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  • Lord Hunt of Kings Heath – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Lord Hunt of Kings Heath – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Hunt of Kings Heath on 2015-12-15.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government what is the current membership of the care.data Advisory Group.

    Lord Prior of Brampton

    The care.data Advisory Group met between March 2014 and October 2015 and has now been disbanded. The group was Chaired by Ciarán Devane, who at the time was a non-executive director of NHS England, and included representatives from the following organisations:

    – Academy of Medical Royal Colleges;

    – Association of Medical Research Charities;

    – Big Brother Watch;

    – British Heart Foundation;

    – British Medical Association;

    – HealthWatch England;

    – Hurley Group;

    – Kings College London;

    – Kings Fund;

    – medConfidential;

    – MIND;

    – National Institute for Health Research;

    – National Voices;

    – Patients4Data;

    – Royal College of General Practitioners;

    – Royal College of Psychiatrists;

    – Clinical Commissioning Groups;

    – UCL Partners; and

    – Wellcome Trust.

  • Lord Hunt of Kings Heath – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

    Lord Hunt of Kings Heath – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Hunt of Kings Heath on 2015-12-15.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government why the training scheme to create a career ladder for care workers by developing the role of care practitioners has been cancelled.

    Baroness Neville-Rolfe

    The Government is spending significant sums this year (circa £130 million) to train and develop the adult social care workforce; this includes £12m for the Workforce Development Fund for training to develop the workforce.

    Whilst pre-contract discussions had taken place, no formal financial commitment was made to this specific project by UK Commission for Employment and Skills and the project has been informed that funding is not available.

    In order to prioritise funding on the adult skills participation budgets, savings are being made from supporting budgets such as the UKCES.

    The Government is working closely with its delivery partners, Skills for Care and National Skills Academy Social Care to improve the level of skills of the adult social care workforce.

    The adult social care workforce has a key role to play as service users experience of care depends heavily on the sensitivity and compassion of care workers. Better skills and training are an important part of raising standards overall.

  • Lord Hunt of Kings Heath – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Lord Hunt of Kings Heath – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Hunt of Kings Heath on 2015-12-15.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they intend to establish an independent external assessment of the reasons for the failure of the contract for older people’s services in Cambridge and Peterborough; and what plans they have for a moratorium on further large-scale procurements until lessons from that contract have been learnt.

    Lord Prior of Brampton

    NHS England advises that it will be commissioning an investigation into the circumstances leading up to the termination of the contract between Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Clinical Commissioning Group and UnitingCare Partnership LLP to deliver urgent care for the over 65s and adult community services. This will include the role of the Strategic Projects Team. NHS England is also considering how similar contracts will be managed and assured in the future.

  • Lord Hunt of Kings Heath – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Lord Hunt of Kings Heath – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Hunt of Kings Heath on 2015-12-15.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government how the NHS Strategic Projects Team is to be held to account for the advice it gave to the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Clinical Commissioning Group, and to the NHS Commissioning Board, on the contract for older people’s services in Cambridge and Peterborough.

    Lord Prior of Brampton

    NHS England advises that it will be commissioning an investigation into the circumstances leading up to the termination of the contract between Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Clinical Commissioning Group and UnitingCare Partnership LLP to deliver urgent care for the over 65s and adult community services. This will include the role of the Strategic Projects Team. NHS England is also considering how similar contracts will be managed and assured in the future.

  • Lord Harrison – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Lord Harrison – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Harrison on 2015-12-15.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government, further to the Written Answer by Lord Prior of Brampton on 26 November (HL3958), what plans they have to ensure that podiatric services are available to diabetics who need them; and what criteria they are recommending that Clinical Commissioning Groups use to differentiate between those diabetics who will continue to require podiatric services and those who will not.

    Lord Prior of Brampton

    Podiatry services are commissioned locally by clinical commissioning groups working with local partners and based on the need of the local population, resources available and evidence based practice. Treatment decisions should always be made by doctors based on a patient’s individual clinical needs.

    Preventing diabetes and promoting the best possible care for people with diabetes is a key priority for this Government and is part of the 2016/17 Mandate to NHS England. Building on the NHS Diabetes Prevention Programme, the Department of Health and NHS England are exploring options for ensuring a sustained focus on improving the management and care of people with diabetes.

    The new National Diabetes Foot Care Audit, a module of the National Diabetes Audit, aims to establish the extent to which national guidelines on the management of diabetic foot disease are being met. The audit will provide local teams with the evidence needed to tackle any identified differences in practice which will lead to an overall improvement in management and outcomes for patients. Local and national level results will be available in March 2016. However, we do know that there has been an increase in the proportion of Trusts with multidisciplinary diabetic foot care teams, from around 60% in 2011 to over 70% in 2013.

  • Lord Evans of Weardale – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    Lord Evans of Weardale – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Evans of Weardale on 2015-12-15.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government what national co-ordinating arrangements are in place to provide reassurance or security assistance to MPs or members of the House of Lords who receive direct or implicit threats as a result of their parliamentary duties.

    Lord Bates

    As the Rt Hon Chris Grayling MP, Leader of the House of Commons, stated during Business of the House of Commons on Thursday 17th December (Hansard Column No 1703), it has been agreed that a standardised approach to security packages will be made available to Members of Parliament and will address the personal security outside Westminster including at constituency offices and their homes and will include consideration of staff safety. The Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority (IPSA) will shortly be announcing details of how to access the security packages.

  • Baroness Coussins – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    Baroness Coussins – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Baroness Coussins on 2015-12-15.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government how many (1) Afghan interpreters, and (2) members of their immediate families, have been relocated to the UK under (a) the ex gratia redundancy scheme, and (b) the intimidation policy.

    Lord Bates

    Up to the end of November, 230 Afghan locally engaged civilians along with 297 members of their families have been relocated to the UK under the ex gratia redundancy scheme.

    No locally engaged civilians have been relocated to the UK under the current intimidation policy. One former staff member was relocated to the UK under a previous version of the policy.

  • Earl Baldwin of Bewdley – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Earl Baldwin of Bewdley – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Earl Baldwin of Bewdley on 2015-12-15.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government what is their view on the merits of reducing the concentration of fluoride in water supplies subject to fluoridation schemes from 1.0 to around 0.7 part per million, in the light of the experience of countries such as Canada, the Republic of Ireland, Hong Kong and Singapore.

    Lord Prior of Brampton

    Public Health England advise that there is no current evidence from monitoring data to support a variation of the target level for fluoride in drinking water.

  • Lord McColl of Dulwich – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    Lord McColl of Dulwich – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord McColl of Dulwich on 2015-12-15.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the number of people being killed by buildings collapsing as a result of subterranean excavations carried out in order to increase accommodation.

    Baroness Altmann

    In the last 10 years, no people have been killed by buildings collapsing during subterranean excavation work to increase accommodation. Subterranean excavation to increase accommodation involves significant health and safety risks, including the potential for the collapse of both excavated ground and buildings. There have been two deaths caused by collapsing excavated ground during construction of subterranean accommodation. The Health and Safety Executive’s construction programme has initiatives aimed at improving standards in this type of construction work, including targeted inspection and enforcement campaigns.

  • Lord Hylton – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

    Lord Hylton – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Hylton on 2015-12-15.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government what evidence they have received, if any, of civilian casualties in Syria caused by Russian military action by air, by land, or by cluster weapons; and what assessment they have made of the means available to them to prevent Russian military action from increasing casualties in Syria.

    Baroness Anelay of St Johns

    It is difficult to ascertain with complete certainty the numbers of civilian casualties as a direct result of Russian attacks, though there are numerous, credible open source reports of civilian casualties as a result of Russian air strikes. Although Russian claims to be targeting Daesh, 75 per cent of their strikes have been against other targets. We continue to urge Russia to end strikes against the moderate opposition and, instead, to use its political leverage over the Assad regime to stop the regime’s indiscriminate bombing against civilians. In February 2014 we co-sponsored UN Security Council Resolution 2139 calling for the protection of civilians and an end to indiscriminate attacks, including the use of barrel bombs and obstructing the flow of humanitarian aid.