The below Parliamentary question was asked by Chris Ruane on 2014-06-04.
To ask the Deputy Prime Minister, what steps he is taking to disseminate the lessons learned from the data mining pilots for the introduction of individual electoral registrations; and if he will make a statement.
Greg Clark
The Government published its results in March 2012 and July 2013 and can be found at:
The Electoral Commission also produced their assessment of the pilots. Their reports can be found at:
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The below Parliamentary question was asked by Gordon Henderson on 2014-03-18.
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what plans the Government has to improve the rail infrastructure on the North Kent rail line.
Stephen Hammond
The Government is working with Network Rail, train operators and Kent County Council to progress the case for journey time reductions between Ashford and Ramsgate by 2019 through infrastructure improvements. Funding is available for this, subject to a satisfactory business case.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Chris Ruane on 2014-06-04.
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what use his Department has made of the National Wellbeing Index introduced by the Office for National Statistics in formulating policy since the introduction of that Index in 2011; and what policies his Department has introduced to improve national wellbeing as defined in that Index since 2010.
Norman Lamb
The Department has worked closely with the Office for National Statistics (ONS) on the development of the Measuring National Wellbeing Framework. Given the experimental nature of the data it is too early to use it specifically to formulate policy. However, some examples of relevant work taken forward by the Department include:
– working in partnership with ONS to include a measure of mental wellbeing into the Measuring National Wellbeing Framework;
– including wellbeing questions on a range of health surveys, for example the Health Survey for England, Health Behaviours of School-aged Children, the trial of a local level survey of 15 year olds, and the current wave of the Adult Psychiatric Morbidity Survey;
– including wellbeing as a key indicator in the Public Health Outcomes Framework;
– publishing a narrative and a series of factsheets on why wellbeing matters to health policy;
– publishing a report on the predictors of wellbeing across the lifecourse;
– conducting two wellbeing workshops with policy makers to allow them to consider their policies from a wellbeing perspective; and
– co-founding a collaborative studentship with the University of Warwick on positive genetics using twin data to explore how genetics are related to wellbeing.
Wellbeing will also be considered in the forthcoming Chief Medical Officer’s annual report.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Mr Gareth Thomas on 2014-03-18.
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what proportion of disability living allowance claims took longer than 40 days to process in each of the last three years for which data is available.
Mike Penning
Please see the table below showing the percentage of Disability Living Allowance (DLA) new claims, for Normal Rules (NR), that took longer than 40 days to process. Claims not yet processed within 40 days, include cases where we are awaiting additional information from the claimant and/or medical evidence.
|
2012/13 |
|
|
Volume of Claims Cleared |
402,861 |
|
Volume of claims cleared after 40 working days |
89,678 |
|
% of DLA New Claims (NR) |
22.3% |
Prior to 2012/13 the measure reported against was an Actual Average Clearance Time (AACT). This is the cumulative clearance days divided by the number of cleared events within the reporting period.
Please see the table below for 2010/11 and 2011/12:
|
2010/11 |
2011/12 |
|
|
Volume of Claims Cleared |
431,572 |
412,556 |
|
AACT (Level 37.7 days) |
30.3 |
27.2 |
Notes:
The reported figure only relates to DLA (NR) new claims. NR claims are those where the claimant is not terminally ill and the normal rules of entitlement therefore apply.
The figures above cover the period from 1st April to 31st March and shows the national position including working age and child claimants.
The AACT level (37.7 days) shown in the above table is a measure based on a prior year’s performance.
We have not provided data for 2013/14 due to not having a full financial year available at this time.
Source:
Source: Department for Work and Pensions – RDA 80123 report – DLA Management Information Statistics
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Thomas Docherty on 2014-06-10.
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, whether a Minister will be responsible for preparing the Department’s response to the Belgian government’s request for information regarding the Typhoon as a successor to their F-16 fleet.
Michael Fallon
The Eurofighter Typhoon programme is carried out in partnership with the Governments of Germany, Italy and Spain. This includes cooperation on exports. The Government of Belgium has expressed an interest in Typhoon as well as other competing aircraft as a potential replacement for their F-16 fleet. UK Trade and Investment have been invited, to participate in preliminary discussions at official level on Typhoon. United Kingdom Trade and Investment (UKTI) officials are working with colleagues across Government, in the partner nations and with Eurofighter GmbH to coordinate a response.
Within UK Government work on Typhoon export campaigns is led by UKTI, but HMG takes a collaborative approach to defence exports and so all campaigns are a cross departmental effort. Information on staffing numbers is not therefore available centrally.
Ministerial responsibility for UKTI rests with my noble Friend the Minister of State for Trade and Investment (Lord Livingston of Parkhead). My noble Friend reports to my Rt Hon Friends the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills and Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, as the two responsible Cabinet Ministers.
Information regarding Ministers’ meetings is published by the Department on the internet: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications?departments%5B%5D=department-for-business-innovation-skills&publication_type=transparency-data
The Minister of State for Trade and Investment discussed Typhoon exports during his meeting with BAES on 18 December 2013. The Secretary of State for Business Innovation and Skills has no immediate plans to meet his Belgian counterpart.
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The below Parliamentary question was asked by Helen Goodman on 2014-03-18.
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps his Department plans to take to ensure that children and adoptive parents receive support beyond the initial stages of the adoption process.
Edward Timpson
People who adopt are making a life changing decision, both for themselves and the children they adopt.
Research indicates a high level of need among adoptive families for therapeutic services often many years after the adoption process has ended.
It is for this reason that we have committed £19.3 million into an Adoption Support Fund to make therapeutic support much more widely accessible, timely and of high quality for adoptive families.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Margaret Ritchie on 2014-06-10.
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what progress has been made on procuring the vaccine for Meningitis B as part of the primary infant immunisation schedule; and if he will make a statement.
Jane Ellison
Work is nearing completion to gain approvals to commence the procurement. The Department and Public Health England will start negotiations with Novartis, which produces the only licensed Meningitis B vaccine, as soon as possible.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Mr Barry Sheerman on 2014-03-17.
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps he is taking to improve the education of children on the autistic spectrum.
Edward Timpson
Children on the autism spectrum will benefit from the changes to the special educational needs system which the Government is bringing about through the Children and Families Act 2014, including the strengthened arrangements, through 0-25 Education, Health and Care plans, for the transition from children’s services to adulthood which young people with autism can find particularly difficult.
The Department for Education is funding the Autism Education Trust to provide training to early years, school and further education staff on autism. From January 2012 to February 2014, 22,451 staff have received level 1 basic awareness training, 3,214 have received level 2 hands-on tools and techniques training and 775 have received level 3 training for those who want to develop their knowledge of autism further and those who will themselves take on a training role, such as school Special Educational Needs Co-ordinators.
The Department is also funding three autism organisations from 2013 to 2015, including Ambitious about Autism, to work with four general further education colleges and schools to test innovative ways of supporting the transition of young people with autism from school to college and the National Autistic Society to help young people with autism take part in the development of ‘local offers’, to provide advice to professionals and to fund an exclusion adviser for parents and professionals.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Stephen Timms on 2014-06-10.
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how much his Department spent on correspondence with recipients of (a) jobseeker’s allowance and (b) employment and support allowance in (i) 2010, (ii) 2011, (iii) 2012 and (iv) 2013.
Esther McVey
The information requested is not available.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andrew Percy on 2014-03-17.
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many schools in Brigg and Goole constituency participate in the Schools Direct Programme.
David Laws
Our records show that there are no School Direct lead schools located in the parliamentary constituency of Brigg and Goole.
However, many School Direct lead schools work in partnership with other schools to deliver the programme.