The below Parliamentary question was asked by Chris Ruane on 2014-05-06.
To ask the Secretary of State for Wales, what assessment he has made of the net benefits to people in Wales of the UK’s membership of the EU.
Mr David Jones
I refer the hon Gentleman to the answer I gave to the members for Delyn, Cardiff West and Ogmore earlier today.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Julie Elliott on 2014-05-02.
To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, what estimate he has made of the amount of private-sector investment committed to large-scale solar PV farm projects in (a) 2014-15 and (b) 2015-16; and what assessment he has made of the potential effect of an early reduction in Renewables Obligation support on those levels of investment.
Gregory Barker
We do not hold data on the amount of private investment committed to large scale solar PV projects.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Graham Stringer on 2014-05-02.
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what estimate he has made of the social costs caused by (a) large particulates (PM10), (b) small particulates (PM2.5) and (c) nitrogen dioxide emitted to air in the UK by (i) domestic biomass generation of heat and (ii) biomass for power generation in the latest year for which figures are available.
Dan Rogerson
Defra has not made any direct assessment of such social costs.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Nicholas Brown on 2014-05-02.
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, how many Regional Growth Fund bids were submitted by each local enterprise partnership area in the most recent bidding round; and how many of these were successful.
Michael Fallon
133 bids were submitted to Round 5 of the Regional Growth Fund. Three of these bids withdrew and one was for less than the £1 million bidding threshold.
129 bids were therefore appraised, of which 98 were projects and 31 were programmes. Of these, 13 programmes and 37 projects were selected. Programmes may cover a number of Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP) areas and some are national in scope so are not represented in the following table.
The following table shows the number of Round 5 project bids by LEP area with the number of bids that were selected for funding. Project bids originating from an area covered by more than one LEP are shown at the bottom of the table.
|
LEP Round 5 Projects |
Applications |
Selected |
|
Black Country |
1 |
0 |
|
Cheshire and Warrington |
5 |
1 |
|
Coast to Capital |
2 |
1 |
|
Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly |
5 |
0 |
|
Coventry and Warwickshire |
2 |
2 |
|
Cumbria |
1 |
0 |
|
Enterprise M3 |
1 |
1 |
|
Gloucestershire |
1 |
1 |
|
Greater Birmingham and Solihull |
6 |
3 |
|
Greater Cambridge & Greater Peterborough |
1 |
0 |
|
Greater Lincolnshire |
1 |
0 |
|
Greater Manchester |
5 |
2 |
|
Heart of the South West |
13 |
3 |
|
Hertfordshire |
1 |
0 |
|
Humber |
2 |
1 |
|
Lancashire |
4 |
1 |
|
Leeds City Region |
3 |
2 |
|
Leicester and Leicestershire |
2 |
0 |
|
Liverpool City Region |
5 |
3 |
|
London |
3 |
0 |
|
New Anglia |
1 |
0 |
|
North Eastern |
7 |
5 |
|
Sheffield City Region |
2 |
0 |
|
South East |
1 |
0 |
|
South East Midlands |
2 |
2 |
|
Stoke-on-Trent and Staffordshire |
1 |
0 |
|
Swindon and Wiltshire |
2 |
1 |
|
Tees Valley |
8 |
6 |
|
Thames Valley Berkshire |
1 |
0 |
|
West of England |
2 |
0 |
|
York and North Yorkshire |
1 |
0 |
|
Project bids from an area covered by more than one LEP: |
||
|
Derby, Derbyshire, Nottingham and Nottinghamshire, & Sheffield City Region |
1 |
0 |
|
Greater Birmingham and Solihull & Stoke-on-Trent and Staffordshire |
1 |
1 |
|
Greater Birmingham and Solihull & Worcestershire |
1 |
0 |
|
Greater Cambridge & Greater Peterborough & New Anglia |
1 |
0 |
|
Northamptonshire & South East Midlands |
2 |
1 |
|
Grand Total |
98 |
37 |
The below Parliamentary question was asked by David T. C. Davies on 2014-05-02.
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, what plans the Government has to ensure that places where repeater transmitters are situated receive a full Freeview service.
Mr Edward Vaizey
Ofcom estimates that 98.5% of UK households have access to 17 channels including those from the public service broadcasters (PSBs) on the digital terrestrial TV (DTT, or Freeview) platform, and that approximately 90% of UK households are also able to receive additional commercial DTT channels. Around 1.5% of UK households cannot easily receive DTT services with less than 0.5% not able to receive DTT services at all. However, DTT, cable and satellite digital television services together cover practically 100% of UK households, so that in all but the most exceptional of cases, everyone should be able to get digital television by one means or another. As well as subscription services, digital satellite TV offers non-subscription reception options for a one-off equipment and installation cost, but with no on-going monthly payments.
We have had no discussions with Freeview or Digital UK, who manage the DTT platform, about extending services and there are no plans to require broadcasters to improve the DTT coverage levels agreed for digital television switchover in 2006.
Purely commercial DTT services are not subject to the ‘near-universal’ coverage requirements which apply to PSB DTT services, and while the operators of the commercial DTT services were given the opportunity to extend their networks at the time of digital switchover, the operators determined that it was not commercially viable for them to build-out their services to additional transmitter sites.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Sadiq Khan on 2014-05-02.
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what the maximum is a prisoner can earn per (a) week, (b) month and (c) year from working while serving a custodial sentence.
Jeremy Wright
Maximum rates of pay for prisoners are not set centrally. Governors have responsibility for setting rates of pay in each establishment, which should reflect regime priorities. NOMS Prisoners’ Pay policy is set out in Prison Service Order 4460, a copy of which is held in the House of Commons library.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Chris Ruane on 2014-05-01.
To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, how many people registered as self-employed claimed tax credits in each of the last five years.
Nicky Morgan
The following table is based on finalised tax credits administrative data for each financial year. The latest data available is 2011-12.
|
Tax Year |
Number of families in receipt of tax credits containing at least one member identified as self-employed |
|
Thousands |
|
|
2007-08 |
820 |
|
2008-09 |
860 |
|
2009-10 |
910 |
|
2010-11 |
950 |
|
2011-12 |
910 |
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Philip Davies on 2014-05-01.
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, who the members were of Sir Cyril Chantler’s Review team working as part of the Standardised Packaging for Tobacco Independent Review; and what the cost was of commissioning expert advice from (a) Dr Yanzhong Wang and (b) Professor Catherine Pope as part of this review.
Jane Ellison
The members of Sir Cyril’s team are named, and their roles noted in the acknowledgements on page 9 of Sir Cyril’s report. The costs of commissioning expert advice from Dr Wang and Professor Pope were £12,000 (plus VAT) and £3,000 (plus VAT) respectively.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Gerald Kaufman on 2014-05-01.
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, when he intends to reply to the letter to him dated 24 March 2014 from the right hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton with regard to Mr Sherratt.
Jeremy Wright
The letter from the right hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton (Sir Gerald Kaufman) to the Secretary of State for Justice was transferred to the Department for Education for a response.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Stephen Doughty on 2014-05-01.
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, on how many times the offence of possession of mobile telephones within a prison has been proceeded upon; and how many days were added to the offender’s sentence in each case.
Jeremy Wright
The National Offender Management Service (NOMS) takes the issue of mobile phones in prisons very seriously and is committed to addressing the risks they present to both the security of prisons and the safety of the public.
NOMS has implemented a multi-layered approach: to minimise the number of mobile phones entering prisons, to find phones that do get in and to disrupt mobile phones that cannot be found. A range of technology has been rolled out to prisons to strengthen searching and security, including portable mobile phone signal detectors, Body Orifice Security Scanners (BOSS chairs), high sensitivity metal detecting wands and short range portable mobile phone blockers.
The adjudication process exists to allow prison governors to deal with breaches of prison discipline, including possession of unauthorised items such as mobile telephones.
From centrally held data, it is not possible to identify those offenders who breached prison discipline by possessing a mobile phone, were proceeded against and given the punishment of additional days. The prison adjudication offence details held centrally are not of sufficient detail to identify the specific breach item – mobile phone possession offences are grouped with other prohibited items.
Determining if the requested information is held would require a manual search through all individual prison records where a breach of prison discipline led to adjudication in respect of possession of a prohibited item to see if any information is recorded on the type of item. Inspecting each record to ascertain if there was an adjudication for possession of a mobile phone and how many additional days were given as a punishment could only be done at disproportionate cost.