Category: Speeches

  • Cathy Jamieson – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Communities and Local Government

    Cathy Jamieson – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Communities and Local Government

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Cathy Jamieson on 2014-06-04.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, how many tenants from elsewhere in the UK have taken advantage of Home Swap Direct to arrange exchanges to Scotland in each of the last three years for which figures are available.

    Kris Hopkins

    Details of the number of moves that have taken placeunder the HomeSwap Direct Scheme from elsewhere in the United Kingdom to Scotland in each of the last three years are not held centrally.

    HomeSwap Direct increases opportunities for social tenants who wish to find a new home by allowing tenants looking for a swap to see details of every possible property nationwide, no matter which mutual exchange website their landlord has chosen to subscribe to. The scheme has operated very successfully since its launch in October 2011 with tenants carrying out over 18 million searches of the property data held on HomeSwap Direct.

  • Mr Jim Cunningham – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    Mr Jim Cunningham – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Mr Jim Cunningham on 2014-03-17.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what proportion of (a) converter academies and (b) maintained schools achieved a lower percentage of students achieving five GCSE A* to C grades than the previous year in (i) 2010-11, (ii) 2011-12 and (iii) 2012-13.

    David Laws

    The requested information is publicly available in the 2010/11[1], 2011/12[2] and 2012/13[3] performance tables.

    [1] http://www.education.gov.uk/schools/performance/download_data.html

    [2] http://www.education.gov.uk/schools/performance/2012/download_data.html

    [3] http://www.education.gov.uk/schools/performance/2011/download_data.html

    “

  • Dominic Raab – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Culture Media and Sport

    Dominic Raab – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Culture Media and Sport

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Dominic Raab on 2014-06-04.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, how many reports on equality information and objectives each category of public authority has published under the Equality Act 2010 (Specific Duties) Regulations 2011 in each year since the regulations came into force; and what the cost of producing those reports was for each category of public authority in each such year.

    Mr Edward Vaizey

    The specific information requested is not collected or held centrally.

    The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC), an independent statutory body, is responsible for the enforcement, monitoring and assessment of how public bodies comply with the public sector Equality Duty (PSED) and specific duties. The EHRC has published two reports to date which look at the performance of public bodies in England under the PSED and specific duties:

    • ‘Publishing equality information: Commitment, engagement and transparency’ was published in December 2012. This report looked at how public authorities had performed with regard to the first specific duty (publication of equality information). Data for this assessment was collected between February and April 2012 and covered 1,159 public authorities in England. The report indicated that about half of the public authorities reviewed were publishing equality information on their workforce and service users by April 2012. Many more (78%) were publishing information on either their staff or their service users.

    • ‘Assessment of the publication of equality objectives by English public authorities’ was published in Autumn 2013. This report sets out the findings of an assessment of how public authorities in England are publishing equality objectives. Data for the assessment was collected between September and December 2012 and covered 2,010 public authorities.

    These reports do not estimate the associated costs of producing and publishing equalities information.

  • Mike Crockart – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    Mike Crockart – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Mike Crockart on 2014-03-17.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how disputed child tax credits claims will be managed under the universal credit system.

    Esther McVey

    Currently the child element will be awarded to the parent with whom the child or qualifying young person normally lives. Where separated parents both share the care of a child or qualifying young person they are expected to jointly nominate which of them has the main responsibility.

    Where parents are unable to come to an agreement themselves, a determination will be made. This will take account of where the child normally lives and who has the main day to day responsibility.

    The proposed approach to Universal Credit was set out in a White Paper "Universal Credit: Welfare that Works" and in draft Regulations upon which a wide range of organisations responded to in the consultation exercise carried out by the Social Security Advisory Committee.

  • Frank Field – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    Frank Field – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Frank Field on 2014-06-04.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, when he expects Atos to appoint new agency staff to administer appeals on reassessment of eligibility for disability benefits.

    Mike Penning

    Appeals on the disability benefits are administered and heard by Her Majesty’s Courts and Tribunals Service. Atos has no role to play.

  • Mr Barry Sheerman – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    Mr Barry Sheerman – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Mr Barry Sheerman on 2014-03-14.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what proportion of free schools approved to date are faith schools.

    Edward Timpson

    37 of 142 open mainstream free schools have a faith designation (26%); this compares to 34% of all state-funded mainstream schools.

  • Nicholas Soames – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

    Nicholas Soames – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Nicholas Soames on 2014-06-04.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, when he expects to transfer (a) the first and (b) the last Community Rehabilitation Company to an external provider.

    Jeremy Wright

    The Transforming Rehabilitation Programme is opening up the market to a diverse range of new providers, so that we can harness the best that the private and voluntary sectors has to offer to reduce reoffending. In mid December 2013, the bidders who passed the first stage of the competition to bid for the rehabilitation contracts were announced. The list includes a mix of private and voluntary sector partnerships with more than 50 organisations represented. We expect to announce the winners of these contracts by the end of 2014 and are committed to the roll out of payment by results by 2015.

    The Government has been clear that we want to see a diverse market delivering probation services, rather than being dominated by just a few providers. We have set a market share restriction whereby bidders can win a maximum of 25% of market share based on the indicative contract values set out in the competition documentation. Bidders will be allowed to win multiple contracts up to the point at which their market share cap would be breached subject to meeting any other requirements set out by the Authority.

  • Chris Ruane – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Deputy Prime Minister

    Chris Ruane – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Deputy Prime Minister

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Chris Ruane on 2014-03-13.

    To ask the Deputy Prime Minister, whether his Department’s funding of £3.6 million to improve electoral registration will be given to local authorities which have not used local government databases to improve electoral registration in the individual electoral registration dry run.

    Greg Clark

    All Electoral Registration Officers (EROs) have received funding, based on their levels of under-registration, to support local activities to maximise registration, as part of the transition to Individual Electoral Registration. EROs are best placed to decide how to improve the completeness and accuracy of their registers.

    Performance Standard one of the Electoral Commission’s framework encourages EROs to use local data sources to build understanding of local challenges and to identify potential new electors. The Electoral Commission monitors and reports on the performance of EROs against the performance standards. All EROs met performance standard one in 2012 and the Commission will report on the 2013 performance shortly.

  • Tessa Munt – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Tessa Munt – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Tessa Munt on 2014-06-04.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, with reference to section 3 of the guidance issued by Monitor on the Commissioning of Radiosurgery Services on 4 April 2014, if he will require NHS England to publish the evidence on which it based its decision not to allow patients to be treated with the gamma knife at University College Hospital London.

    Jane Ellison

    Section 3 of Monitor’s substantive guidance on The National Health Service (Procurement, Patient Choice and Competition) (No.2) Regulations 2013 provides guidance to commissioners on publishing new contract opportunities for National Health Service health care services.

    On page 42 of the guidance, it states that "a commissioner may decide to carry out a detailed review of the provision of particular services (for example, A&E services) in its local area in order to understand how those services can be improved in the interests of patients. The review may involve extensive public consultation and engagement with existing and potential providers and other stakeholders. Reviewing available services and providers in this way is good commissioning practice and something that commissioners should consider doing as a matter of course."

    In its role as commissioner, NHS England is currently undertaking such a review of stereotactic radiosurgery services. This will inform procurement decisions for these services.

    University College London Hospitals is not contracted by NHS England, nor was it contracted by former primary care trusts, to provide Gamma Knife services. It is for this reason that NHS patients cannot normally be treated at this facility. Instead, NHS patients requiring Gamma Knife treatment should be treated by the Gamma Knife services commissioned by the NHS, that have been shown to meet NHS England service specifications. These can be accessed by patients in London without a waiting time, fully maintaining the continuity of their care and normally with the same consultant and clinical team.

    Until the capacity requirements are made clear as part of the review being undertaken, NHS England has said that it would be inappropriate to encourage new market entrants to provide this service as it cannot be clear what the potential consequential impacts on service quality, sustainability (financial and clinical) and potential unintended changes to patient pathways will be. Until the review is complete NHS England has said no substantive changes will be made to the current provision.

  • Mr Jim Cunningham – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    Mr Jim Cunningham – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Mr Jim Cunningham on 2014-03-13.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what proportion of service leavers (a) applied to and (b) were accepted on initial teacher training in (i) 2008-09, (ii) 2009-10, (iii) 2010-11, (iv) 2011-12, (v) 2012-13 and (vi) the current academic year to date.

    David Laws

    In the 24 month period between March 2011 and April 2013, 322 service leavers applied to postgraduate initial teacher training (ITT). 132 of these were successful. This is an average of six successful applicants per month.

    In the current academic year we have introduced the new Troops to Teachers undergraduate route. This is not comparable to previous years as it is a dedicated undergraduate route which is only for service leavers.

    982 service leavers applied to Cohort 1, and the application process ran for 4 months. 41 service leavers joined the programme in January 2014. This is an average of 10 successful applicants per month. We expect a higher acceptance rate for Cohort 2 as we develop this new programme.