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  • Andrew Rosindell – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Communities and Local Government

    Andrew Rosindell – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Communities and Local Government

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andrew Rosindell on 2016-01-25.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, whether the £20 million funding for English language tuition to isolated women announced by the Prime Minister on 18 January 2016 will come from the Home Department’s counter-terrorism budget.

    Mr Marcus Jones

    No. The £20 million community-based English language training offer is new funding which will be routed through DCLG and will form part of its Integration Programme.

  • Tulip Siddiq – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    Tulip Siddiq – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Tulip Siddiq on 2016-01-25.

    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many refugees were referred to her Department by the UN High Commission for Refugees under (a) the Gateway Protection Programme, (b) the Vulnerable Persons Relocation Scheme and (c) the Mandate Refugee Scheme in each year since 2009-10; and how many such refugees in each year and for each scheme her Department refused after carrying out checks.

    James Brokenshire

    We do not report on how many people have been identified for resettlement in the UK under these schemes. Not all referrals translate into arrivals for a variety of reasons. In some instances, refugees choose to withdraw, for example, following the death of a family member, marriage or childbirth. Furthermore the Home Office also retains the right to reject individuals on security, war crimes or other grounds. In addition we do not currently differentiate between cases that are refused or withdrawn and therefore do not hold the information on refusals in the format requested.

    Notwithstanding this, the Home Office is committed to publishing data on arrivals through the resettlement programmes in an orderly way as part of the regular quarterly Immigration Statistics, in line with the Code of Practice for Official Statistics. The next set of figures will be in the quarterly release on 25 February 2016 and will cover the period October-December 2015. These numbers will be updated each quarter.

  • Paul Monaghan – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    Paul Monaghan – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Paul Monaghan on 2016-01-25.

    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, if she will bring forward legislative proposals to decriminalise drug use and encourage the implementation and enforcement of anti-discrimination and protective laws, based on human rights standards, to eliminate stigma, discrimination, social exclusion and violence against young people who inject drugs based on actual or presumed behaviours and HIV status.

    Karen Bradley

    The Government has no intention of decriminalising drugs in the UK. Decriminalisation would not eliminate the crime committed by the illicit trade, nor would it address the harms associated with drug dependence and the misery that this can cause to families and communities.

    The Government’s approach to drugs, based on our balanced 2010 Drug Strategy, remains clear. We must prevent drug use in our communities and support people dependent on drugs through treatment and recovery. At the same time, we have to stop the supply of illegal drugs and tackle the organised crime behind the drugs trade.

    There are promising signs our approach is working, with a downward trend in drug use over the last decade and more people recovering from dependency now than in 2009/10.

  • Nic Dakin – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Nic Dakin – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Nic Dakin on 2016-01-25.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what plans his Department has to hold NHS bodies accountable to the recommendations of the Accelerated Access Review.

    George Freeman

    The Accelerated Access Review, which was set up to look at speeding up access to innovative drugs including those for rare diseases, devices and diagnostics for National Health Service patients, has been making strong progress since it was first announced in November 2014.

    The review is independently chaired by Sir Hugh Taylor and has been engaging stakeholders extensively since the summer to gather evidence on the big questions the review is considering, and has developed a number of emerging solutions.

    Sir Hugh published his interim report of the review on 27 October 2015. The report is high-level, direction-setting and grounded in evidence gathered through the review’s stakeholder engagement to date. Included in the report were proposals for a National Innovation Partnership of key bodies in the innovation pathway who would be party to a Concordat committing them to the ambitions set out in the review. The review has used a second phase of engagement to work closely with industry stakeholders, Government, the NHS and arm’s length bodies on these and other proposals set out in the interim report.

    In April 2016 the review will conclude with Sir Hugh making his final recommendations to Government. The Department will review these recommendations and consider how best to respond.

  • Gregory Campbell – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Gregory Campbell – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Gregory Campbell on 2016-01-25.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what steps are being taken to ensure (a) pregnant women and (b) other people intending to visit South America and the Caribbean are aware of the risks posed by Zika virus.

    Jane Ellison

    Public Health England (PHE) and the National Travel Health Network and Centre (NaTHNaC) have been carefully monitoring the Zika virus outbreak in the Americas since it was first reported in Brazil during May 2015. When the Brazilian Ministry of Health announced a potential link between maternal Zika virus infection and microcephaly in December 2015, PHE and NaTHNaC published updated advice for travellers to South and Central America and the Caribbean, including specific advice for pregnant women. This advice continues to be updated regularly as more information becomes available.

    PHE has been and continues to liaise with the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, Association of British Neurologists and the Association of British Travel Agents who have published updates on their respective websites. The Foreign and Commonwealth Office has also updated its country travel advice pages with information about Zika virus.

  • Andrew Gwynne – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Andrew Gwynne – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andrew Gwynne on 2016-01-25.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, pursuant to the Answer of 14 January 2016 to Question 21778, on genito-urinary medicine, what questions it is planned will be asked of local commissioners as part of Public Health England’s survey of local commissioning arrangements for sexual health; when that survey is planned to be completed; and when he plans to make publicly available the results of that survey.

    Jane Ellison

    Public Health England, supported by the Association of Directors of Public Health, is undertaking a review of Sexual Health, Reproductive Health and HIV Commissioning services; the survey was first published on the 19 January 2016. The closing date for the survey is 8 February 2016. Results of the survey, including responses and analysis of the questions, will be published this summer.

    A range of tailored commissioning questions have been selected for local authorities, NHS England and clinical commissioning groups. Each survey is slightly adapted for its audience. The survey questions focus on 11 key areas; commissioning support structures, services commissioned, needs assessments, service specifications, access to services, tendering, changes to investment, tariffs and payments, outcomes and performance, resources and top challenges.

  • Nic Dakin – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Nic Dakin – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Nic Dakin on 2016-01-25.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how the objectives for NHS England’s National Clinical Directors post April 2016 will be agreed.

    George Freeman

    From 1 April 2016, objectives for the National Clinical Directors will be set according to the priority areas and major programmes, as set out in the Mandate and planning guidance. They will relate, where appropriate, to established programmes of service improvement.

  • Jim Cunningham – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Jim Cunningham – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Cunningham on 2016-01-25.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how much the National Institute for Health Research has invested in research into (a) lung cancer, (b) adult asthma, (c) pneumonia, (d) chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, (e) idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, (f) mesothelioma and (g) childhood wheezing and childhood respiratory infection in each of the last five years.

    George Freeman

    The information requested is not available. Spend on research funded directly by the Department’s National Institute for Health Research is categorised by Health Research Classification System (HRCS) health categories including ‘cancer’ and ‘respiratory’. There are no HRCS health sub-categories, such as for specific cancer sites or respiratory diseases.

  • Tulip Siddiq – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Tulip Siddiq – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Tulip Siddiq on 2016-01-25.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, if his Department will amend its A&E waiting times target to set a target time for patients to wait from their arrival at hospital to admission.

    Jane Ellison

    NHS England’s urgent and emergency care review is supporting the delivery of new ways of delivering urgent and emergency care to provide highly responsive, effective and personalised care as close to patients’ homes as possible and ensure people with more serious or life threatening emergency care needs are treated in centres with the very best expertise and facilities.

  • Alison McGovern – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Alison McGovern – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Alison McGovern on 2016-01-25.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what steps his Department is taking to develop polices on confirming the date a transgender person has begun living in role.

    Jane Ellison

    Specialised gender identity services are directly commissioned by NHS England.

    NHS England has considered the outcomes of the listening exercise conducted by Professor Field and has put in place a significant programme of work to improve healthcare services for transgender and non-binary people. A dedicated task group has been established to provide leadership and coordination of NHS England’s work to improve transgender and non-binary people’s experience of the National Health Service, and NHS England holds a Transgender Network event twice a year. Regular updates on NHS England’s work to improve gender identity services are given on NHS England’s website by the Regional Director of Specialised Commissioning (London) who chairs the task group.

    A Clinical Reference Group for Gender Identity Services has been established, comprising professional and lay experts. This group makes recommendations to NHS England on clinical matters. Issues around the standardisation of pathways across gender identity services and clinical protocols are being considered as part of the current work to develop a service specification that, it is proposed, will describe how NHS England will commission these services in the future. The process for developing a proposed service specification has included a period of public consultation.