Tag: 2016

  • David Simpson – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    David Simpson – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by David Simpson on 2016-02-11.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of the potential merits of criminalising cyber bullying.

    Edward Timpson

    The Government continues to work closely with social media companies to make sure they are committed to protecting children who use social media platforms. Ministers from the Department for Education, the Department for Culture Media and Sport, and the Home Office meet quarterly with social media providers and other key stakeholders at the UK Council for Child Internet Safety (UKCCIS) executive board meetings, to discuss important issues relating to child safety online, including cyberbullying.

    Recently, Ofcom led a social media working group on behalf of UKCCIS, with representation from Twitter, Facebook, Google, Ask.FM, and MindCandy. The group developed best practice guidance aimed at encouraging responsible practice from industry to ensure children using their services are able to do so in a safe and protected way. The guidance was issued by UKCISS in December 2015 and can be found on their website.

    To help schools prevent and tackle bullying, we are providing £1.3m this year (2015-16) to anti-bullying charities to tackle all forms of bullying including cyberbullying, on top of the £4m provided in 2013-15. We are also providing £2m this year (2015-16) to organisations to specifically tackle homophobic bullying, which includes cyberbullying.

    We do not want to make any form of bullying a criminal offence as to do so would risk criminalising young people. In some circumstances that may be justified, but probably only in a limited number of very serious cases, for which there are already laws in place to protect people. Internet providers, schools and parents all have a role to play in keeping children and young people safe online.

    The Government Equalities Office is funding the UK Safer Internet Centre to produce advice for schools on how to keep children safe online. This is scheduled for publication this spring.

  • Greg Mulholland – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

    Greg Mulholland – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Greg Mulholland on 2016-03-10.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, what discussions his Department or its employment agency adviser had with Mr Paul Newby about actual and potential conflicts of interest prior to his appointment as the Pubs Code Adjudicator.

    Anna Soubry

    As is standard practice, Mr Newby was asked during the appointments process to declare any potential conflicts of interest.

  • Crispin Blunt – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

    Crispin Blunt – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Crispin Blunt on 2016-04-18.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what assessment he has made of the effect of improvements to the Brighton Mainline in Control Period 5 on seat capacity on northbound trains at (a) Horley, (b) Redhill and (c) East Croydon rail stations during weekday morning peak periods.

    Claire Perry

    The Department has not carried out a specific assessment of the effect of improvements to the Brighton Mainline (BML) in Control Period 5 (2014-19) on seating capacity from the three aforementioned stations. We are investing significantly in capacity improvements on the BML which will start to be delivered this year and fully delivered for the 2018 timetable change. Govia Thameslink Railway intend to carry out a public consultation on their proposed 2018 timetable changes later this year.

  • Kevin Hollinrake – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

    Kevin Hollinrake – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Kevin Hollinrake on 2016-05-24.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what progress her Department has made on developing the pork export accreditation protocol.

    George Eustice

    Defra has submitted detailed information required by the Chinese authorities, which they are reviewing. The UK Agriculture, Food and Drink Counsellor, based in Beijing, has met with the Chinese authorities to raise the importance of this agreement and we continue to press for expeditious consideration of the UK application to allow exports of UK pigs’ trotters to commence as soon as possible.

  • Richard Burden – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

    Richard Burden – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Richard Burden on 2016-07-12.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, pursuant to the Answer of 11 July 2016 to Question 41675, on shipping: exhaust emissions, what legal and technical barriers his Department has identified that could restrict the growth in green technologies in shipping.

    Mr John Hayes

    Given the international nature of shipping and with a ship’s life cycle being typically in the region of 25-30 years, the Government’s priority has been to ensure that appropriate international and regional standards are in place for green technologies in shipping. The Government is keen to promote the global application and implementation of technical and where appropriate legal standards, applied fairly across the board, and with industry given as much advance notice as possible of any new requirements. This delivers a level and competitive playing field and clarity of regulatory approach.

    Currently, our focus has been on barriers which inhibit the development of abatement technologies and alternative fuels which control sulphur emissions. The lack of international technical standards for the storage, loading and the safe handling of liquefied natural gas and methanol is one factor which has discouraged ports and ships from investing in this technology. Uncertainty about whether the global 0.5 per cent sulphur cap will come into force in 2020, or be deferred until 2025 is another. As a consequence the UK is pressing for decisions to be taken as soon as possible to give industry as much time as possible to prepare for the new requirements.

  • Barry Sheerman – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Barry Sheerman – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Barry Sheerman on 2016-10-07.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many hospital-borne cases of MRSA were recorded in England in (a) 2000, (b) 2005, (c) 2010 and (d) 2015.

    Mr Philip Dunne

    In April 2013 Public Health England took over the surveillance of methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) bacteraemia, formerly undertaken by the Health Protection Agency. We do not hold the data for 2000 and 2005.

    Cases are published according to both trust apportionment and trust assignment. For the purpose of answering this question trust apportionment or assignment can be considered as “hospital borne” cases.

    The assignment process was added to the MRSA surveillance in 2013 superseding the previously used apportionment method. The assignment process utilises individual case review and therefore allows for a much more considered categorisation of a case and associated learning to prevent similar cases occurring in the future, than was previously possible. The assignment process was only introduced in 2013 as MRSA numbers were previously considered to be too high to make this resource demanding method viable.

    The total number of trust apportioned and trust assigned cases are displayed in Tables 1 and 2 respectively.

    Table 1: Trust apportioned counts of MRSA bacteraemia in 2008, 2010 and 2015.

    April 2008 to March 2009

    April 2010 to March 2011

    April 2015 to March 2016

    1,606

    688

    297

    Table 2: Trust assigned counts of MRSA bacteraemia in 2015.

    April 2015 to March 2016

    302

    Notes:

    1. Cases are published on a financial year basis.
    2. Trust apportioned data are not available for the years 2000 and 2005.
    3. Trust assigned are not available for the years 2000, 2005 and 2010.
    4. Cases are deemed to be Trust apportioned if the following criteria are met:-

    – The location where the specimen was taken is given as ‘acute trust’ or is not known;

    – The patient was either an ‘In-patient’, ‘Day-patient’, in ‘Emergency assessment’ or is not known.

    – Patient’s specimen date is on, or after, the third day of the admission (or admission date is null), where the day of admission is day 1.

    1. Cases are deemed to be trust assigned on the basis of Post Infection Review (PIR) assignment and relevant cases are assigned to acute trusts.
    2. The trust assignment method supersedes the apportionment one post 2013 and utilises case review by the teams caring for the patient.

    “

  • Gregory Campbell – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Gregory Campbell – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Gregory Campbell on 2016-01-26.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what progress his Department has made on establishing ex gratia financial support for people who were affected prior to 1991 by (a) HIV and (b) hepatitis C over the last 12 months.

    Jane Ellison

    The Government launched its consultation on proposals to reform the current payment schemes for those affected by HIV and/or hepatitis C through National Health Service-supplied blood/blood products on 21 January 2016.

    The consultation can be accessed on the gov.uk website:

    https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/infected-blood-reform-of-financial-and-other-support

    “

  • Nic Dakin – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    Nic Dakin – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Nic Dakin on 2016-02-11.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many staff in the office of each regional schools commissioners are employed under a contract of employment to another third party.

    Edward Timpson

    The regional school commissioners currently have one agency worker and one inward secondee from a County Council.

  • Gordon Marsden – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

    Gordon Marsden – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Gordon Marsden on 2016-03-10.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, what estimate he has made of the potential number of large employers who will require existing training expenditure as a result of the introduction of the apprenticeship levy.

    Nick Boles

    The Government is committed to significantly increasing the quantity and quality of apprenticeships in England to 3 million new starts by 2020.

    Overall, there has been a steady decline in the amount and quality of training undertaken by employers over the last 20 years. This has been bad for productivity.

    We need a step change to reverse these trends and secure a high quality, sustainable apprenticeship programme, which is why we are introducing a levy on larger employers.

    The introduction of the apprenticeship levy will put employers in control of funding and incentivise them to train more apprentices. Large employers can potentially get out more than they put into the levy and will therefore have greater reward if they invest significantly in training their workforce.

    We are working closely with employers on the details of the design of the apprenticeship levy in preparation for its launch in April 2017.

  • Frank Field – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    Frank Field – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Frank Field on 2016-04-18.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many claimants making the transition from employment and support allowance to jobseeker’s allowance have received a decision assurance call; and what the outcome was of each such call.

    Priti Patel

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