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Category: Speeches

  • Clive Betts – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Communities and Local Government

    Clive Betts – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Communities and Local Government

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Clive Betts on 2015-11-26.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, what estimate he has made of the number of social rented homes that will be completed in (a) 2015-16 and (b) each of the succeeding four years.

    Brandon Lewis

    Through the Spending Review the Government has committed to investing £8 billion to deliver over 400,000 affordable housing starts, doubling our investment in affordable housing from 2018-19.

    This includes £1.7 billion to deliver around 100,000 homes for affordable or intermediate rent. Already through the 2015-18 Affordable Homes programme we have allocated over £1 billion to deliver affordable housing, with the majority being for rented housing.

    Since April 2010 we have delivered over 260,000 affordable homes. Under Labour the stock of affordable homes fell by 420,000, with 1.8 million families on social housing waiting lists. More council housing has been built since 2010 than in the previous 13 years of a Labour Government.

    The funding allocated to housing associations and local authorities will depend on the bids submitted to the Affordable Homes programme.

  • Andy Slaughter – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

    Andy Slaughter – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andy Slaughter on 2016-01-11.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, what reports he has received on Saudi Arabia’s use of counter-terrorism laws; and whether such laws are being used legitimately to tackle terrorism or to supress political and religious opposition.

    Mr Tobias Ellwood

    We have been following Saudi Arabia’s counter-terrorism and terrorism financing legislation issue closely since it was implemented on 31 January 2014. As we noted in our 2014 Human Rights and Democracy, a number of human rights activists have been sentenced in the Specialised Criminal Court, set up under this legislation for security and terrorism cases. We will continue to monitor this issue carefully.

  • Andrew Gwynne – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Andrew Gwynne – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andrew Gwynne on 2016-01-28.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what the budget was for the Rare and Imported Pathogens Laboratory in each of the last five years.

    Jane Ellison

    Public Health England (PHE) was formed on 1 April 2013; below are budgets for the Rare and Imported Pathogens Laboratory (RIPL) for each year since PHE’s formation. The RIPL was previously part of the Health Protection Agency, whose functions transferred to PHE.

    2013/14 (Actual)

    2014/15 (Actual)

    2015/16 (Budget)

    £3,491,300

    £3,667,600

    £3,465,300
  • Virendra Sharma – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Cabinet Office

    Virendra Sharma – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Cabinet Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Virendra Sharma on 2016-02-23.

    To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, what his Department’s wellness strategy is.

    Matthew Hancock

    The Cabinet Office takes the well-being of its employees seriously and provides a range of support, including the recent launch of the Cabinet Office Listening Service, resourced by staff who have been trained in active listening and emotional support. The service can provide upfront support to Cabinet Office staff dealing directly or indirectly with specific issues in their personal or working life or to help them to cope with mental health issues of any kind including depression, anxiety or stress. Listeners can also signpost individuals onto other relevant services such as the external Employee Assistant Programme which offers counselling, impartial advice and access to online health and wellness related resources.

    The department has established an employee led WorkWell community to further develop and implement a strategy for wellness. Progress to date includes establishing resilience training for senior leaders and their teams, signing up to the Time to Change pledge on mental health, providing access to coaching and training in skills to improve wellbeing such as mindfulness. WorkWell are also seeking to increase awareness of opportunities to improve physical wellbeing at work including provision of on-site health checks.

  • Tania Mathias – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    Tania Mathias – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Tania Mathias on 2016-03-23.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what the average value is of a personal independence payment in (a) the UK and (b) Twickenham constituency.

    Justin Tomlinson

    Information on average weekly payments of Personal Independence Payment (PIP) is not published but can be calculated from the available claimant data extractable from Stat-Xplore (https://stat-xplore.dwp.gov.uk/) and the amount of benefit paid by component combination. At the end of January 2016 the average amount payable to PIP recipients in Great Britain was £88.70 per week and £88.14 per week in the Twickenham parliamentary constituency.

    Personal Independence Payment (PIP) will be introduced in Northern Ireland later this year and will be a matter for the Northern Ireland Office.

    “

  • William Wragg – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Cabinet Office

    William Wragg – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Cabinet Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by William Wragg on 2016-04-21.

    To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, how many nationals of other EEA member states migrated to the UK with dependants of school age in each of the last 10 years; and how many school-aged dependants of other EEA member states have lived in the UK in each of the last 10 years.

    Mr Rob Wilson

    The information requested falls within the responsibility of the UK Statistics Authority. I have asked the Authority to reply.

  • Louise Haigh – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

    Louise Haigh – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Louise Haigh on 2016-06-06.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what proportion of staff in her Department were (a) payroll and (b) non-payroll staff in each financial year from 2010-11 to 2015-16.

    George Eustice

    Core Defra publishes Workforce Management Information on a monthly basis. This sets out the number of staff who are a) on payroll and b) off payroll and the published data covers financial years 2010-11 to 2015-16. It can be found at the following link: https://data.gov.uk/dataset/workforce-management-information-defra.

    No civil servants within Core Defra are paid through limited companies.

    The figure for spend on non-payroll staff in 2015-16 will be published in the 2015-16 Annual Report and Accounts.

    “

  • Tom Elliott – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Northern Ireland Office

    Tom Elliott – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Northern Ireland Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Tom Elliott on 2016-09-02.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, what the estimated cost to the public purse is of implementing online voter registration in Northern Ireland.

    Kris Hopkins

    The cost of extending the digital registration service to Northern Ireland is being met by the Cabinet Office as part of the wider project to implement digital registration throughout the UK.

    This work is ongoing and the current estimate of costs is approximately £250,000.

  • Lord Kennedy of Southwark – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    Lord Kennedy of Southwark – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Kennedy of Southwark on 2016-10-10.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to ensure that they meet their target of halving the disability employment gap.

    Lord Freud

    In the last three years, the number of disabled people in work has increased by almost half a million. But we recognise that the gap between the employment rates of disabled people and non-disabled people remains too large. That is why we are committed to halving it.

    Last year the Work and Health Unit was established to lead the drive for improving work and health outcomes for people with health conditions and disabilities, as well as improving support for people absent from work through ill health and those at risk of leaving workforce.

    The Unit has begun work to build the evidence base of what works to support disabled people and people with health conditions to obtain and remain in work. We are increasing the reach of Access to Work which provide support to an additional 25,000 people per year by 2021, and we have recently launched the Access to Work Digital Service which as so far received an average of 500 claims per week. We are more than doubling Disability Employment Advisors in job centres to help disabled people into employment and embedding employment advisers in IAPT, so that individuals with mental health conditions can receive timely and tailored employment advice.

    We will soon publish a Green Paper that will explore a range of options for long-term reform across different sectors enabling everyone to realise their aspirations, regardless of their health condition or disability. We will engage with disabled people, their representative organisations and a wide range of other stakeholders, who all have an important part to play in making the transformative changes required for long-term reform on supporting disabled people into work.

  • Baroness Kinnock of Holyhead – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for International Development

    Baroness Kinnock of Holyhead – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for International Development

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Baroness Kinnock of Holyhead on 2015-10-29.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government what is their assessment of the proportion of aid funding which is channelled to large international agencies compared to that channelled to local non-governmental organisations.

    Baroness Verma

    UK Official Development Assistance (ODA) channelled through non-governmental organisations is set out in the table below. DFID is currently conducting the Civil Society Partnership Review, which is considering future funding arrangements.

    2014 data will be published on the DFID website as National Statistics on Thursday 3rd December 2015.

    Channel Code Description

    2013 ODA (£ millions)

    % of Total UK ODA

    NGO (where country base is undefined)

    £150,895

    1%

    Internationally-based (non-UK) NGO*

    £362,696

    3%

    UK-based NGO*

    £662,307

    6%

    Developing country-based NGO

    £178,313

    2%

    *Many international and UK-based NGOs have significant local developing country footprints.