Category: Speeches

  • Gregory Campbell – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the HM Treasury

    Gregory Campbell – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the HM Treasury

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Gregory Campbell on 2014-06-11.

    To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, if he will bring forward legislative proposals to introduce a statutory definition of a personal service company to enable HM Revenue and Customs to make a better informed assessment of those using such devices to artificially reduce income tax.

    Mr David Gauke

    There are currently no plans to create a statutory definition of a personal service company. Working through a personal service company does not indicate that a person is artificially reducing their tax.

    The Government keeps all areas of the tax system under review.

  • Ben Bradshaw – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

    Ben Bradshaw – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Ben Bradshaw on 2014-03-28.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what information (a) his Department and (b) HM Tribunals Service hold on the age of people (i) prosecuted and convicted for television licence evasion and (ii) imprisoned for non-payment of a fine for television licence evasion.

    Jeremy Wright

    No published information is available. The information in the table is taken from a live case management system. As such, it is subject to change and is not checked to the level of Official Statistics. No information is available in respect of socio-economic status of those prosecuted or convicted or imprisoned for non-payment of a fine in respect of television licence evasion. The Government has said that it will examine whether television licence evasion should be decriminalised.

  • Liz Kendall – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Liz Kendall – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Liz Kendall on 2014-06-11.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how much NHS trusts (a) planned to spend and (b) spent on agency and contract staff in 2013-14.

    Dr Daniel Poulter

    As part of the response to the issues in Mid-Staffordshire hospital, and following the recommendations of the Francis report, many trusts have increased agency spend in the short-term to protect patients and improve patient care. Over the longer term, a key objective for the NHS is to keep agency spend to a minimum, an increase in the number of permanent front-line staff is vital to both improving patient care and delivering value for money. The number of frontline clinical staff has increased by more than 16,300 since 2010.

    In 2013-14, NHS foundation trusts planned to spend £523 million on agency and contract staff and spent £1,373.0 million. NHS trusts spent £1,209.1 million, how much they planned to spend is not available.

    Sources: for NHS trusts – unaudited data in NHS trust summarisation schedules; for NHS foundation trusts – quarterly monitoring information.

    Plans are in place in Better Procurement to reduce by £450 million spend on agency and contract staff by the end of 2016.

    NHS Trusts spent £1,209.1 million on agency and contract staff n 2013/14.

    Source: Unaudited data in NHS Trust Summarisation Schedules.

    Amounts for 2009-10 to 2012-13 were not separately identified from other non-permanent staff.

    Spend by NHS Foundation Trusts on agency and contract staff is in the following table.

    Year

    £ million

    2009/10

    764.1

    2010/11

    854.7

    2011/12

    907.0

    2012/13

    1,101.0

    2013/14

    1,373.0

    Notes: For 2009/10 – 2012/13 actual figures are based on gross staff costs as per notes in the NHS FT consolidated accounts. The figures from the consolidated accounts may differ to the Board reports due to adjustments made on redundancy, early retirement, capitalisation of staff costs and costs of R&D staff. 2013/14 figures are from quarterly monitoring information.

    Information available about spend on all staff is set out in the tables below.

    NHS Trusts

    Year

    £ million

    2009/10

    18,225.1

    2010/11

    18,929.5

    2011/12

    19,839.5

    2012/13

    19,344.7

    Source: NHS (England) Summarised Accounts 2009/10, 2010/11; NHS Trust Audited Summarisation Schedules 2011/12, 2012/13.

    Note: Total staff costs for 2013/14 are not yet available.

    NHS Foundation Trusts

    Year

    £ million

    2009/10

    17,599.7

    2010/11

    19,442.9

    2011/12

    23,046.0

    2012/13

    24,709.0

    2013/14

    26,246.0

    Notes: For 2009/10 – 2012/13 actual figures are based on gross staff costs as per notes in the NHS FT consolidated accounts. The figures from the consolidated accounts may differ to the Board reports due to adjustments made on redundancy, early retirement, capitalisation of staff costs and costs of R&D staff. 2013/14 figures are from quarterly monitoring information.

  • Paul Flynn – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Defence

    Paul Flynn – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Defence

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Paul Flynn on 2014-03-27.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what discussions his Department has had with the United States Department of Defense (USDoD) in respect of the installation by BT of a special communications system to link RAF Croughton in Northamptonshire with the USDoD headquarters in Washington DC and the US Africa headquarters for unmanned aircraft operations in Djibouti.

    Mr Mark Francois

    The installation of US communications systems at RAF Croughton is a matter for the United States Visiting Forces. No discussions have taken place in respect to the installation by BT of a special communications system to link RAF Croughton with the Department of Defence headquarters in the US, and US Forces in Djibouti.

  • Aidan Burley – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

    Aidan Burley – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Aidan Burley on 2014-06-11.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, how many apprenticeships commenced in each sector in (a) Cannock Chase constituency and (b) Staffordshire in the last 12 months.

    Matthew Hancock

    Information on the number of Apprenticeship starts by Sector Subject Area and geography is published in a supplementary table to a Statistical First Release (SFR):

    https://www.gov.uk/government/statistical-data-sets/fe-data-library-apprenticeships–2

    https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/308418/apprenticeship-starts-by-region-and-sector-subject-area.xls

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  • Ms Harriet Harman – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    Ms Harriet Harman – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Ms Harriet Harman on 2014-03-27.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what the three most popular instruments are for secondary school children in England who are learning an instrument in school.

    Elizabeth Truss

    The information requested is not held by the Department for Education. A recent report[1] published by Arts Council England shows that in the academic year 2012/13, 437,975 pupils in years 1-9 received free whole class ensemble teaching. This is 8.6% of the national cohort. 430,998 pupils were in years 1-6 (12.4% of the cohort) and 6,977 were in years 7-9 (0.4% of the cohort).

    Many other children learn instruments in and out of school, but these figures are not collected or held centrally.

    [1]http://www.artscouncil.org.uk/funding/apply-funding/funding-programmes/music-education-hubs/

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  • Wayne David – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    Wayne David – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Wayne David on 2014-06-11.

    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how much the recently employed additional staff in passport offices are estimated to cost.

    James Brokenshire

    Her Majesty’s Passport Office have been training and redeploying staff from
    other duties within the Agency, from other parts of the wider Home Office, and
    in the case of one individual another Government department, to meet the
    exceptional levels of passport demand. There will be some additional costs
    relating to staff where they will be temporarily working away from their normal
    workplace and where overtime is worked by staff from other parts of the
    Department. At this time it is not possible to put a reliable estimate on
    these additional costs.

  • Joan Walley – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

    Joan Walley – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Joan Walley on 2014-03-27.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what plans he has to meet representatives of Cuadrilla and other members of the shale gas industry.

    Dan Rogerson

    The Secretary of State has no such planned engagements at present but always welcomes meeting a broad range of organisations to understand their needs and concerns. The UK Government is committed to the development of the shale gas industry in a safe and environmentally responsible manner.

  • Angus Robertson – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Defence

    Angus Robertson – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Defence

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Angus Robertson on 2014-06-11.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what military or civilian personnel in his Department of what rank or grade have been reprimanded for failing to deliver an ICT hosting environment for Capita as part of the Recruiting Partnering Project.

    Anna Soubry

    No personnel have been reprimanded in connection with the delivery of the Recruiting Partnering Project.

    An ICT hosting platform is being provided for Capita.

  • Lindsay Roy – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Scotland Office

    Lindsay Roy – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Scotland Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lindsay Roy on 2014-03-27.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland, what estimate he has made of the number of homeless (a) single people and (b) families in Scotland.

    David Mundell

    Homelessness statistics in Scotland are published by the Scottish Government who gather the information from local authorities.

    The last such publication was on 25 March 2014 and is available at:

    http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/Statistics/Browse/Housing-Regeneration/RefTables/HomelessOcttoDec2013.

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