The below Parliamentary question was asked by Tania Mathias on 2016-02-29.
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, whether his Department is taking steps to increase awareness amongst small retailers of EU directive 2014/40/EU, section 14, regulating packet sizes for cigarettes.
Jane Ellison
The Government is developing guidance on the implementation of Article 14 of the revised Tobacco Products Directive (2014/40/EU) and is considering how best to raise awareness of the changes.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Nicholas Soames on 2016-04-08.
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what recent discussions he has had with the Highways Agency on litter clearance on roads.
Andrew Jones
The Secretary of State discusses a range of issues in his regular meetings with the Chief Executive of Highways England. I also raised the issue of litter on roads with the Chief Executive at our most recent monthly meeting on 15 March 2016.
Highways England actively monitors local authorities to ensure standards are maintained, as it is a local responsibility to clear litter on most of the A roads on the strategic road network. On the motorways for which Highways England is responsible, more than 150,000 sacks of litter are collected every year; an average of 411 bags every day at a cost of £40 per sack.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Stephen Timms on 2016-04-27.
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, what steps he is taking to discourage employers from cutting staff benefits on the grounds that implementing the national living wage compels them to do so.
Nick Boles
It is for employers to decide how to manage increases in their wage bill. Many employers will be giving their staff a pay rise and maintaining other benefits.
Employers need to ensure their pay and reward packages are competitive to retain and develop the people and talent they need for their business.
Employers should be planning ahead, taking steps to boost their productivity and maintain an effective workforce. In every case they must pay at least the statutory National Living Wage, or the National Minimum Wage for workers aged under 25.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Cunningham on 2016-06-13.
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what estimate his Department has made of the number of British nationals claiming pensions who live outside the UK and in the European Economic Area; and if he will make a statement.
Justin Tomlinson
No information is available concerning the number of British individuals who are living outside the UK and inside/outside the European Economic Area who are in receipt of a UK State Pension. This is because the UK State Pension is a contributory based pension, where nationality or citizenship do not form part of the eligibility criteria.
Information is available on the number of UK State pension recipients who live outside the UK by country; this can be found on the link below to the Department’s Tabulation tool.
http://tabulation-tool.dwp.gov.uk/100pc/sp/cccountry/ccsex/a_carate_r_cccountry_c_ccsex_nov15.html
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The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Shannon on 2016-09-06.
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, what discussions he has had with the government of Sudan on bringing peace to South Sudan.
Mr Tobias Ellwood
Whilst I have not yet personally discussed South Sudan directly with representatives of the Government of Sudan, the UK regularly engages with the Sudanese over this pressing issue. We do this both bilaterally and in the margins of international meetings on South Sudan’s peace process, such as July’s Joint Monitoring and Evaluation Commission Partners Group meeting, which Sudan hosted and co-chaired with China.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Stephen Kinnock on 2016-10-18.
To ask the Secretary of State for International Trade, if he will be part of the UK-China economic and financial dialogue meeting in November 2016; and whether the illegal dumping of steel by China will form part of the discussions at that meeting.
Greg Hands
My Rt Hon Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer, alongside other Government Ministers, is attending the UK-China economic and financial dialogue meeting in November 2016, at which a range of issues will be discussed.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Seema Malhotra on 2015-11-04.
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps the Government has taken to (a) improve destination data for school leavers and (b) develop online portals to help advise school leavers of all post-16 learning options.
Mr Sam Gyimah
Information on the destinations of Key Stage 4 and Key Stage 5 students was published on 20 October 2015. These experimental statistics are available online.[1]
The statistics are published at national, local, constituency, and institution level.Since they were first released in 2012, we have added data about employment destinations; improved the coverage by including independent schools, special schools, pupil referral units and other alternative provision; and have improved the timeliness of the data. We have also included the Key Stage 4 education destinations in performance tables.
We are looking to improve the quality of the destinations data by linking it to employment and benefits data. We plan to publish all Key Stage 4 and Key Stage 5 destinations as headline performance measures in the 2016 performance tables.
In our guidance on post-16 funding, we set out the expectation that providers of post-16 education and training will add information on their Government funded courses to a national database. The aim is that portal providers will be able to access this information and present it in a user-friendly way, to help young people make informed decisions about their options. Providers of post-16 education and training are currently uploading course information to this database.
[1] https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/statistics-destinations
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The below Parliamentary question was asked by Justin Madders on 2015-12-03.
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, whether hospitals will incur financial penalties if they breach performance standards as a result of the suspended industrial action on 1 December 2015.
Ben Gummer
In the normal course of events, a hospital which misses a key national standard (such as the 18-week referral to treatment waiting time standard or the six-week diagnostic wait standard) will incur a mandatory financial sanction applied by its commissioners, as set out in the NHS Standard Contract.
However, the Contract also includes a ‘Force Majeure’ clause (General Condition 28) which would, in principle, apply to planned industrial action. Under this clause, a provider is able to claim relief from its liabilities under the Contract, to the extent that an event outside of its reasonable control has directly caused it to fail to meet its contractual obligations.
Therefore, if a hospital were to breach an operational standard for the month, but could demonstrate to the commissioner that:
* this was solely and directly due to the action it had reasonably taken in anticipation of the industrial action proceeding; and
* it had done everything reasonable to mitigate the impact of its actions on achievement of the standard in that month
then the commissioner could set aside the sanction for that month.
If the breach of the standard was only partly due to the impact of the planned industrial action, only the relevant proportion of the sanction would be set aside.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Diana Johnson on 2016-01-14.
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, whether there will be discussion of long-term support for the countries bordering Syria at the Syria Donors Conference 2016.
Mr Tobias Ellwood
We and our co-hosts (Germany, Norway, Kuwait and the United Nations) are inviting leaders from countries around the world, NGOs and civil society to come together next month to raise significant new funding to meet the needs of all those affected by the Syria crisis within the country itself and by supporting neighbouring countries. The conference will identify long term funding solutions for Syria and the region, covering 2016 and subsequent years. It will address the longer term needs of all those affected by the crisis, inside and outside Syria, by identifying ways to create jobs and provide education, offering all those that have been forced to flee their homes greater hope for the future. The conference will also pave the way for a broader discussion about how the international community responds to protracted crises, in advance of the UK, UN and World Bank High-Level Forum on Forced Displacement in Protracted Crises later in 2016 and the World Humanitarian Summit in Istanbul in May.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by John Mann on 2016-02-03.
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what assessment he has made of the potential contribution of city regions to commissioning and delivering healthcare.
George Freeman
Devolution of health and social care responsibilities has the potential to further progress local integration going beyond statutory health and care services – leading to better patient experience, improved outcomes and more efficient use of local resource.
Devolution creates opportunity for strategic, innovative commissioning, underpinned by a stronger model of local shared accountability.