Category: Speeches

  • Kelvin Hopkins – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

    Kelvin Hopkins – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Kelvin Hopkins on 2014-06-12.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what recent discussions he has had with train operating companies on changes in staffing for revenue protection functions.

    Stephen Hammond

    Staffing levels and the roles to which staff are allocated are matters for the train operator, as long as they continue to deliver the services that meet the requirements of the Franchise Agreement.

    Train operating companies do sometimes inform us of staff restructuring; for example as was explained in the answer to the hon. member for Coventry South on 17 June 2014 [Official Report, column 530W].

  • Philip Davies – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    Philip Davies – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Philip Davies on 2014-03-31.

    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, pursuant to the Answer of 5 March 2014, Official Report, column 821W, on immigration controls, what procedures are in place to ensure that immigration officers ensure the removal of any face coverings before authorising entry to the UK; how many incidents have been recorded where the correct procedures relating to the removal of face coverings have not been followed by immigration officers in each of the last three years; and what disciplinary action has been taken in such incidents in each of the last three years.

    James Brokenshire

    This information is not held centrally.

  • Roger Godsiff – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    Roger Godsiff – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Roger Godsiff on 2014-06-12.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what guidance he gives to jobcentre staff on informing jobseekers of cancellation of their jobseeker’s allowance claim.

    Esther McVey

    All jobcentre staff have access to comprehensive and clear procedures, guidance and learning which equips them to advise customers appropriately

    Additionally, everyone claiming Jobseeker’s Allowance is provided with information about the conditions under which it is paid and the potential consequences of not complying. Where a doubt is identified and the case is to be referred to a decision maker, this is explained to the claimant and information provided about what will happen next.

    If a sanction or disallowance is applied or the Jobseeker’s Allowance claim is cancelled, the claimant is notified of this in writing.

  • Lilian Greenwood – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

    Lilian Greenwood – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lilian Greenwood on 2014-03-31.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what Directly Operated Railways’ total staffing budget was in each of the years since 2010-11; and what its planned staffing budget is for 2014-15 and 2015-16.

    Stephen Hammond

    The total budgeted staff costs for the years in question are as follows.

    £000’s

    Salaries

    Other Staff Costs

    Consultants

    Total

    2010/11

    539

    77

    412

    1028

    2011/12

    476

    52

    386

    914

    2012/13

    194

    32

    853

    1079

    2013/14

    378

    10

    455

    843

    2014/15

    1245

    61

    187

    1493

    2015/16

    No Budget

    As with all other costs associated with Directly Operated Railways (DOR), these are recovered through a combination of a management charge to their subsidiary (East Coast Main Line Company Ltd), charges to the performance bond which was secured from National Express following the early termination of their franchise in 2009 and fees charged to the Department for Transport for services in connection with the Rail Franchising (Direct Awards) programme.

    The total headcount in DOR for the years in question are set out in the table below.

    Year ending March

    Core DOR

    Direct Award

    2010

    7

    2011

    7

    2012

    7

    2013

    8

    2014

    7

    6*

    *Prior to the year ending March 2014, DOR’s work in respect of the Direct Award programme was staffed by a combination of the core DOR team and consultants.

  • Alex Cunningham – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for International Development

    Alex Cunningham – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for International Development

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Alex Cunningham on 2014-06-12.

    To ask the Secretary of State for International Development, if she will take steps to ensure that the funding of infrastructure projects in the Jordan Valley is not dependent on approval from the Israeli government.

    Justine Greening

    We continue to believe the best approach to development in Area C is to engage constructively with Israel to help Palestinian communities to plan and build for their future without fear of demolition. We consistently emphasise the need for unfettered humanitarian provision, including necessary infrastructure.

  • Jim Cunningham – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    Jim Cunningham – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Cunningham on 2014-03-28.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, for what reasons his Department has not published data on the effects of the under-occupancy penalty on the number of social housing tenants who have moved home or fallen into rent arrears.

    Esther McVey

    It is still too early in the policy’s lifetime to draw any firm conclusions as to its effect, including the number of tenants who have moved home. Rent arrears can have multiple causes and levels tend to fluctuate over time. A longer timeframe than one year is required in order to see whether and, if so, to what extent the removal of the spare room subsidy has impacted on rent arrears levels.

    A consortium led by Ipsos-MORI and which includes the Cambridge Centre for Housing and Planning Research has been commissioned to carry out a two year monitoring of the effects of the removal of the spare room subsidy measure across Great Britain.

    The Homes and Communities Agency reported in February that the median level of arrears among the larger housing associations had fallen from 4.1% in the second quarter of 2013-14 to 3.9% in the third quarter of 2013-14.

  • 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.