Category: Speeches

Jim Cunningham – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Cunningham on 2016-05-09.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what estimate he has made of the cost to the public purse of hotel bookings his Department made for its (a) Ministers, (b) special advisers and (c) officials in each of the last five years.

Jane Ellison

The Department implemented the Crown Commercial Services solution for travel awarded to Redfern Ltd on 1 July 2012 with all information taken from that system. Hotel bookings prior to that date were facilitated via an alternative provider with the information requested not being readily available. Total spend on hotel bookings by financial year broken down by Ministers, special advisers and all officials is in the table below split by overseas and United Kingdom arrangements.

Table 1

REDFERN TRAVEL LTD	*July 2012-2013	2013-2014	2014-2015	2015-2016	Grand Total
Hotels Accommodation (Overseas) Total of which:	£19,771	£36,941	£86,181	£72,738	£215,631
Minister	£153	£223	£808		£1,184
Official	£19,618	£36,718	£85,306	£72,738	£214,380
Special Adviser			£67		£67

Hotels Accommodation (UK) Total of which:	£242,946	£369,386	£319,169	£272,203	£1,203,703
Minister	£118	£1,491	£747	£312	£2,667
Official	£242,828	£367,895	£318,337	£271,785	£1,200,845
Special Adviser			£85	£107	£192
Grand Total -UK and Overseas	£262,717	£406,326	£405,350	£344,941	£1,419,334

Expenditure information taken from the Department’s I-Expenses system, Table 2, contains hotel costs incurred by officials that was later reimbursed. There are no hotel transactions relating to Ministers or special advisers within the system however additional information on expenses for Ministers and special advisers may exist where claimed via the manual expense claim form (EXP1). Investigation of this source to identify costs associated with hotels would incur disproportionate costs.

Table 2
I-EXPENSES	This covers Accommodation UK and overseas for all staff. *No Ministers or Special Adviser costs

Sum of Amount
Financial Year	Expense Type	Total
2012-13	130 Hotels Accommodation (UK)	£15,861
	131 Hotels Accommodation (Overseas)	£14,128
2012-13 Total		£29,990
2013-14		£18,123
2014-15	130 Hotels Accommodation (UK)	£8,252
	131 Hotels Accommodation (Overseas)	£12,107
2014-15 Total		£20,358
2015-16	130 Hotels Accommodation (UK)	£4,933
	131 Hotels Accommodation (Overseas)	£6,918
2015-16 Total		£11,851
Grand Total		£80,322

01/01/2023

Steve McCabe – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the HM Treasury

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Steve McCabe on 2016-06-28.

To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, what information his Department publishes on its process of reviewing and revising the UK’s tax treaties with other countries.

Mr David Gauke

HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) have responsibility for negotiating the UK’s double taxation agreements, subject to oversight by HM Treasury. HMRC run a periodic consultation exercise to establish the negotiating priorities, which are then approved by ministers. As part of this exercise they consider representations made by UK businesses, non-governmental organisations and government departments, as well as the UK’s diplomatic missions throughout the world. The results of the last such review were published by HMRC on the gov.uk website in November 2015.

Decisions on the negotiation or renegotiation of a tax treaty are taken on the basis of a range of factors including the results of HMRC’s periodic review of the tax treaty network, economic factors, the need to counter avoidance and evasion, and the role of treaties in promoting development. We also receive requests from countries to negotiate with us, and we will endeavour to accommodate them as time and negotiating resources permit. Given the number of treaties the UK already has, most of the programme will involve renegotiating existing agreements.

01/01/2023
Cat Smith – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Culture, Media and Sport

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Cat Smith on 2016-09-08.

To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, what information her Department holds on the number of youth centres planned for closure in 2016-17.

Mr Rob Wilson

It is the responsibility of local authorities to decide how to allocate funding for youth services, according to local need. Individual local authorities would be best placed to advise on any youth centres that are planned for closure in their local area in 2016-17.

01/01/2023
Debbie Abrahams – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Debbie Abrahams on 2015-11-10.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what information is recorded by the Cancer Registry on secondary breast cancer.

Jane Ellison

Public Health England (PHE) is responsible for collecting cancer data to support national cancer registration in England and recognises the importance of collecting data on recurrent breast cancer; however data on the number of people diagnosed with secondary breast cancer is not currently available. Pilot work undertaken in April 2012 in acute trusts has improved the reporting for breast cancer recurrence and metastasis to the National Cancer Registration Service (NCRS). In order to drive up data completeness for the submissions to the NCRS, monthly reports on data quality and completeness of the Cancer Outcomes and Services Dataset are made available to all acute providers.

Since the completion of the pilot project the NCRS in PHE has been working with all acute National Health Service providers in England to improve the reporting of breast cancer recurrence. The collection of this particular item of data remains challenging because relapsed patients may represent in many different ways and through many referral routes.

Further work is being scoped by NHS England and PHE based on the recommendation in the recent Independent Cancer Taskforce report to establish robust surveillance systems to collect this data on all cancers.

01/01/2023
Robert Flello – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Robert Flello on 2015-12-10.

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, what representations his Ministers have made to their counterparts abroad or to their diplomatic representatives in the UK on the practice of consuming and selling dog meat for consumption subsequent to the debate in the House on the dog meat trade of 5 November 2015.

Mr Hugo Swire

Since the debate on 5 November my Department has not received any representations from any diplomatic missions in the UK on the dog meat trade, nor have Ministers made representations to their counterparts abroad. As highlighted during the debate by the Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, my hon. Friend the Member for Rochford and Southend East (James Duddridge), I am contacting our Ambassadors in the countries concerned to review our activities in this area.

The Government is committed to raising the standards of animal welfare at home and abroad. I raised animal welfare issues during my visit to the region in February and will continue to make representations when appropriate.

01/01/2023
Lord Birt – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Birt on 2016-01-14.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what proportion of buses, taxis, and other public transport road vehicles are wholly electrically powered.

Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon

We do not have detailed numbers on the information requested.

According to Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA) statistics some 133 public transport buses, coaches and minibuses are wholly electrically powered. There are no purpose built electric taxis recorded on the DVLA records, although electric cars are used as minicabs and private hire vehicles, and a number of plug-in hybrid purpose built taxis are in development.

This Government has a comprehensive £600 million package of measures over the course of this parliament to keep Britain at the forefront of the ultra-low emission vehicle technology. This includes grants encouraging low emission buses and taxis.

The proportion of wholly electric vehicles operated by central Government is not recorded by the DVLA. However, the total number of central government electric vehicles that have been purchased via the Crown Commercial Service framework is 20. Just over 300 ultra-low emission vehicles are being integrated into public sector fleets under the ULEV readiness project; with over 70% being fully electric.

01/01/2023
Douglas Carswell – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Attorney General

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Douglas Carswell on 2016-02-09.

To ask the Attorney General, what planning his Department has undertaken in the event of the UK voting to leave the EU.

Jeremy Wright

At the February European Council the Government negotiated a new settlement, giving the United Kingdom a special status in a reformed European Union. The Government’s view is that the UK will be stronger, safer and better off remaining in a reformed EU.

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

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Charlotte Leslie on 2016-03-07.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, when his Department plans to announce the net allocations from the primary care transformation fund.

Alistair Burt

The Primary Care Transformation Fund is a multi-year programme and the first tranche of local estates and technology projects to improve general practitioner premises and supporting infrastructure across the country are already underway. Expenditure on 2015/16 projects will be finalised with the audit of NHS England’s national accounts, which is expected to complete in July.

Clinical commissioning groups have commissioned the development of Strategic Estates Plans that include the individual estates and technology projects for years two to four, which are due for submission later in the spring. These will then be assessed during the summer and the allocations required to support them developed later this year.

01/01/2023
Anne-Marie Trevelyan – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Anne-Marie Trevelyan on 2016-04-08.

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what modelling she has conducted to assess the likelihood of the emergency brake mechanism to control immigration from the rest of the EU into the UK being utilised in the next five years.

James Brokenshire

The European Commission has clearly said that the UK already meets the criteria for the implementation of the ‘emergency brake’ and the text of the agreement makes clear that, once the necessary legislation is in place, EU workers newly arriving in the UK will not have full access to our in-work benefits for up to four years.

The Home Office accepted the view of the independent Migration Advisory Committee that to produce such estimates "would not be sensible, or helpful to policymakers" and did not prepare specific forecasts of likely inflows from Romania and Bulgaria once restrictions expired on 1 January 2014. There are no plans to undertake a review of this decision.

01/01/2023
Jeff Smith – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jeff Smith on 2016-05-09.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many students currently receive the NHS bursary in (a) England and (b) Manchester, Withington constituency.

Ben Gummer

The latest available figures provided by the NHS Business Services Authority show that there were 99,549 students attending a university in England who received an NHS Bursary payment in the financial year 2014/15. Of the students receiving an NHS Bursary payment, 48 provided their current address with a postcode in the Withington constituency of Greater Manchester.

01/01/2023