Category: Speeches

  • 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 2014-04-29.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, who authorises the public release of photographs of aircraft that are intercepted during Quick Reaction Alert flights.

    Mr Mark Francois

    Photographs are routinely taken during Quick Reaction Alert (QRA) interceptions. There is strong public and media interest in the RAF Quick Reaction Alert deterrent capability. MOD policy is to release a limited amount of non-sensitive information on QRA launches, sometimes including photographs. This provides the public with strong examples of how the RAF is able to respond to this kind of incident. It also provides public awareness of the RAF’s ability to defend the UK through the effectiveness of its air defences and to maintain the full deterrence value of the QRA mission. Media enquiries regarding QRA launches also often include requests for photographs.

    Consequently, RAF Operations Staffs in coordination with MOD officials, including the MOD Directorate of Media and Communications, will occasionally consider these photographs for public release.

    Photographs of a recent QRA mission were released on 25 April 2014. The previous release of photographs of intercepted aircraft from a recent mission was in March 2010; additionally for other QRA information releases in the last three years, MOD have utilised stock images from the Defence Image Library.

  • Ian Lavery – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the HM Treasury

    Ian Lavery – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the HM Treasury

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Ian Lavery on 2014-04-29.

    To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, if he will place in the Library a copy of the business case for the outsourcing of compliance checks on tax credits claims.

    Nicky Morgan

    From April to July 2013, HMRC carried out a trial to test whether it would be feasible to increase the number of compliance checks on tax credits claims, through the use of private sector resource. HMRC will publish the evaluation of the trial and the customer research report in due course.

    It is not appropriate to place the business case in the public domain given the commercial sensitivities and the risk of prejudice to HMRC’s ability to tackle tax credits error and fraud.

    In terms of the external costs of the trial, I refer the Hon Member to the Thirty-Fourth Report of the Committee of Public Accounts [2013/14] into HMRC Tax Collection: Annual Report & Accounts 2012–13, which may be found at http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201314/cmselect/cmpubacc/666/66602.htm. All internal HMRC operating costs are published annually in the HMRC Annual Report and Accounts.

    “

  • Charlotte Leslie – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Charlotte Leslie – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Charlotte Leslie on 2014-04-29.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what information patients are entitled to as to whether a medical operation will be undertaken by a fully surgically qualified member of staff.

    Dr Daniel Poulter

    It is the responsibility of the individual National Health Service trust or NHS foundation trusts to ensure that patients are treated by suitably qualified staff.

    The Department encourages patients to make an informed decision before having medical operations. As part of this, patients can ask to have information on the clinical staff that will be conducting any medical operation and the Department would expect that the trust should provide this information to them.

    The NHS Constitution sets out patients’ rights when using NHS services, these include:

    – The right to be treated with a professional standard of care, by appropriately qualified and experienced staff, in a properly approved or registered organisation that meets required levels of safety and quality; and

    – The right to be involved in discussions and decisions about your health and care, including your end of life care, and to be given information to enable you to do this. Where appropriate this right includes your family and carers.

    One of the Care Quality Commission’s (CQC) core 16 quality and safety standards, is that providers must ensure that those carrying on a regulated activity, such as medical operations, must have the qualifications, skills and experience necessary for the work to be performed. The CQC can take action against healthcare providers if they are concerned about them employing inappropriately qualified staff.

    In addition, the General Medical Council (GMC) holds the central registers of doctors’ qualifications. The medical register shows who is properly qualified to practice medicine, whilst the specialist register shows doctors who have completed specialist training, including surgical training. Patients may visit the GMC website to search the Medical Register online.

    On patient consent, the GMC’s guidance, Consent: patients and doctors making decisions together states patients must be provided with the information they have requested on:

    “the people who will be mainly responsible for and involved in their care, what their roles are, and to what extent students may be involved.”

    This means that as part of the consent process, doctors are expected to give honest answers to any questions from patients, including questions about their qualifications to carry out the particular procedure in question. This is specifically expressed in the GMC’s document, Good Medical Practice, paragraph 66, where it says“You must always be honest about your experience, qualifications and current role.”

  • Sadiq Khan – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

    Sadiq Khan – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Sadiq Khan on 2014-04-29.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what additional staffing requirements will arise in HM Prison Hull and HM Prison Chelmsford from the re-opening of closed wings; what the cost of this re-opening will be; and where any additional staff be sourced from.

    Jeremy Wright

    We will always have enough prison places for those sent to us by the courts and continue to modernise the prison estate so that it delivers best value for the taxpayer

    This Government has a long term strategy for managing the prison estate. We will have increased the adult male prison capacity so that we have more places than we inherited from the previous Government.

    The retention of significant spare prison capacity over and above what is required is expensive and cannot be justified given the current financial climate. The mothballing of spare capacity at HM Prisons Chelmsford and Hull saved the taxpayer £3.6m in the financial year 2013-14. This compares to the significantly lower cost of maintaining this accommodation on a mothballed basis, so that it could be reactivated if necessary.

    We have reviewed the refurbishment requirements at both sites and believe that, with minor investment, they can now be reopened on a contingency basis without carrying out a full refurbishment. These costs are anticipated to be around £132k by the time they have reopened. From the end of March to date, around £12k has been spent on Chelmsford, and around £107k has been spent on Hull.

    The indicative additional staffing requirement to reactivate the places at Hull is around 65 members of staff – of which approximately 40 are uniformed. The indicative additional staffing requirement to reactivate the places at Chelmsford is around 30 members of staff – of which approximately 20 are uniformed grades. This means we are able to create additional places at an average cost of £7k per place (subject to final benchmarking review), as opposed to the average cost of a prison per place of £26,139.

    The staffing requirement will initially be met by short term detached duty from other prisons, before looking to redeploy staff permanently where surpluses exist – and if necessary through external recruitment.

    Subject to certification, Hull will create 282 places and Chelmsford 148 places, with prisoners due to start arriving this summer.

    The reactivation of these places is a prudent and good value for money response to an increased prison population. Under the previous administration, police and court cells were turned into temporary prisons, with over 50,000 prisoners held in these cells in 2007-08 alone.

  • Sadiq Khan – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

    Sadiq Khan – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Sadiq Khan on 2014-04-29.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how much has been spent purchasing additional prison places from existing privately run prisons in each month since 1 January 2014; from which prisons such additional spaces have been purchased; how many additional spaces were agreed; for how long each such additional space has been purchased for; and what the cost was for each space agreed.

    Jeremy Wright

    The Ministry of Justice has purchased the following Additional Prisoner Places (APPs) in existing privately run prisons since February 2014.

    We are unable to provide the cost of APPs at each prison as this information is commercially sensitive.

    We have presented the information below setting out at which prisons the APPs have been purchased since February 2014, and the duration of these places.

    Prison

    Number Places

    Duration

    Altcourse

    100

    11 months

    Dovegate

    73

    11 months

    Forest Bank

    96

    11 months

    Lowdham Grange

    32

    6 months

    Peterborough (male only)

    48

    6 months

    Parc

    63

    9 months

    Total Number of Places

    412
  • Mary Creagh – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    Mary Creagh – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Mary Creagh on 2014-04-29.

    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, pursuant to the Answer of 10 April 2014, Official Report, columns 352-3W, on asylum: children, if she will publish a breakdown by constituency of the number of unaccompanied asylum-seeking children in each of the last 10 years.

    James Brokenshire

    Figures for unaccompanied asylum-seeking children by parliamentary constituency
    are not collected by the Home Office.

    The Home Office publishes aggregate statistics on asylum applications from
    unaccompanied asylum seeking children in tables as_08 and as_08_q (Asylum data
    tables Volume 2) of Immigration Statistics. Figures based on revised counting
    rules appear in the latest release Immigration Statistics October to December
    2013 which is available from
    https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/immigration-statistics-october-to-dec
    ember-2013.

  • Tim Farron – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Communities and Local Government

    Tim Farron – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Communities and Local Government

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Tim Farron on 2014-04-29.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, how many environmental health officers are currently employed by each local authority.

    Brandon Lewis

    The Department does not collect detailed information on the staff roles employed by local authorities.

  • Lucy Powell – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    Lucy Powell – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lucy Powell on 2014-04-29.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Education, pursuant to the Answer of 9 April 2014, Official Report, column 284W, on children: day care, how many survey packs were sent out to (a) childminders and (b) parents; and when the surveys were completed.

    Elizabeth Truss

    The surveys of childminders and parents were not stand-alone surveys but part of a much wider piece of action research by IPSOS Mori and Ecorys to gather findings from child minder agency trials. The surveys of childminders and parents were carried out to supplement fieldwork carried out with organisations trialling and testing elements of the agency model. The surveys were not intended to be fully representative of local populations and sample sizes were small. 1,622 survey packs were sent out to childminders and 3,426 packs were sent out to parents. The final closing date of the survey was 7 March 2014; the research is still being finalised.

  • Charles Kennedy – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Scotland Office

    Charles Kennedy – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Scotland Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Charles Kennedy on 2014-04-29.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland, what recent assessment he has made of the economic potential of the Scottish Highlands and Islands; and if he will make a statement.

    Mr Alistair Carmichael

    The Scottish Highlands and Islands play an important role in the Scottish economy.

    The UK Government recognises this and has demonstrated strong support for rural areas through measures such the fuel duty rebate scheme, the abolition of the fuel duty escalator, and in the Budget 2014 supporting Scotch Whisky by freezing duty on spirits.

  • Liam Byrne – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

    Liam Byrne – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Liam Byrne on 2014-04-28.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, with reference to page 201 of HM Treasury’s Central Government Supply Estimates 2013-14, Supplementary Estimates and New Estimates, February 2014, HC 1006, what factors led to the need for the revised forecast that gave rise to the reserve claim of £5.455 billion for non-cash relating to revised forecasts for student loans; for what reasons this was unforeseen in his Department’s main estimate for 2013-14; and what steps he plans to take to avoid the need for such a supplementary estimate in the future.

    Mr David Willetts

    The Supplementary Estimates claim covered additional impairment of up to £3.2 billion resulting from improvements made to the student loans repayment model. Significant changes were made to the model after Main Estimates 2013-14 which enabled the Department to make better use of historical earnings data, which in turn produced greater accuracy in modelling borrowers’ earnings paths. These changes, in addition to greater use of Student Loan Company data to support the model, have enabled us to address the historic over-forecasting of repayments.

    The claim also included a contingency of £1.4 billion for any change to the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) economic forecasts between December 2013 and March 2014. If unusually low interest rates were forecast to continue for longer than expected, this would result in a cost to Government as future cash flows would be lower. Any changes to forecasts of earnings growth and RPI would also mean that lower loan repayments would be likely in future years The Department will continue to take account the possibility that the OBR will change its forecasts in March of future years.

    Non-cash pressures of £0.4 billion from higher than forecast growth in the take-up of loans and pre-agreed claims of £0.7 billion for higher impairment charges identified at SR13 were also included.

    The Department will continue to update its modelling of student loan repayments in the light of the latest data and forecasts, and methodological innovation.