Tag: 2016

  • Rosie Cooper – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Rosie Cooper – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Rosie Cooper on 2016-02-24.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what training staff in (a) Lancashire and (b) the North West who handle NHS 111 calls receive other that the mandatory training covered by the NHS 111 Commissioning Standards.

    Jane Ellison

    This information is not held centrally and is a matter for the local providers and commissioners.

    The NHS 111 commissioning standards issued in June 2014 state that all staff involved in handling NHS 111 calls must comply with the Licensing Requirements of the Clinical Decision Support Software used (NHS Pathways). Staff must also undertake training on: how to interact with urgent care services; the use of local Directories of Services; NHS Values; delivering excellent customer services; and safeguarding.

  • Steve McCabe – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    Steve McCabe – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Steve McCabe on 2016-03-15.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what financial support her Department has provided to fostering services in each year from 2011 to 2015; and how much that funding was for looked after child in each of those years.

    Edward Timpson

    Local authority (LA) funding for the provision of children’s services, including fostering services, is provided by the Department for Communities and Local Government. However, LAs are required to submit annual budget and outturn statements about their actual spending to the Secretary of State for Education.

    The total LA expenditure on looked after children (including fostering), based upon the section 251 out turn statements, are set out below for each financial year between

    2011 – 2015:

    2011-12 (£000s)

    2012-13 (£000s)

    2013-14 (£000s)

    2014-15 (£000s)

    Looked After Children

    £3,383,664

    £3,495,626

    £3,661,327

    £3,768,523

    Fostering

    £1,376,869

    £1,477,678

    £1,515,352

    £1,540,324

    Since the introduction of the Children’s Social Care Innovation Programme in October 2013, the Department is funding the following programmes relating to supporting fostering:

    The £100 million Children’s Social Care Innovation Programme is currently supporting 53 projects in the development, testing and spreading of more effective ways of supporting children and families who need help from children’s social care services. The programme is providing funding to projects which have elements that support foster services including matching, specialist foster placements and foster family support and training.

    Achieving for Children (£1.1 m) to develop a new approach to supporting adolescents in, and on the edge of, care across the two boroughs of Richmond and Kingston. This will draw together specialist fostering placements, a children’s home and a family intervention team using a new, consistent training programme ‘Better by Design’ across all of these elements.

    Action for Children (up to £3.3m) to work with Barnet, Harrow and Hounslow councils to run a suite of evidence based programmes (functional family therapy, multi-systemic therapy and multi-dimensional treatment foster care) to transform the support available to adolescents in West London.

    The Fostering Network (£1.6m) to import and adapt the successful mockingbird family model of fostering from the US to the UK. Mockingbird clusters a group of 10 foster carers around a ‘hub’ home. This hub, led by an experienced foster carer, provides respite support and short breaks to the carers in the cluster. All of the carers receive shared training and the carers and young people within a cluster meet regularly, engage in activities and get to know and support each other.

    The National Implementation Service (£4.1m) to hot-house, test and build the sustainability of evidence-based interventions in the UK – including multi-systemic therapy and RESuLT (a therapeutic training programme for residential care staff). Four sites have been specially funded to implement KEEP Safe, a training and support programme for foster carers who look after teenagers.

    Match Fostercare (£781k) to take on delegated statutory social work responsibilities for children in foster care from several local authorities. They believe this will reduce duplication and bureaucracy and provide a better service to children.

    NSPCC (£1m) to introduce the New Orleans intervention model in South London. The model aims to transform delivery and joint commissioning in children’s social work and CAMHS teams in relation to children aged 0 to 5 years who are in foster care due to maltreatment.

    Sheffield and South Yorkshire Councils (£1.2m) to develop a sub-regional delivery model for young people experiencing or at risk of child sexual exploitation. This will include recruitment, development and support of specialist foster carers to provide safe placements for young people across South Yorkshire. Local authorities involved are Sheffield, Barnsley, Rotherham and Doncaster. Other partners are LSCBs in these areas and South Yorkshire police.

    Further details about these and other Innovation Programme funded projects can be found here:

    http://springconsortium.com/projects-being-funded/

    “

  • David Lammy – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Defence

    David Lammy – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Defence

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by David Lammy on 2016-04-19.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what the (a) status and (b) purpose is of the Defence Diversity and Inclusion Programme established in September 2013.

    Penny Mordaunt

    The Defence Diversity and Inclusion Programme (DDIP) is a high priority change programme aimed at increasing the diversity of our workforce – both military and civilian. The Defence Board agreed in 2014 that the DDIP should be regarded as core business, on a par with other Defence Transformation activities.

    The main purpose of the DDIP is to ensure that Ministry of Defence outputs are delivered by the right mix of capable and motivated people that appropriately represent the breadth of the society we exist to defend, now and in the future. The programme continues to drive real change in the core areas of leadership and culture; recruitment; retention and progression; and outreach, seeking to remove barriers where they might exist.

    The benefits of this will be better access to talent for Defence’s workforce and improving the Armed Forces’ ability to achieve overall recruitment levels; improved decision making as a result of the different perspectives that come from a more diverse workforce; greater levels of cultural understanding so that we are more effective and trusted in our international operations and activities; improved workforce engagement and morale; and better relations with, and support from, the wide range of communities within British society as a result of a more representative workforce.

  • Imran Hussain – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for International Development

    Imran Hussain – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for International Development

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Imran Hussain on 2016-05-26.

    To ask the Secretary of State for International Development, whether her Department plans to increase the number of interventions to tackle violence against women and girls through programmes funded by her Department at (a) donor and (b) country level.

    Mr Nick Hurd

    As set out in our UK Strategy to end violence against women and girls: 2016 to 2020 we are pursuing an ambitious programme of work at the international level. Scaling up efforts to eliminate VAWG requires global action and leadership. DFID is continuing to demonstrate leadership internationally, for example, at the World Humanitarian Summit the UK announced an expansion of the VAWG programme in Syria with UNFPA. DFID will continue to support VAWG interventions at country and central level where it is appropriate and where there is a comparative advantage for DFID to do so .

  • Virendra Sharma – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Virendra Sharma – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Virendra Sharma on 2016-07-18.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what proportion of visits to accident and emergency departments were for minor ailments in (a) England and (b) former strategic health authority areas in each year since 2006.

    Mr Philip Dunne

    The information is not available in the format requested. Such information as is available is attached.

    NHS England publishes information on the number of attendances at all types of accident and emergency department. A type 3 accident and emergency department is one that treats minor injuries and illnesses (sprains for example) and can be routinely accessed without an appointment. In this context, minor ailments have been interpreted as a type 3 accident and emergency attendance.

    Data are reported to NHS England by all organisations providing National Health Service funded emergency care services and averaging more than 200 attendees per month. It is not possible to aggregate these data to clinical commissioning group, and the 10 strategic health authorities were abolished in March 2013. Published data for type 3 attendances are only available from 2011-12 onwards. These data are presented by 13 commissioning sub-regions, which are not legal entities but are sub-divisions of NHS England.

  • James Cartlidge – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

    James Cartlidge – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by James Cartlidge on 2016-10-10.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps the Government has taken with the food, farming and agri-tech industries to treble the number of apprenticeships in those sectors.

    George Eustice

    Food, farming and agri-tech apprenticeships provide exciting career opportunities and the Food and Drink Federation predict they will need 130,000 new skilled recruits by 2024.

    Food and farming businesses have led the way in developing new standards, so that apprenticeships such as “Dairy Technologist” are ready for delivery.

    We are also encouraging food and farming apprentices to feature in the “Get In Go Far” apprenticeships campaign.

  • FALSE – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

    FALSE – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by FALSE on 2015-12-17.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government, further to the Written Answer by Baroness Anelay of St Johns on 16 December (HL4327) that we are not submitting any evidence of possible genocide against Yezidis and Christians to international courts

    Baroness Anelay of St Johns

    The Government believes that recognition of genocides should be a matter for international courts. It should be a legal, rather than political determination, decided by international judges after consideration of all the evidence available in the context of a credible international judicial process.

    However, we are funding a project that is documenting sexual violence in Iraq, in a victim sensitive way. This database of cases will then be used to help survivors access justice and ensure that perpetrators are held to account. We also co-sponsored the UN Human Rights Council Resolution mandating the UN to investigate and report on Daesh abuses.

  • Tasmina Ahmed-Sheikh – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

    Tasmina Ahmed-Sheikh – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Tasmina Ahmed-Sheikh on 2016-01-27.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, pursuant to the Answer of 4 January 2016 to Question 20769, how many individuals have been subject to sanctions imposed by the UK Government for (a) brokering oil deals between Daesh and the Assad regime and (b) other matters covered by UN Security Council Resolution 2253.

    Mr Tobias Ellwood

    The UK implements the EU’s Syria Sanctions Regime. The EU has listed George Haswani due to his role as a middleman in the purchase of oil from Daesh by the Syrian Regime. In doing so he helps the regime’s military effort against the Syrian people.

    There are an additional 26 Daesh related individuals/entities on the UN list that the UK takes action against, five of whom the UK proposed in September, and the majority of whom we have co-sponsored with partners. This was the first time the British Government asked the UN to add Britons associated with Daesh to its ‘Daesh and Al-Qaeda Sanctions list’, which UNSCR 2253 renewed. We will continue to consider whether more individuals should be subjected to the sanctions.

    The UK implements all UN Daesh/AQ sanctions fully following the adoptions of UN Security Council Resolution 2253 on 17 December 2015.

    Our primary focus remains bringing individuals supporting terrorist organisations to justice; for example the recent conviction of Tareena Shakil who had been a member of Daesh in Syria and encouraged acts of terror.

  • Diane Abbott – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for International Development

    Diane Abbott – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for International Development

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Diane Abbott on 2016-02-24.

    To ask the Secretary of State for International Development, whether her Department has made an assessment of the potential effect of the change in the OECD definition of foreign aid to include some military spending on the effectiveness of aid spend on reducing poverty.

    Justine Greening

    We welcome the outcome of the recent High Level Meeting of the OECD’s Development Assistance Committee (DAC), which agreed how the Official Development Assistance (ODA) rules should be updated to better tackle the pressing global development issues of the 21st century. The updates to the ODA rules both better recognise the detrimental impact that conflict, fragility and insecurity have on efforts to tackle poverty and reflect the importance of private sector investment for development.

  • Michelle Donelan – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

    Michelle Donelan – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Michelle Donelan on 2016-03-15.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, if he will press for the release of former Malaysian opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim.

    Mr Hugo Swire

    We have made clear on a number of occasions our deep concern about Anwar Ibrahim’s imprisonment. I made a statement on 10 February 2015, following his conviction and sentencing. The Prime Minister, my Rt Hon. Friend the Member for Witney (Mr Cameron), raised Anwar Ibrahim’s case with his Malaysian counterpart during a visit to Malaysia in July last year.

    A number of other Ministers have raised Anwar Ibrahim’s case with their Malaysian counterparts. Most recently, in separate meetings with Malaysia’s Deputy Prime Minister in London in November 2015, the Home Secretary, my Rt Hon. Friend the Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May) and I raised our concerns, including about his health and medical treatment. I have also met Anwar Ibrahim’s daughter, Nurul Izzah, several times to discuss this case, most recently in February.

    We are aware of concerns regarding judicial independence and the rule of law in this case. We will continue to raise our concerns and encourage Malaysia to recognise the importance of international confidence in its judicial system and to restore trust in its commitment to international human rights standards.