Category: Speeches

Tim Loughton – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Tim Loughton on 2016-01-13.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, whether the existing Vineyard Register is maintained in accordance with EU regulations.

Jane Ellison

The Food Standards Agency (FSA) currently maintains a Vineyard Register for the United Kingdom on behalf of the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. This was established and managed in accordance with the European Union requirements set out in Regulation (EC) 436/2009. This statutory obligation was removed on the 1 January 2016 as a result of Regulation (EC) 1308/2013.

The FSA uses the register for the purposes of official controls relating to UK wine production and to underpin traceability for the various UK wine schemes.

01/01/2023
Rosie Cooper – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Rosie Cooper on 2016-02-08.

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment he has made of the potential effect of changing eligibility criteria for personal independence payment on people with long-term medical conditions; what estimate he has made of how many people will be affected by those changes; what type of work he expects people with long-term medical conditions to undertake; and what steps he has taken to (a) ensure that employers employ people with such conditions and (b) tackle any discriminatory practices against people with such conditions.

Justin Tomlinson

DWP has conducted a consultation to seek views on how support can best be provided, through Personal Independence Payment (PIP), to help meet the costs of disability faced by people who are currently awarded points due to aids and appliances. No decision has yet been made as to whether any change should be made to the current system and the department does not have any preference between the five options presented in the consultation. We have also invited additional suggestions for change.

If the Department decides that change is required, a full equality analysis will be conducted and considered prior to a final decision being made, in line with the Department’s obligations under the Equality Act 2010. This will include an estimate of the number who would be affected.

PIP is payable both in and out of work. The Government is committed to giving all disabled people the opportunity to fulfil their potential and achieve their ambitions. Work is an important part of this, which is why the Government has committed to halving the disability employment gap, requiring us to transform policy, practice and public attitudes. The government’s award winning Disability Confident was launched by the Prime Minister in 2013 and works to improve employer awareness and confidence in employing, retaining and unlocking disabled people’s talents.

Employment programmes like Work Choice continue to help thousands of disabled people find, start and remain in work. Since 2010, Work Choice has achieved over 39,490 job outcomes for disabled people. The Equality Act 2010 also provides statutory protection against discrimination and applies to every stage of the recruitment process. Access to Work offers additional support beyond an employer’s statutory duty to provide reasonable adjustments and last year the scheme supported 36,800 disabled people in work.

01/01/2023
Roger Godsiff – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Roger Godsiff on 2016-02-26.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what steps are being taken to ensure that the pay calculator for junior doctors published by the Government is accurate; and when that calculator will be made available.

Ben Gummer

The pay calculator accurately reflects the position of junior doctors were they to be working any of the illustrative rotas in the pay calculator. As pay is directly related to the number of hours worked including the number of unsocial hours, different rotas will give different results. NHS Employers are considering how to provide more information for juniors who are working a different balance of hours from those in the illustrative rotas.

01/01/2023
Lord Beith – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Defence

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Beith on 2016-03-23.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government why the Bomber Command clasp is not awarded to veterans who served with 205 Group and flew sorties over occupied Europe from Southern Italy, and what recent consideration they have given to this issue.

Earl Howe

We have enormous admiration and respect for the unique contribution and sacrifice made by bomber aircrew who served outside of the UK. Sir John Holmes, in his Military Medals Review, specifically included a reconsideration of recognition for Bomber Command, although he recommended not to award medallic recognition to those who flew from outside the UK. This decision was made independently of the Ministry of Defence and subsequently agreed by the Committee on the Grant of Honours, Decorations and Medals and Her Majesty The Queen.

01/01/2023
Philip Davies – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Philip Davies on 2016-05-04.

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many and what proportion of first-time offenders (a) of each ethnic group and (b) for each offence were sentenced to immediate custody in the latest year for which figures are available.

Dominic Raab

This information is published routinely in the Criminal Justice Statistics quarterly bulletin, and can be accessed from the Offending History data tool from the following web link:

https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/criminal-justice-system-statistics-quarterly-september-2015

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01/01/2023
Kevin Hollinrake – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Kevin Hollinrake on 2016-06-20.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, by what process his Department plans to evaluate and continue to develop national antibiotic prescribing targets for primary and secondary care.

Jane Ellison

The Department takes advice on the measurement of prescribing levels and the development of objectives for levels of prescribing of antibiotics from the Department’s Health’s Advisory Committee on Antimicrobial Resistance and Healthcare Associated Infections as well as the English Surveillance Programme for Antimicrobial Utilisation and Resistance.

The English Surveillance Programme on Antimicrobial Use and Resistance, (ESPAUR), was established by Public Health England (PHE) in 2013 in response to the publication of the UK 5 year Strategy on Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR). ESPAUR provides the data on prescribing of antibiotics and levels of resistance to antibiotics in both primary and secondary care that allows the Department to evaluate progress.

PHE uses the ESPAUR data to provide ongoing expert advice to NHS England to enable ongoing development of commissioning incentives to encourage healthcare providers to achieve the antibiotic prescribing quality measures recommended by the national expert Advisory Group on AMR and Healthcare Associated Infections for primary and secondary care.

The Department’s Policy Research Programme has also commissioned the Imperial National Institute for Health Research Health Protection Research Unit to evaluate and research the impact of reduced antibiotic prescribing on hospital admissions and mortality.

01/01/2023

Baroness Finlay of Llandaff – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Baroness Finlay of Llandaff on 2016-09-05.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what estimates they have made of the costs of road traffic accidents associated with alcohol to (1) the NHS, (2) the emergency services, (3) the police, (4) the justice system, (5) the benefits system, and (6) individual victims.

Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon

The Department for Transport publishes estimates of the average cost to society of road traffic accidents as part of the Transport Analysis Guidance (called WebTAG). The cost is broken down into six elements. Three of these elements are casualty-related:

lost output/cost to the economy
medical and ambulance costs
human costs

The remaining three are accident-related:

police costs
insurance and administration costs
damage to property

The human cost element is estimated using evidence of individuals’ willingness to pay for a marginal reduction in their risk of suffering a road traffic accident. The other components are estimated using official data sources.

The Department has not made any estimate of the costs of road traffic accidents to the justice system or the benefits system. However, it is likely that these will be small in comparison with human and lost output costs.

The table below gives an estimate of the costs for each of the six WebTAG elements for all reported personal-injury accidents in Great Britain where at least one driver was over the alcohol limit. The figures are based on accidents that occurred in 2014 as this is the most recent year for which final drink drive accident statistics are available. The totals are in 2016 prices.

Total value of prevention of reported accidents when at least one driver is over the alcohol limit, Great Britain, 2014

£million in 2016 prices
Accident severity	Police costs	Insurance and admin	Damage to property	Lost output	Human costs	Medical and ambulance	Total
Fatal	4.4	0.1	2.7	150.6	287.3	0.3	445.4
Serious	2.1	0.2	4.9	25.9	178.0	15.7	226.7
Slight	2.7	0.6	15.0	17.6	84.0	7.5	127.4
							799.5

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01/01/2023

Baroness Walmsley – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Baroness Walmsley on 2016-10-20.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what action is being taken to build local primary care leadership to challenge variation, and drive quality improvement, in the detection and management of atrial fibrillation.

Lord Prior of Brampton

NHS England’s Sustainable Improvement Team is taking action to promote the use of GRASP-AF (Guidance on Risk Assessment and Stroke Prevention for Atrial Fibrillation) within general practitioner (GP) practices in England. GRASP-AF is an audit tool developed by and trialled in the National Health Service which greatly simplifies the process of identifying patients with Atrial Fibrillation (AF) who are not receiving the right management to help reduce their risk of stroke.

The Sustainable Improvement Team is also working with NHS RightCare, a programme committed to improving people’s health and outcomes, to help promote the use of GRASP-AF in the programme’s 65 first wave clinical commissioning groups (CCGs). NHS RightCare’s ‘Commissioning for Value’ packs help CCGs identify priority areas such as AF, and the GRASP AF tool provides a practical method of addressing any inequalities. NHS England’s intention is that the work with NHS RightCare will increase the number of CCGs using GRASP-AF in a systematic way.

Anonymised data from GRASP-AF can be uploaded to CHART Online, a secure web enabled tool that helps practices improve performance through comparative data analysis. This allows practices and CCGs to benchmark their management of AF with other practices across England and so help identify and reduce any variation in practice.

The use of GRASP-AF is voluntary and its use therefore varies across CCGs. Currently 2,248 GP practices have uploaded data from GRASP-AF to CHART online across 151 out of the 209 CCGs. Of these, 19 CCGs have all GP practices in their area uploading data.

In addition to the NHS action outlined above, all local authorities in England are required to offer the NHS Health Check programme, with the large majority commissioning general practice to provide them on their behalf. More than 15 million people aged 40-74 are, have been or will be eligible for an NHS Health Check between 2014 and 2018. The programme’s best practice guidance recommends that a pulse check is carried out as part of the process of taking a blood pressure reading and those individuals who are found to have an irregular pulse rhythm should be referred for further investigation.

01/01/2023
Grahame Morris – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Grahame Morris on 2015-11-10.

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many safety case assessments the Health and Safety Executive has received from installation operators in the oil and gas sector in each of the last three years; and what the rate of compliance of that sector is with the provision of the EU Directive on the safety of offshore oil and gas operations.

Justin Tomlinson

HSE received Safety Case submissions from UK Continental Shelf oil and gas installation operators as follows: 2012 – 187; 2013 – 183; 2014 – 223; 2015 (to 11/11/2015) – 223. These figures include submissions required by statute for new installations, and material changes or summaries of thorough reviews of existing safety cases.

The 223 submissions received so far in 2015 include 53 cases required for compliance with the provisions of the EU Directive.

01/01/2023
Jamie Reed – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jamie Reed on 2015-12-02.

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of regional variations in the level of education provision for children with cerebral palsy.

Edward Timpson

The reforms introduced in September 2014 will ensure that all children and young people with special educational needs or disabilities (SEND) aged 0 to 25, including those with cerebral palsy, have improved access to the support they need.

Local authorities are responsible for meeting the educational needs of all children with SEND within their local area. They must co-ordinate education, health and care provision for individual children and ensure that young people and parents are involved in discussions about their individual support and about local provision more generally. Statutory Local Offers published by each local authority must set out what support is available for all children and young people with SEND in their area, including those with more complex needs.

The reforms detailed in the SEND Code of Practice were drawn up in consultation with a wide range of interested parties, many of whom represented the interests of children and young people with specific impairments. They are intended to improve outcomes for every child or young person with SEND by placing them at the heart of a system designed to respond to their individual needs and aspirations.

The Department has not assessed the impact of the SEND Code of Practice, or regional variations in provision, on the basis of any specific impairment but is monitoring implementation closely.

This monitoring includes inputs from annual data collection; termly surveys of local authorities and Parent Carer Forums; and feedback from specialist SEND Advisers and funded voluntary sector organisations. From May 2016, this monitoring will be enhanced by a new joint Ofsted/CQC inspection framework for SEND, which is currently the subject of a national consultation.

Schools are required by the Children and Families Act 2014 to identify the SEN of the pupils they support and to use their best endeavours to make sure that they get the support they need. Teachers are expected to be able to adapt their teaching to the needs of all pupils, and to have an understanding of the factors that can inhibit learning and how to overcome them.

To support the school workforce, the Department has funded almost 11,000 SEN Coordinators to attain Masters-level national awards between 2009 and 2014, at a cost of almost £33 million; is funding SEND conferences for school leaders and supporting the development of a ‘SEND gateway’ for education professionals, which offers a wide range of online training and information.

01/01/2023