Category: Speeches

  • Lord Kennedy of Southwark – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the HM Treasury

    Lord Kennedy of Southwark – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the HM Treasury

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Kennedy of Southwark on 2015-11-26.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government what is the current level of spending on infrastructure in the UK, compared to the rest of the G7.

    Lord O’Neill of Gatley

    The National Infrastructure Pipeline outlines over £410 billion of planned investment to the end of the decade and beyond; this includes both public and private investment.

    At the Spending Review, it was announced that the Government will exceed its commitment to invest £100 billion in infrastructure by 2020-21. It will now make a public investment of £120 billion. (This includes social infrastructure).

    HM Government does not hold figures on infrastructure spending in other G7 countries, and methodological discrepancies prevent reliable comparison of infrastructure spending.

  • Lord Campbell of Pittenweem – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Defence

    Lord Campbell of Pittenweem – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Defence

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Campbell of Pittenweem on 2016-01-12.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether their most recent estimate of the unit cost of the UK’s F-35Bs has been revised (1) upwards, or (2) downwards, as a result of updated information provided by the US Joint Strike Fighter programme.

    Earl Howe

    We continue to see a reduction in aircraft unit costs which is in line with the estimates shown in the annual US Selected Acquisition Report. The UK’s F-35 programme remains within its cost approval limit as detailed in the National Audit Office Major Projects Report 2015.

  • Douglas Chapman – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Defence

    Douglas Chapman – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Defence

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Douglas Chapman on 2016-02-03.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how many Zephyr 8 UAVs his Department plans to buy; what the estimated cost per unit is of that equipment; what the programme through life cost is of that equipment; and where he plans units of that equipment will be based.

    Mr Philip Dunne

    As part of our commitment to providing next-generation battlefield intelligence capabilities to the UK Armed Forces, the Ministry of Defence is planning to contract for the demonstration of two Zephyr Unmanned Aerial Vehicles. This contract will allow the UK to understand whether Zephyr can fulfil the requirement for a high-altitude persistent surveillance capability, as announced in the 2015 Strategic Defence and Security Review.

    The £10.6 million contract, due to be signed imminently with Airbus Defence and Space, is for an operational concept demonstration rather than individual platforms, so unit costs are not held. Furthermore, as the Zephyr demonstrators will not be in-service, they will not be based at a particular location and there will be no related support or through-life costs.

    Tests are due to take place in 2017 to assess Zephyr’s capabilities and explore its potential.

  • Catherine West – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Wales Office

    Catherine West – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Wales Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Catherine West on 2016-02-25.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Wales, what the rate of pay is for cleaners in his Department.

    Alun Cairns

    Cleaning services within the Wales Office are undertaken by outsourced providers under Ministry of Justice contracts.

    Rates of pay for cleaners are determined by their respective employers and not held by the Wales Office or Ministry of Justice.

    All employers are obligated to pay at least the National Minimum Wage and the new National Living Wage from April 2016.

  • Andy Slaughter – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    Andy Slaughter – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andy Slaughter on 2016-03-24.

    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, pursuant to the Answer of 21 March 2016 to Question 31078, on immigration officers, what policy, guidance or code of practice is provided to immigration officers carrying out equipment interference.

    James Brokenshire

    The Office of Surveillance Commissioners (OSC) provides independent oversight of the use of property interference powers by law enforcement, including immigration officers. The Police Act 1997 was amended in 2013 to enable immigration officers to carry out property interference. The OSC regularly inspects law enforcement use of the power and scrutinises all individual property interference authorisations. A statutory code of practice for covert surveillance and property interference which can be found at:

    https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/384975/Covert_Surveillance_Property_Interrefernce_web__2_.pdf

    applies to all agencies with property interference powers.

    The Investigatory Powers Bill will provide enhanced safeguards for the use of equipment interference, including the requirement that equipment interference warrants are subject to the double-lock authorisation safeguard. The Bill will also create a new and more powerful Investigatory Powers Commissioner who will keep the use of this important power under close and regular review. A new Equipment Interference Code of Practice was published in draft alongside the Investigatory Powers Bill. This Code will provide further guidance on the use of equipment interference powers to all relevant agencies.

  • Alan Brown – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    Alan Brown – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Alan Brown on 2016-04-29.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what the target time is for processing applications to the Social Fund; and what performance was against that target in (a) 2013-14, (b) 2014-15 and (c) 2015-16.

    Justin Tomlinson

    There is no overall target or performance data for the Social Fund as they vary depending on each of the individual programmes.

  • David Burrowes – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    David Burrowes – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by David Burrowes on 2016-06-07.

    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, with reference to the Answer of 9 May 2016 to Question 36277, how many requests have been made for asylum applications to be transferred for consideration by the UK from (a) Greece and (b) Italy since UK experts were deployed to support the respective Dublin units.

    James Brokenshire

    Whilst all asylum claims including those accepted under Dublin III are registered on the Home Office Case Information Database (CID), this data is not currently held in a way that allows it to be reported on automatically and is therefore not currently available.

  • Richard Burden – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Richard Burden – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Richard Burden on 2016-09-02.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what recent steps his Department has taken to (a) improve access to and (b) decrease waiting times for services provided by GPs.

    David Mowat

    To implement the Government’s commitment to transform access to general practice (GP), £175 million has been invested in the GP Access Fund to test improved and innovative access to GP services. Across the two waves of the Access Fund, there are 57 schemes covering over 2,500 practices and 18 million patients – a third of the population – have benefited from improved access and transformational change at local level.

    This includes more appointments being made available, especially at times more convenient for patients, such as weekday evenings and weekends. It also includes different approaches like telephone consultations and better use of the wider primary care workforce (such as Advanced Nurse Practitioners, pharmacists, the voluntary sector, physiotherapists and paramedics) to deliver improved access to patients.

    These approaches have helped release local GP capacity, improve patient choice, and more appropriately matched the needs of patients with the most appropriate professional to care for them. In addition to Access Fund sites, clinical commissioning groups (CCGs) may offer local initiatives for improving access to GPs.

    Practices in the GP Access Fund are testing an automated appointment measuring interface (the GP Appointment Tool) to give them detailed information about their activity and how it varies over time. This will help practices match their supply of appointments more closely to demand. It will be available for every practice from 2017-18.

    The General Practice Forward View, published in April 2016, announced that an extra £2.4 billion a year will be invested in GP services by 2020-21. As part of overall investment in general practice, NHS England will provide over £500 million of recurrent funding by 2020-21, on top of current primary medical care allocations, to enable CCGs to commission and fund extra capacity across England. This is to ensure that by 2020, everyone has access to GP services, including sufficient routine appointments at evenings and weekends to meet locally determined demand, alongside effective access to out-of-hours and urgent care services.

  • Bill Wiggin – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the HM Treasury

    Bill Wiggin – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the HM Treasury

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Bill Wiggin on 2015-11-02.

    To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, what steps he is taking to reduce red tape affecting estate agents subject to the Money Laundering Regulations 2007.

    Harriett Baldwin

    The Government’s Anti-Money Laundering regime has a clear aim: to make the UK financial system a hostile environment for illicit finances, whilst minimising the burden on legitimate businesses and reducing the overall burden of regulation.

    With this in mind, the Government has launched a review of the impact on business of the current anti-money laundering and terrorist finance regime as part of the Cutting Red Tape Review programme. The call for evidence from all parties closes on 6th November and the Review is specifically seeking evidence on the role of supervisors in that regime, so that regulatory activity can be made as efficient as possible. The Review will examine the potential to improve compliance and efficiency, by identifying aspects of the supervisory regime that appear to businesses in the regulated sector to be unclear or unnecessarily cumbersome.

  • Lord Freyberg – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Lord Freyberg – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Freyberg on 2015-11-26.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government what percentage of NHS secondary care centres do not provide tumour genetic testing in (1) breast cancer, (2) colorectal cancer, (3) lung cancer, and (4) melanoma.

    Lord Prior of Brampton

    All NHS England commissioned secondary and tertiary hospitals will be able to collect blood and/or tissue samples for the purpose of genetic testing, depending on the sampling technique required. The testing itself is however usually undertaken by commissioned genetic laboratories, which will typically serve a catchment area much greater than the hospital in which they are based. There will usually be recommended criteria in place to guide National Health Service referrals for genetic testing.

    In a small number of cases, usually for very rare conditions, a test may need to be sent away to a non commissioned laboratory, including some abroad and some falling within the private sector, to access expertise. Funding will, however, continue to be provided from NHS budgets.

    The United Kingdom is also leading the world by using cutting edge technology in the form of whole genome sequencing to transform healthcare and health research. The Prime Minister launched the 100,000 Genomes Project to bring the benefits of genome sequencing to NHS patients. The Project will sequence 100,000 whole human genomes of NHS patients with cancer or a rare disease by the end of 2017. Eleven Genomic Medicine Centres have been established across the country and are recruiting patients to this landmark project. Otherwise, NHS England does not hold data on private or self-funded care or testing commissioned from either NHS or third party laboratories.

    Information on the percentage of eligible patients who received access to genetic testing is not held by NHS England. Due to data protection requirements, detailed data on the reasons for referral for specific tests are not currently aggregated at national level.