The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andrew Bridgen on 2016-04-14.
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, if he will (a) commission research to estimate the number of people from other EU member states who receive housing benefit and (b) publish that information before 23 June 2016.
Mr Shailesh Vara
There are no current plans to conduct the analyses listed.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andrew Gwynne on 2016-05-18.
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what plans his Department has to publish a new tobacco control strategy in the next two months.
Jane Ellison
The Tobacco Control Plan is currently being developed and Ministers will decide on an appropriate publication date in due course.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jess Phillips on 2016-07-07.
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how much her Department has spent on its teaching blog since that blog was established.
Nick Gibb
The teaching blog has received an average of 758 visits per week, and 15,938 visits in total. The costs are only in staff time and image usage of £2.50 per image as the blog is hosted on the GOV.UK platform. The blog is run by the Department’s social media team as a small proportion of one member of staff’s overall workload.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Steve McCabe on 2016-10-07.
To ask the Secretary of State for International Trade, (a) how many and (b) what proportion of the staff employed by his Department are non-UK nationals.
Greg Hands
Following her appointment on 13 July 2016 the Prime Minister established the Department for International Trade (DIT). The DIT aggregates UK Trade and Investment (UKTI), UK Export and Finance (UKEF), Trade Policy Units from the Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy (BEIS), as well as some new hires.
Until such time as a transfer of functions order establishes my Rt hon. Friend the Secretary of State for International Trade as a corporation sole, DIT remains a unified Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) and Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy (BEIS) department for accounting purposes.
As DIT is currently being formed, details of the staff that the Department employs is being finalised, whilst employee transfers and recruitment are taking place.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Baroness Hodgson of Abinger on 2015-11-19.
To ask Her Majesty’s Government how many women were present as representatives at the recent UN Support Mission in Libya conference in London.
Baroness Anelay of St Johns
Over 150 representatives attended the UK and UN Support Mission in Libya (UNSMIL) meeting held on 19 October in London on international support for a new Libyan Government of National Accord (GNA). 36 women accepted the invitation to attend the meeting, drawn from 40 countries, UN Agencies, and international bodies. The UK recognises that female participation in politics and civil society is an essential component of restoring stability in Libya, and our Libya Office in Tunis, working closely with UNSMIL, made a particular effort to ensure female Libyan participation. Four of the 17 independent Libyan delegates were women. The meeting was co-chaired by Jane Marriott, Director of the Middle East and North Africa Directorate in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Patrick Grady on 2015-12-14.
To ask the Secretary of State for International Development, what her Department’s policy priorities are for supporting projects in The Gambia.
Mr Nick Hurd
DFID does not have a bilateral aid programme in The Gambia. The decision to end our programme was agreed with the Government of Gambia in 2008, and our office closed in 2011. The decision was taken to wind down the programme gradually as part of a responsible exit, and to ensure partners built on successful DFID programmes.
The UK continues to maintain a good relationship with the Gambia. The UK supports The Gambia through its contributions to multilateral institutions, such the World Bank, the African Development Bank and the EU’s European Development Fund.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Rehman Chishti on 2016-01-19.
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what information his Department holds on the number of UK pilots who have been stood down after a laser pen attack occurring in the course of their work.
Mr Robert Goodwill
The Civil Aviation Authority does not have any evidence to confirm that any pilot has been removed from flying duties or suffered long term damage as a result of exposure from a laser attack whilst undertaking their duties.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Louise Haigh on 2016-02-10.
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, pursuant to the correction of 9 February 2016 to Question 13206, what the cause was of the error in information on former unaccompanied minors removed between 2007 and 31 December 2015; and what steps she is taking to ensure that correct information is collected and published in future.
James Brokenshire
The mistake given in the original response to Question 13206 resulted from two errors in the query for extracting information from the relevant database. One error involved the use of an incorrect definition which excluded former unaccompanied asylum seeking children who now had linked dependants. The other was an error in the computer code which extracted the data. In this instance, the code for the query was mistyped and so the data returned was incorrect. These errors have now been resolved and a correction issued. Such mistakes are rare and when they occur they are taken very seriously.
It is regrettable that human error caused the original response to this Parliamentary Question to be incorrect and improvements have been put in place. The appropriate definition has been reviewed and confirmed. This definition, and the correct approach on careful coding, have been made clear to the officials involved. We are reviewing other Parliamentary Answers about unaccompanied asylum seeking children to see if these were affected by similar issues. While these respond to different specific questions, we wish to review the methodology used thoroughly. We are also reviewing whether additional processes are needed for Parliamentary Questions that require complex data queries.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Royston Smith on 2016-03-08.
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what recent progress has been made on devolving local transport schemes to local enterprise partnerships (LEP); and if he will assess the effect of such policies on the work of the Solent LEP in developing Southampton’s infrastructure.
Andrew Jones
Funding for major local transport schemes is devolved as part of the Local Growth Fund to which the Department is contributing over £7billion. It is for LEPs to determine the priority projects in their areas. I understand that schemes that Solent LEP is undertaking in Southampton include the Cross Solent Connectivity Project, junction improvements near the Western Docks, and the recently completed Station Quarter scheme.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Viscount Waverley on 2016-04-13.
To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether, in the event of the UK leaving the EU, UK citizens living in EU member states will retain all of their rights to medical treatment in the EU under the existing terms and conditions based on their contributions to the UK NHS social security system.
Lord Prior of Brampton
As set out in the Government’s White Paper: ‘The process for withdrawing from the European Union’, published on 29 February and attached, the withdrawal process is unprecedented. No country has ever used Article 50 – it is untested. There is a great deal of uncertainty about how it would work. United Kingdom citizens currently enjoy a range of specific rights to live, to work and access to pensions, health care and public services that are only guaranteed because of European Union law. If the UK voted to leave the EU, the Government would do all it could to secure a positive outcome for the country, but there would be no requirement under EU law for these rights to be maintained. Should an agreement be reached to maintain these rights, the expectation must be that this would have to be reciprocated for EU citizens in the UK.