Tag: 2014

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, how many service leavers have (a) applied to and (b) been accepted on the Troops to Teachers programme to date.

David Laws

The Troops to Teachers undergraduate programme is a brand new programme, which started in January 2014. It provides a route into teaching for non-graduates with relevant skills and experience. It is a school-based two year programme, at the end of which service leavers will have both a degree and Qualified Teacher Status.

982 service leavers submitted an initial application to cohort 1 of the new undergraduate Troops to Teachers programme. 332 of these applications went forward to be considered by the initial teacher training provider, which is the normal first stage for initial teacher training applications. 41 service leavers joined the Troops to Teachers programme in January 2014.

These figures represent only the first cohort of Troops to Teachers trainees. We are looking forward to more service leavers joining the programme this September.

01/11/2022
Lord Bradshaw – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Bradshaw on 2014-06-10.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether plans to cascade rolling stock between rail franchises are made by officials in the Department for Transport; and whether proposed cascades have been examined by operating and engineering people to ensure that costs associated with the cascade are kept to a minimum.

Baroness Kramer

In line with the Government’s policy set out in the March 2012 Command Paper, which is for a market-led approach to rolling stock, the Government does not believe that the cascade of units between franchises should be planned by officials within the Department for Transport.

When proposals arise, such as the transfer of the nine Class 170 trains from TransPennine, officials will work with industry to help find a solution, but the Department has made it clear that it expects train operators and rolling stock companies ultimately to resolve such situations.

01/11/2022

Mr David Hanson – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Mr David Hanson on 2014-03-13.

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what estimate she has made of the cost of merging the e-borders programme into the border system programme.

James Brokenshire

The activities of the e-Borders programme have been absorbed into the Border
Systems Programme. The estimated cost to close the e-Borders programme and
define the Border Systems Programme was £340,000. These costs are attributable
to civil servants already in post and there has been no additional expenditure
or procurement in order to move the work from e-Borders to Border Systems.

The procurement approach to replacing the primary border security elements of
the Border Systems Programme will reflect broader Government ICT and Commercial
strategy, and there will be no single, large supplier. The Home Office will
lead development, with services procured from a range of providers, potentially
including small and medium enterprises; no tenders have been received at this
time.

By March 2015 the Border Systems Programme aims to:

• Complete resilience of all current business critical systems;
• Develop replacement primary border security systems;
• Provide the capability to support commitments on exit checks;
• Establish a programme for the next generation of Radiological and Nuclear
detection (Cyclamen);
• Continue the implementation of second generation e-Gates across the estate;
• Develop and implement new freight targeting capability for Sea Containers;
• Establish contracts to purchase new detection equipment;
• Continue to assure live operations of existing systems.

The breakdown of FTE Civil Servants engaged by the e-Borders and subsequently
the Border Systems Programme in each year since 2010, is:

	Dec-10	Dec-11	Dec-12	Dec-13
SCS PB 2	1	1	1	0
SCS PB 1	2	1	2	2
G6	7.8	7.8	7.8	9.8
G7	11.8	9.8	10.8	17.8
SEO/HMI	33.5	34.7	48.8	49.7
HEO/CIO	26	25.4	22.5	30.9
EO/IO	22	19.3	25	20.8
AO/PS	7	5	5	3

01/11/2022

Lord Steel of Aikwood – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Steel of Aikwood on 2014-06-10.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what was the cost to public funds of the evacuation of tourists from Mombasa in May.

Baroness Warsi

The British Government did not evacuate British nationals from Mombasa in May and there was no cost to public funds.

01/11/2022
Chris Ruane – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Speaker’s Committee on the Electorial Commission

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

To ask the hon. Member for South West Devon, representing the Speaker’s Committee on the Electoral Commission, if he will list each local authority database used by electoral registration offices in the dry run for individual electoral registration (IER) for the 10 local authorities with the (a) best and (b) worst registration rates during the IER dry run.

Gary Streeter

The Electoral Commission informs me that this information was provided to the Hon. Member in the answer to Question 191356.

01/11/2022
Lord Palmer – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Palmer on 2014-06-10.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government from which companies and organisations, other than those involved in the tobacco industry, they have received representations since October 2013 regarding their plans to consider introducing standardised tobacco packaging.

Earl Howe

The information cannot be provided without incurring disproportionate cost.

01/11/2022
Jonathan Edwards – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Deputy Prime Minister

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jonathan Edwards on 2014-03-12.

To ask the Deputy Prime Minister, what assessment he has made of the suitability of the chief executives of Carmarthenshire County Council and Pembrokeshire County Council acting as returning officers in future elections.

Greg Clark

It is the responsibility of individual local authorities to appoint an officer of the council to be the returning officer for local government elections in their area. Electoral law provides that returning officers for local government elections shall also be local returning officers for European Parliamentary elections. It therefore does not fall to the Government to assess the suitability of individuals carrying out these roles.

01/11/2022
Lord Beecham – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Beecham on 2014-06-09.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what is the budgeted annual expenditure of the National Probation Service.

Lord Faulks

The total probation budget for 2014-15 is £804 million. This includes the first two months of the financial year, during which services were provided by the probation trusts. As well as operational delivery, the probation budget includes provision of corporate services to support the new operating model.

The budget figureis based on an initial assessment of operational and business needs and may vary within the financial period. The costs associated with high-risk offenders fall within a number of budget items and do not constitute a separate category.

01/11/2022
Steve Rotheram – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Steve Rotheram on 2014-03-12.

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many individuals convicted of (a) murder or (b) attempted murder in each of the last 10 years have been released with exclusion zones forming a part of their licence arrangements.

Jeremy Wright

Unfortunately, it is not possible to answer these questions without carrying out a manual search through all relevant individual offender files, at disproportionate cost.

Conditions such as an exclusion zone may be applied to an offender’s licence where it is necessary to manage the risk that the individual offender poses following release into the community – and where it is proportionate to that risk. Where qualifying victims have exercised their statutory right to make representations about the offender’s licence conditions, the exclusion zone set will take into account those representations. In each case, the supervising officer proposes conditions as appropriate and requests these from the appropriate authority, which applies it to the licence on behalf of the Secretary of State. In the case of determinate sentence prisoners, the authority is the prison governor; in the case of indeterminate sentence prisoners, or others whose release is on the direction of the Parole Board, the authority is the Parole Board.

These conditions must be kept under review, and are intended to be flexible to the possible resettlement needs of an offender in the community and any new risks that arise.

An exclusion zone will rarely be absolute, as it is recognised that there may be exceptional reasons why the offender needs to enter the exclusion zone. Thus, where an exclusion zone is included in the offender’s licence, it will usually be open to the supervising officer to grant the offender permission to enter the exclusion zone, for a temporary period and for a specific purpose.

As this is a purely localised decision, there is no national record of the number of occasions such permission has been given. It is, therefore, not possible to answer the questions regarding how many times an offender has been granted permission to enter the exclusion zone applied to his licence.

Data from the last 10 years is not available in the required electronic format to answer the question relating to numbers of offenders with exclusion zones included in their licence. To provide such information would again require a manual interrogation of offenders’ records and this would incur disproportionate cost.

01/11/2022
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Hunt of Kings Heath on 2014-06-09.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they are taking any action to prevent the closure of the Worcester Walk-In Health Centre; and if so, what.

Earl Howe

The reconfiguration of local health services is a matter for the National Health Service. All service changes should be led by clinicians and be in the best interests of patients, not driven from the top down.

We are aware that the local consultation on the Worcestershire Urgent Care Strategy closed on 9 April 2014. The clinical commissioning groups in Worcestershire are now considering the responses. No decisions have yet been made.

01/11/2022