Tag: 2015

Philip Davies – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Philip Davies on 2015-10-20.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, pursuant to the Answer of 16 October 2015 to Question 10530, what the job titles are of those officials undertaking the assessment of the grant funding for Action on Smoking and Health; and what transparency measures have been built into the assessment process.

Jane Ellison

The assessment of the grant application for funding from Action on Smoking and Health is undertaken by members of the Tobacco Control policy team.

The assessment process is the same for all grants awarded under Section 64 powers. The assessment process uses standard business case criteria and consists of a Strategic Case, Economic Case, Financial Case, Commercial Case and Project Governance.

The assessment is reviewed by the Department’s Voluntary Sector Grants Hub to ensure that the grant proposal is affordable within Departmental budgets; relevant Efficiency Review Group Controls have been considered;the grant has been assessed as delivering value for money and the grant is considered to be appropriate for the Grant funding route rather than procurement.

A grant application is currently under assessment and a decision on funding has not yet been made.

01/12/2022
Vicky Foxcroft – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Vicky Foxcroft on 2015-10-20.

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what recent (a) meetings and (b) correspondence she has had on the setting up of buffer zones around abortion clinics; and if she will make a statement.

Mike Penning

I refer the Hon Member to the answers I gave to 5385 and 7247 on 13 July and 22 July 2015. We have also received correspondence from Members of Parliament on behalf of their constituents on this issue. The Home Office has not issued guidance to the police on this matter.

01/12/2022
Callum McCaig – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Energy and Climate Change

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Callum McCaig on 2015-10-20.

To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, if she will meet the organisations who wrote to the Prime Minister about the Feed-in Tariff and its effect on local investment in renewable energy on 21 August and 9 October; and when the Prime Minister will respond to both of those letters.

Andrea Leadsom

DECC officials and Ministers have had extensive meetings with stakeholders from across the renewables industry during the feed-in tariff review consultation, including many of the organisations signing the letters of 21 August and 9 October. I held a roundtable in Parliament on Wednesday 21 October, with a wide ranging group of stakeholders. It was a highly productive meeting.

DECC replied to the letter of 21 August, and will respond to the letter of 9 October in due course.

01/12/2022
Steve Rotheram – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Steve Rotheram on 2015-10-20.

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps his Department is taking to close the pay gap between disabled workers and other workers.

Justin Tomlinson

The Government is committed to ensuring that all disabled people have the opportunity to fulfil their potential and realise their aspirations. Work is an important part of this, which is why we committed to halving the disability employment gap in our manifesto – we want to ensure that many more disabled people who can and want to work have that opportunity.

Equality Act 2010 protects disabled people (and other groups) from discrimination at work, including unequal pay (in relation to the disabled person’s gender) and less favourable treatment, which may require the employer to provide a reasonable adjustment.

The National Living Wage – which will ensure that all low wage workers, including those with disabilities, can take a greater share of the gains from growth – will come into force from 1 April 2016.

Disability Confident works with an increasing number of employers to promote the benefits of employing disabled people, encouraging good practice, challenging prejudicial attitudes, increasing understanding of disability, removing barriers, and helping to ensure that disabled people have the opportunities to fulfil their potential and realise their aspirations.

Access to Work provides support above and beyond employers’ reasonable adjustments. Every year, Access to Work supports tens of thousands of disabled workers to enter or retain employment and progress in their careers.

01/12/2022
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Hunt of Kings Heath on 2015-10-19.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what is the latest date by which they need to amend secondary legislation to change the NHS tariff objection mechanism in order for such changes to operate for the setting of the 2016–17 tariff.

Lord Prior of Brampton

The objection mechanism is part of the provisions relating to statutory consultation by Monitor on proposals for a new or revised national tariff. We anticipate that Monitor will start statutory consultation on 2016-17 national tariff proposals in January. Accordingly any regulations making amended provision for the objection mechanism before that consultation starts would need to be made and brought into force no later than January 2016.

01/12/2022
Lord Tanlaw – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Tanlaw on 2015-10-19.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the case for the civil timescale Greenwich Mean Time being renamed Greenwich Meridian Time, with a value of UT1 at longitude zero based on GPS rather than the historic location of the prime meridian.

Baroness Neville-Rolfe

As the reference frame for the Global Positioning System (GPS) is established through a mathematical interpretation of satellite radio signals, rather than a physical meridian, it is not conceptually appropriate to represent it in the same way as other meridians have historically been marked at Greenwich.

We do not see any practical benefit in changing the reference point for UT1 even if it was a decision the UK Government could make unilaterally. Such a change could cause confusion as could use of the term “Greenwich Meridian Time”. In line with the International Telecommunication Union Radio Regulations, all time‑signal broadcasts in the UK transmit. the international timescale UTC, and so any change to UT1 or GMT would have no impact on the time-signal available to the UK public.

01/12/2022
Lord Dear – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Communities and Local Government

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Dear on 2015-10-19.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether a Community Land Trust under the proposed Right to Buy scheme is required to sell one of the houses it owns if it is unable to provide an alternative from (1) its existing stock, (2) its newly built stock, (3) the stock it will build in the future or (4) the stock of another housing association.

Baroness Williams of Trafford

Under the voluntary agreemment with the National Housing Federation, there would be a presumption that housing associations would sell the tenant the property in which they live, but there would be some broad circumstances where a housing association could exercise discretion to decline a sale. These circumstances include properties held in the Communities Land Trust.

01/12/2022
Lord Falconer of Thoroton – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Falconer of Thoroton on 2015-10-19.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they have signed a prisoner transfer agreement with the government of Jamaica.

Lord Faulks

During the recent visit by the Prime Minister, a Memorandum of Understanding was signed with the Government of Jamaica. The Memorandum of Understanding will pave the way to the negotiation of a prisoner transfer agreement between the United Kingdom and Jamaica, in exchange for UK financial support for the construction of a new prison in Jamaica. The funding will only become available after the prisoner transfer agreement is signed and after satisfactory completion of each stage of the prison build.

01/12/2022
Ian Mearns – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Communities and Local Government

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Ian Mearns on 2015-10-23.

To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, what assessment he has made of the potential cumulative financial effecr by 2021 on the twelve local authorities in the North East of the Government’s proposal to localise business rates.

Mr Marcus Jones

The Government intends to move to 100% business rates retention in England by the end of this Parliament. We have confirmed that as part of the new system there will continue to be redistribution of local tax revenue between authorities and protections in place for authorities that see their business rates income fall significantly. Over the coming months we will be working with local government on the details of the scheme.

Ahead of final decisions, it is too early to assess what the impact will be on individual areas or authorities, but before the start of the financial year, local authorities in the North-East estimated that the total business rates income for 2015-16 would be £854.58 million.

01/12/2022

Nicholas Soames – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Defence

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Nicholas Soames on 2015-10-23.

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, if he will place in the Library copies of the Naval Service Operational Pinch Point Groups for (a) each quarter of each financial year from 2005-06 to 2014-15 and (b) the first two quarters of 2015-16.

Mark Lancaster

Prior to 2015, Naval Service Operational Pinch Point Groups were not recorded quarterly. However, Pinch Points as at 1 April of each year are published in the Ministry of Defence (MOD)Annual Report and Accounts which are available in The Library of the House. Please note, an MOD Annual Report for 2009-10 was consolidated into the MOD Departmental Resource Accounts 2009-10.

The number of Naval Service Operational Pinch Points in July 2015 and October 2015 are as shown in the following table.

01/12/2022

1 Apr-1 Jul 2015	1 Oct 2015
Nuclear Watchkeepers Petty Officer-Warrant Officer1	Nuclear Watchkeepers Petty Officer-Warrant Officer1
Strategic Weapon Systems Engineers Leading Hand-Warrant Officer1	Strategic Weapon Systems Engineers Leading Hand-Warrant Officer1
Tactical Weapon Systems Engineers Petty Officer-Chief Petty Officer	Tactical Weapon Systems Engineers Petty Officer-Chief Petty Officer
Marine Engineer General Service Petty Officer	Marine Engineer General Service Petty Officer
Weapon Engineer General Service Petty Officer	Weapon Engineer General Service Petty Officer
Seaman specialist Able Seaman	Seaman specialist Able Seaman
Mine Warfare Leading Hand-Petty Officer	Mine Warfare Leading Hand-Petty Officer
Medical Technician (Operating Department Practitioner) Leading Hand-Chief Petty Officer	Medical Technician (Operating Department Practitioner) Leading Hand-Chief Petty Officer
Medical Assistant (Submarines) Senior Rates	Medical Assistant (Submarines) Senior Rates
Hydrographic Services Leading Hand	Hydrographic services Leading Hand
Underwater Warfare specialist Able Seaman-Petty Officer	Underwater Warfare specialist– Rank: Able Seaman-Petty Officer
Submarine Coxswain Chief Petty Officer	Submarine Coxswain Chief Petty Officer
Submarine Sonar specialist (SSM) Able Seaman	Submarine Sonar specialist (SSM) Able Seaman
Above Water Warfare specialist Leading Hand	Above Water Warfare specialist Leading Hand
Above Water Tactical specialist Leading Hand	Above Water Tactical specialist Leading Hand
Marine Engineer General Service Chief Petty Officer	Marine Engineer General Service Chief Petty Officer
Chef Able Seaman-Leading Hand	Chef Able Seaman-Leading Hand
Marine Engineer General Service Leading Hand	Marine Engineer General Service Leading Hand
Weapon Engineer General Service Leading Hand	Weapon Engineer General Service Leading Hand
Weapon Engineer Officer (Submarines) Lieutenant	Weapon Engineer Officer (Submarines) Lieutenant
	Submarine Tactical specialist (TSM) Petty Officer-Chief Petty Officer