necessary to provide privacy and dignity. There is some evidence that WASH interventions in schools do improve attendance by girls but much evidence points to other important factors as well.

In 2011, DFID published a systematic review of this issue. This determined that separate facilities for girls were likely to encourage their attendance at school, but insufficient alone to increase attendance and that there are many influential factors, including social and economic pressures on poor families. DFID therefore takes a holistic approach to this issue.

The UK played a key role in ensuring that the recently agreed Sustainable Development Goals include a dedicated goal on water which aims to ensure universal access to water and sanitation by 2030.

01/01/2023
Jonathan Reynolds – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jonathan Reynolds on 2015-12-15.

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, whether he plans that smart ticketing will cover the entirety of the North or be separated between city regions.

Andrew Jones

We are working towards a world class transport network that is supported by a ticketing system that makes it simple and easy to travel across the North by bus, tram, metro and rail. In the recent spending review, the Government committed up to £150 million of new funding to help make this vision a reality. By Budget 2016, Transport for the North will set out an implementation plan for the delivery of smart and integrated ticketing across local transport and rail services in the North over this parliament and beyond.

01/01/2023