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Tag: 2015

  • David Anderson – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

    David Anderson – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by David Anderson on 2015-11-03.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, if he will raise with the Prime Minister of India during his forthcoming visit the welfare of elephants being trained to work in the tourism industry in that country; and if he will make a statement.

    Mr Hugo Swire

    We are very much looking forward to Indian Prime Minister Modi’s visit, which gives us an opportunity to discuss a range of issues. We will continue to work together with the Indian authorities, as well as STAE and other non-governmental organisations, on protecting elephants.

  • Mark Hendrick – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Women and Equalities

    Mark Hendrick – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Women and Equalities

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Mark Hendrick on 2015-12-01.

    To ask the Minister for Women and Equalities, when she has visited (a) women’s refugee shelters, (b) maternity units, (c) ante-natal groups and (d) women’s groups since 15 July 2014.

    Caroline Dinenage

    Since taking office as the Minister for Women and Equalities in May 2015, I have visited a variety of organisations, including:

    • 30% Club
    • Everywoman
    • Minerva Women’s Centre
    • Rights of Women
    • The Equality and Diversity Forum
    • WeAreTheCity
    • Women’s Business Council
    • Women’s Private Equity Network

    I have also hosted a number of meetings within my department with women’s organisations. These will be published online at www.gov.uk/government/publications/ministers-quarterly-returns-2015 as part of the quarterly returns.

  • Jim Shannon – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Jim Shannon – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Shannon on 2015-11-03.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many people in each age group were diagnosed with hepatitis C in each of the last five years.

    Jane Ellison

    Public Health England receives laboratory reports of hepatitis C cases from England and Wales and data is presented by age group in the table below.

    Laboratory reports of hepatitis C by age group, England and Wales, 2010 to 2014

    Year

    2010 (i)

    2011 (ii)

    2012 (iii)

    2013 (iv)

    2014 (v)

    Age group (years)

    26

    41

    21

    27

    17

    1-4

    10

    21

    23

    15

    13

    5-9

    6

    9

    7

    7

    10

    10-14

    5

    13

    12

    13

    20

    15-24

    463

    581

    567

    559

    550

    25-34

    2,166

    2,640

    2,957

    3,037

    2,849

    35-44

    2,510

    3,123

    3,340

    3,407

    3,310

    45-54

    1,791

    2,329

    2,627

    2,721

    2,918

    55-64

    778

    1,123

    1,203

    1,293

    1,559

    >=65

    316

    423

    503

    514

    657

    NK

    76

    79

    93

    99

    94

    Total

    8,147

    10,382

    11,353

    11,692

    11,997

    Across the UK, more individuals are being tested for hepatitis C and over the last 5 years particular improvements have been seen in primary care where surveillance indicates that testing has risen by 21% in England (vi).

    Citations

    (i) Health Protection Report Vol 5. No. 29 22 July 2011

    (ii) Health Protection Report Vol 6. No. 30 27 July 2012

    (iii) Health Protection Report Vol.7 No. 30 26 July 2013

    (iv) Health Protection Report Vol 98 No. 29 25 July 2014

    (v) Health Protection Report Vol 9 No. 26 24 July 2015

    (vi) Hepatitis C in the UK; 2015 report. Public Health England

  • Emily Thornberry – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    Emily Thornberry – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Emily Thornberry on 2015-12-01.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many and what proportion of new claims for (a) jobseeker’s allowance and (b) employment and support allowance made in the most recent month for which figures are available were made by a person who had been in receipt of the same benefit at any point during the proceeding 12 months.

    Priti Patel

    The information as requested is not readily available, and could only be provided at disproportionate cost.

  • Seema Malhotra – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    Seema Malhotra – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Seema Malhotra on 2015-11-03.

    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what recent estimate she has made of the average cost to a police authority of employing a (a) police officer and (b) police community support officer; and what estimate she has made of that cost in each year from 2016-17 to 2019-20.

    Mike Penning

    Police authorities were abolished in 2012. Police and Crime Commissioners are now responsible for local priorities. The Home Office has estimated the costs of police officers and police community support officers based on average full time equivalent costs and predicted cost increases. The costs include the employers’ portion of National Insurance and pension contributions.

    £

    2015/16

    2016/17

    2017/18

    2018/19

    2019/20

    Average Officer

    47,800

    50,000

    50,800

    51,500

    52,400

    Average PSCO

    32,300

    33,400

    33,800

    34,200

    34,700
  • Lord Crisp – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    Lord Crisp – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Crisp on 2015-11-30.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they plan to review their current immigration policies to enable universities, research institutes, and other science and health-based organisations to recruit talent globally.

    Lord Bates

    Our current immigration policies, categories and processes already explicitly take account of the needs of academics, scientists and researchers. We have consistently protected and enhanced the treatment of these roles in the immigration system, even whilst restricting migration in other spheres.

    In Tier 2, the skilled work route, we have given PhD level roles, which include academics, scientists and researchers, higher priority when allocating places within the annual limit and relaxed rules relating to recruitment and settlement. We have introduced the Tier 1 (Exceptional Talent) route for world leaders in science, engineering, humanities, the arts and digital technology, and several universities and research organisations are making use of this route. The Tier 5 (Temporary Work) route contains provisions to enable sponsored researchers to participate in international research collaborations, and for overseas medical and dental post-graduates to undertake training in the UK.

    The immigration system also supports the health sector, with several health professions, including doctors in emergency medicine, included on the Shortage Occupation List (SOL). Nurses have been added to the SOL as a temporary measure, pending a full review of the evidence by the independent Migration Advisory Committee (MAC).

    We keep all immigration routes under review to ensure they are working effectively in line with the Government’s migration objectives. For the future, we have commissioned the MAC to advise on restricting Tier 2 to genuine skills shortages and jobs which require highly-specialised experts, but with sufficient flexibility to include high value roles and key public service workers. We await the MAC’s report with interest and will consider it carefully before making any significant changes.

  • Mary Creagh – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Culture, Media and Sport

    Mary Creagh – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Culture, Media and Sport

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Mary Creagh on 2015-11-03.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, how many meetings the Prime Minister has had with his European counterparts on the Green Paper on Safety and Tourism Accommodation Services COM (2014) 464.

    Tracey Crouch

    The DCMS is responsible for the safety of tourism accommodation. The Government responded to the Commission’s Green Paper consultation on theSafety of Tourism Accommodation Services which closed on 30 November 2014. Since I was appointed Tourism Minister in May 2015, I have met ABTA to discuss accommodation safety. I also raised this issue when I met my Greek counterpart on 4 Novemberand I will also be writing to the rest of my EU counterparts to raise awareness of the issue.

  • Lord Lexden – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    Lord Lexden – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Lexden on 2015-11-30.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government what is their latest assessment of the extent of homophobic bullying in schools.

    Lord Nash

    All forms of bullying, including homophobic bullying, are completely unacceptable. In order to tackle homophobic bullying in schools we are providing £2 million this financial year to fund projects designed to build schools’ knowledge and capacity to prevent and tackle homophobic, biphobic and transphobic bullying in schools.

    While evidence points to a high level of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender young people being subjected to bullying, it also indicates that thanks to the efforts of teachers and charities it is falling. Research undertaken by Stonewall shows that homophobic bullying has reduced in recent years – 55% of Lesbian, Gay and Bisexual secondary school pupils reported experiencing homophobic bullying at school in 2012, a drop from 65% in 2007 (Stonewall School Report, 2007 and 2012). The Stonewall Report of 2014 also indicated that homophobic bullying has fallen. The number of secondary school teachers who said their pupils are often or very often the victim of homophobic bullying had almost halved, from 25 per cent in 2009 to 13 per cent in 2014 (Stonewall Teacher Report, 2014 and 2009).

  • Frank Field – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    Frank Field – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Frank Field on 2015-11-03.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many households who have claimed universal credit have also applied for an alternative payment arrangement for their housing costs; and how many such applications have been successful.

    Justin Tomlinson

    The information you have requested is not currently available. The Department published its strategy for releasing official statistics on Universal Credit (UC) in September 2013. As outlined in the strategy, officials are currently quality assuring data for UC therefore it is not yet possible to give a definitive list of what statistics will be provided in the future. These statistics however will be published in accordance with the relevant protocols in the Code of Practice for official statistics.

    The latest official experimental statistics on UC and the Departments release strategy can be found at:

    https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/universal-credit-statistics.

    “

  • Lord West of Spithead – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Defence

    Lord West of Spithead – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Defence

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord West of Spithead on 2015-11-30.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government when they expect HMS Ajax to be launched at Barrow.

    Earl Howe

    Boat 7, yet to be named, is expected to be launched in the 2020s.