The below Parliamentary question was asked by Luciana Berger on 2014-06-10.
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, what assessment he has made of the principal cause of preventable premature mortality, measured in preventable years of life lost, in people up to the age of 60 years.
Mr Nick Hurd
The information requested falls within the responsibility of the UK Statistics Authority. I have asked the Authority to reply.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Emily Thornberry on 2014-06-10.
To ask the Attorney General, with reference to the Answer of 6 May 2014, Official Report, column 8W, on freezing orders, for each of the restraint orders granted since 2010-11, what the length of time was between receipt by the prosecution agency of the freezing request and the granting of the order.
Oliver Heald
Since 2010-11 the Serious Fraud Office has obtained two restraint orders for overseas jurisdictions. The length of time from date of receipt of the requests to the granting of the orders, are shown in the following table;
|
Year |
Time |
|
2010 |
3 days |
|
2011 |
7 days |
The length of time between receipt of freezing requests by the Crown prosecution Service and the granting of the order is shown in the table below. There were two cases (one in 2010/11 and one in 2012/13) which took a significant amount of time to execute as detailed work needed to be done with the requesting country in order to prepare the applications for restraint orders.
|
Year |
Number of overseas restraint orders |
Number of days from the receipt of the external request to the granting of the order |
|
2010/11 |
7 |
Request 1 – 22 Request 2 – 96 Request 3 – 9 Request 4 – 17 Request 5 – 17 Request 6 – 95 Request 7 – 645 |
|
2011/12 |
2 |
Request 1 – 1 Request 2 – 26 |
|
2012/13 |
6 |
Request 1 – 27 Request 2 – 39 Request 3 – 438 Request 4 – 34 Request 5 – 28 Request 6 – 11 |
|
2013/14 |
3 |
Request 1 – 16 Request 2 – 1 Request 3 – 35 |
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Fitzpatrick on 2014-06-10.
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many local authorities have not conducted any sampling to check food composition over the last 12 months.
Jane Ellison
The Food Standards Agency (FSA) collects food law enforcement monitoring returns from local authorities annually. Data for the period 1 April 2013 to 31 March 2014 is currently being collected. Following collation and analysis, the FSA plans to publish this data in November 2014.
The FSA advises that the following local authorities did not report any food composition sampling in 2012-13 via the Local Authority Enforcement Monitoring System (LAEMS):
Armagh
Birmingham
Blackburn
Bolton
Darlington
Isle of Wight
Leicester City
Plymouth City
Redcar and Cleveland
Rochdale
Rutland
South Lanarkshire
Swindon
Tameside
All of these authorities reported taking other labelling or microbiological samples in 2012-13.
A table has been placed in the Library which shows how many food standards samples (composition and labelling) each local authority reported via LAEMS in 2012-13, together with a comparison against the number reported in 2011-12 and how many food standards samples each local authority reported through a FSA-funded project.
All of the reported food standards samples were official samples and would have been submitted to the local authority’s appointed Public Analyst for analysis. Out of 22,055 food standards samples in 2012-13, 4,387 were funded by the FSA, all other food standards samples would have been paid for by the local authority. By comparison, in 2011-12, the FSA funded 5,072 out of 21,970 food standards samples.
For some local authorities, the FSA funded sampling figure is larger than the number included in the LAEMS report. The difference will be due to the LAEMS reports only including samples for which the analytical result was received from the Public Analyst before 31 March 2013.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Kelvin Hopkins on 2014-06-10.
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what protection of existing (a) staffing levels and (b) tickets revenue sharing arrangements with other train operating companies were secured in negotiations with Govia over the extension from the London passenger rail franchise; and if he will seek such protections in future negotiations over the planned direct award of the franchise to Govia.
Stephen Hammond
Staffing levels are a matter for the train operator, as long as they continue to deliver services that meet the requirements of the Franchise Agreement. The 7-period extension announced on 9 June was a priced option in the current Franchise Agreement.
Any existing ticket revenue sharing arrangements continue through the extension. Although preliminary negotiations have taken place with regard to a Direct Award to run services from April 2016, no timetable for formal negotiations is yet in place, and formal negotiations are yet to take place.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Karen Lumley on 2014-06-10.
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, with reference to the Answer of 8 May 2014, Official Report, column 276W, on motor vehicles: exhaust emissions, if he will place the data from his Department’s 2006 study of liquefied petroleum and petrol vehicles in the Library.
Stephen Hammond
The report produced for the Department at the end of the study (Ref: M. Clark, P. Sayer, Euro 3 LPG Retrofit Emissions Factor Testing, Tickford Powertrain Test Ltd., ER07/015, June 2007) contains the data captured by the testing. Copies of the report will be placed in the in the Libraries of the House.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Cunningham on 2014-06-10.
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what recent assessment he has made of the existing contractual obligations to share ticket revenue with other train operating companies through the Operational Research Computerised Allocation of Tickets to Services system in the current franchise agreement between his Department and Govia for passenger rail services on the London Midland line.
Stephen Hammond
The Operational Research Computerised Allocation of Tickets to Services (ORCATS) is owned by Rail Settlement Plan Ltd, a company administered by the Association of Train Operating Companies and wholly-owned by the Train Operating Companies collectively. It is one of the means of allocating revenue. Under the Ticketing Settlement Agreement, ORCATS is the default allocation method used in respect of any ticket type and flow. However, it is not mandatory, and Train Operating Companies are free to agree a non-ORCATS allocation in respect of particular ticket types and/or flows if they think that the ORCATS model will not produce a fair estimate of true passenger behaviour.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth on 2014-06-10.
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what progress they are making in talks with Spain to prevent excessive delays at its border with Gibraltar.
Baroness Warsi
The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, my right Hon. Friend the Member for Richmond (Yorks) (Mr Hague), suggested ad hoc talks, involving all relevant parties, to address practical issues (including the delays at the border) to the Spanish government in April 2012. We are actively discussing this proposal with the Governments of Gibraltar and Spain and hope it will be possible to hold talks soon.
In the meantime, we are maintaining strong diplomatic pressure on the Spanish government to end disproportionate and unlawful checks at the border. We have also asked the European Commission to continue to monitor the situation and urge Spain to return their checks at the border to proportionate levels.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Rooker on 2014-06-10.
To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether any department, executive agency or non-departmental public body has a banking arrangement with the Co-operative Bank.
Lord Deighton
Treasury policy is to hold Exchequer funds safe and secure at the Bank of England and to minimise balances held with commercial banks. The Treasury has been working with departments in recent years to minimise balances held in commercial accounts.
Government Departments and most public bodies bank with the Government Banking Service, which is a directorate within HM Revenue and Customs. GBS is a shared service which manages contracts and supports banking services to Government departments using cost-efficient and modern commercial banking platforms. The balances held by the Government Banking Service are utilised to reduce the Government’s daily borrowing requirement and in turn its financing costs.
In the rare circumstance where banking is required outside of the contract then the Department concerned must seek Treasury approval to open separate commercial accounts. This will normally be when third party-funds are being managed or the banking service requirement is complex. The Treasury provides an annual update to the Public Accounts Committee on monies held outside the Exchequer / Government Banking Service. The most recent update was published on 13th January 2014 and can be found at
https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/270747/36048_Cm_8774.pdf
From the information provided by departments we can confirm that the Forestry Commission and National Forest Company have a banking relationship with the Co-operative Bank.
“
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Roberts of Llandudno on 2014-06-10.
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what consideration they gave to (1) the death of detainee Christine Case, and (2) allegations of sexual assault, at Yarl’s Wood Immigration Removal Centre in permitting Serco to retender to run that facility; and whether they will disclose the tender documents submitted by all applicants who entered bids to run (1) Harmondsworth, and (2) Colnbrook, Immigration Removal Centres.
Lord Taylor of Holbeach
I apologise it has not been possible to answer this question within the usual ten day deadline. I will write to the Noble Lord, Lord Roberts of Llandudno, before the summer recess and will place a copy of that letter in the House library.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andy McDonald on 2014-06-10.
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what recent representations he has received on the number of children with autism informally excluded from school.
Mr Edward Timpson
The Secretary of State has received several recent parliamentary questions about the informal exclusion of children with autism. Officials from the department have also met with Ambitious about Autism in March 2014, to discuss its concerns about this issue, raised in the report, Ruled Out.
The government’s view remains clear. No child should be unlawfully excluded. Ofsted and the department would take seriously evidence that a school had acted unlawfully in excluding a pupil. In addition, most children on the autism spectrum would be considered disabled under the Equality Act 2010. Where disabled children are discriminated against through unlawful exclusion their parents can make a claim to the First-tier Tribunal (Special Educational Needs and Disability). The Tribunal has wide ranging powers, including the power to require the reinstatement of a pupil.
Awareness of autism and appropriate skills are essential to meeting the needs of autistic children. The reforms we are introducing through the Children and Families Act will provide for earlier and better assessment of children and young people’s needs. We’re also investing more than £3 million of funding over two years to raise awareness of autism and help schools and colleges deliver the support these children and young people need. This includes £1.5 million for the Autism Education Trust to provide tiered training to early years, school and further education college staff, as well as £440,000 to the National Autistic Society, part of which is being used to provide advice to professionals and parents on exclusion.