The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andrew Smith on 2015-10-19.
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, if he will make an assessment of the potential of minimum unit pricing of 50 pence per unit of alcohol to improve liver disease health outcomes in England.
Jane Ellison
The 2015-16 remit letter from the Department of Health asked Public Health England to review the evidence and provide advice on the public health impacts of alcohol and possible evidence-based solutions.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Luciana Berger on 2015-10-19.
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many NHS (a) doctors and (b) nurses have been signed off work due to (i) stress and (ii) other mental illness in each of the last five years.
Ben Gummer
The Department does not collect centrally data on how many doctors and nurses have been signed off work due to stress and other mental illness.
Employers across the National Health Service are responsible for reducing staff absences due to stress and mental illness through local sickness absence policies.
NHS England recently launched "A healthy NHS workforce"[1], a commitment in its Five Year Forward View[2] "to ensure the NHS as an employer sets a national example in the support it offers its own staff to stay healthy".
Working with Public Health England and NHS Employers, NHS England aims to improve NHS staff health spearheaded by a group of provider and commissioner organisations. Work will include ensuring board level leadership and engagement as well as line manager training to increase awareness of mental health issues, helping them manage staff in a way which is supportive to health and wellbeing.
The Department continues to commission NHS Employers to help trusts improve staff mental health and wellbeing through advice, guidance and good practice[3].
The launch in July of NHS Employers’ How are you feeling NHS? Toolkit[4] enables staff to talk more openly about their emotional health, helps trusts improve the assessment of the impact emotional wellbeing has on staff and patients and supports action planning to improve staff emotional health and wellbeing.
[1] https://www.england.nhs.uk/2015/09/02/nhs-workplace/
[2] https://www.england.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/5yfv-web.pdf
[3] http://www.nhsemployers.org/search-results?q=supporting+staff+who+are+experiencing+mental+health+issues
[4] http://www.nhsemployers.org/your-workforce/retain-and-improve/staff-experience/health-work-and-wellbeing/protecting-staff-and-preventing-ill-health/how-are-you-feeling-nhs-toolkit
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Shannon on 2015-10-19.
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, if he will take steps to prevent Snapchat images being made public without the consent of the image owner.
Mr Edward Vaizey
Under UK copyright law, it would be unlawful for a Snapchat user to copy an image and make it available to the public without the consent of the image owner. The image owner would be able to sue anyone who does this for copyright infringement.
Snapchat photos are automatically deleted after 10 seconds. The Snapchat Privacy Policy states that if Snapchat is able to detect that a recipient has taken a screenshot of an image, they will try to inform the original poster. However, Snapchat advises users to avoid sending messages which they would not want to be saved or shared.
The disclosure of private sexual photographs or films without the consent of an individual who appears in them and with intent to cause that individual distress, is an offence under Section 33 of the Criminal Justice and Courts Act 2015. Those convicted could face a maximum sentence of two years in prison.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Roger Godsiff on 2015-10-19.
To ask the Secretary of State for International Development, pursuant to the Answer of 16 September 2015 to Question 9671, for what reasons the Government cannot mandate companies to join the 2013 Accord on Fire and Safety in Bangladesh.
Mr Desmond Swayne
The Rana Plaza disaster demonstrated the need for a concerted effort by all stakeholders to address the challenges facing the garments industry in Bangladesh. As well as establishing 2 international initiatives (the Accord and the Alliance), The International Labour Organisation (ILO) worked with the Government of Bangladesh (GoB), employer organisations, and trade union representatives to develop the Tripartite National Plan of Action on Fire Safety and Structural Integrity (NTPA) and in 2014 the Government raised the minimum wage for the country’s garment workers by 77%.
The Accord has been established as a voluntary, independent, legally binding agreement between Trade Unions and brands: we, and the many stakeholders involved, believe this is a more effective mechanism than making it mandatory. We actively encourage UK companies to join the Accord.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jess Phillips on 2015-10-19.
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many people (a) attempted to take and (b) took their own lives at Foston Hall Prison, Derbyshire, was in each of the last five years.
Andrew Selous
Information on all deaths in prison custody and self-harm incidents, including at HMP Foston Hall, can be found in the Safety in Custody statistics which are published quarterly at https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/safety-in-custody-statistics.
NOMS does not record ‘attempted suicide’ as a category of incident as the intention of the prisoner may not be known reliably.
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The below Parliamentary question was asked by Greg Mulholland on 2015-10-19.
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what assessment he has made of the effectiveness of legislation to prevent pavement parking in London.
Andrew Jones
Local authorities are best placed to assess the need for pavement parking controls in their area and the effectiveness of any restrictions in place. It would be for the relevant traffic authorities to conduct an assessment of legislation specific to London.
Last year this Department received around a thousand communications from Guide Dogs campaigners in support of two Private Members’ Bills on pavement parking. Departmental officials met with Guide Dogs officials as recently as 13 October this year.
Local authorities already have the powers to introduce enforceable pavement parking restrictions where they consider it appropriate. My Department’s guidance to local authorities makes clear that, during the appraisal of their parking policies, an authority should consider whether pavement parking is problematic in any part of its area. If it is, and is not covered by an existing Traffic Regulation Order, the authority should consider amending the existing Order or making a new one. We have issued councils with authorisation to place specifically designed traffic signs without the need for Whitehall approval.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Emily Thornberry on 2015-10-19.
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, if he will publish an impact assessment of the Universal Credit (Work Allowance) Amendment Regulations 2015.
Priti Patel
The Explanatory Memorandum that was published alongside the work allowance regulations contained the reference to the existing Universal Credit (UC) Impact Assessment. Whilst it is not standard practice to publish separate impact assessment for each change to the UC Regulations, Ministers gave full consideration to the impacts of these changes before the work allowance regulations were laid.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Stephen Timms on 2015-10-16.
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, what steps he plans to take to increase the number of gifted overseas students studying in the UK.
Joseph Johnson
The UK welcomes the brightest and best international students and there is no cap on the number that can study here. The Government promotes study in the UK through the Britain is GREAT marketing campaign which has an education pillar and through the Education UK brand and website, which is managed by the British Council. Together these measures promote UK education in over 100 countries, connecting millions of people with the United Kingdom.
The Government also has major education agreements with overseas partners. Key programmes include the UK-China Partners in Education Programme, the UK-India Education Research Initiative and engagement in Brazil’s ‘Science without Borders’ scholarship scheme.
The Government also supports student exchange, such as through the Erasmus Scheme, which enables international students to take short placements in the UK and British students to gain valuable overseas experience.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jo Churchill on 2015-10-16.
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many (a) primary and (b) secondary school students in (i) Suffolk and (ii) England and Wales have been funded by the pupil premium in each of the last five years.
Mr Sam Gyimah
The pupil premium was introduced in April 2011 and applies only in England. During the first year of its operation, only pupils who were currently eligible for free school meals (FSM) attracted pupil premium funding. From April 2012, the funding has been paid to schools for the number of pupils who have been eligible for FSM at any point in the previous 6 years.
Data which split the pupil premium into the primary and secondary phases of education are only available for the deprivation element of the premium. Information on deprivation pupil premium by primary and secondary year groups was first published in 2013/14. Total funding allocations were published for earlier years. The most useful data are provided in the tables attached.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Greg Mulholland on 2015-10-16.
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what estimate he has made of the number of nurses in Yorkshire in (a) 2014-15 and (b) 2015-16; and what funding was allocated for nursing in Yorkshire in each of those years.
Ben Gummer
The information requested is not available. The Health and Social Care Information Centre monthly workforce statistics provides data on the number of nursing, midwifery and health visiting staff working in the National Health Service in England. The latest data is for June 2015 and the data for the Health Education England Region Yorkshire and Humber is provided in the attached table, along with June 2014 for comparison purposes.
There is no individual funding stream allocated for nursing. Individual NHS organisations are best placed to decide how many nurses they employ.