Tag: 2016

  • Stephen Timms – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    Stephen Timms – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Stephen Timms on 2016-03-17.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Education, pursuant to her financial statement of 16 March 2016, Official Report, column 963, how the £500 million funding will be used to speed up the introduction of a fair national school funding formula.

    Mr Sam Gyimah

    The Chancellor announced at the Budget that £540 million would be provided to the Department for Education to support the school reform agenda. This will supplement the department’s Spending Review settlement.

    We will spend around £500 million over the Spending Review period, over and above the per pupil protection of the core school budget, to accelerate the introduction of a fair national funding formula. All of this funding will be provided to support children’s education.

    The funding means that the government will be able to accelerate gains for schools that are due to see funding increases under the formula, while continuing to offer a minimum funding guarantee for all schools. We are currently consulting on the principles and funding factors that should define the national funding formula for schools. A second consultation, later this year, will address the weighting attached to those factors and transitional arrangements, including the use of this funding.

    A link to the consultation can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/schools-national-funding-formula.

    “

  • Antoinette Sandbach – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

    Antoinette Sandbach – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Antoinette Sandbach on 2016-04-25.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, whether any aerial surveys have been carried out in Eddisbury constituency in relation to the High Speed 2 project in 2015 and 2016.

    Mr Robert Goodwill

    Aerial surveys were undertaken in this area in 2015 to capture photography, video and topographical information. Additional surveys will be undertaken in 2016 to capture hyperspectral data.

  • Lord Scriven – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Culture, Media and Sport

    Lord Scriven – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Culture, Media and Sport

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Scriven on 2016-05-24.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they intend specifically to look at providing funding to make the North a testbed for experimental technology, as recommended in the recent report The Digital Powerhouse: The innovation potential of tech clusters in the North.

    Baroness Neville-Rolfe

    Government funding is already being used to develop and trial innovative new technology in the North. £170 million has been invested in the Hartree Centre to broaden and deepen the use of High Performance Computing in industry and academia – and has since attracted inward investment of over £200m from IBM and other high-tech industry. Government has also confirmed £45 million of research funding for six new Next Generation Digital Economy Centres – including one led by Newcastle University – to drive the development of new digital technologies. The centres have secured over £22 million additional funding and support in kind that will boost the impact of these centres. In addition, £9 million has been invested in the CityVerve Internet of Things Smart City demonstrator in Manchester to trial "Internet of Things" applications on a large scale.

  • Peter Bottomley – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Peter Bottomley – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Peter Bottomley on 2016-07-20.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, for how many months Mr Aditya Agrawal was (a) employed and (b) not suspended by East Lancashire Hospitals Trust.

    Mr Jeremy Hunt

    This is an employer and employee matter between the East Lancashire Hospitals NHS Trust and Mr Aditya Agrawal respectively. The Department cannot comment on individual employment matters that are the responsibility of independent organisations, and that are subject to ongoing legal proceedings or on matters relating to individual clinical cases or other personal information. We understand that the cost to East Lancashire Trust of legal proceedings concerning Mr Agrawal is £296,848.42 to date, and that the Trust does not have insurance costs for legal awards in the event of the Trust or one of its employees being subject to legal action for defamation.

  • Bridget Phillipson – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    Bridget Phillipson – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Bridget Phillipson on 2016-10-11.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of the effect the availability of childcare provision of extended schools has had on reducing (a) the gender pay gap, (b) child poverty, and (c) workless households in England.

    Caroline Dinenage

    The evaluation of the extended schools programme suggested that extended services, which are not limited to childcare, may help overcome or ameliorate the effects of child poverty and workless households by allowing parents to work, or work more hours. Research by others, such as the Women’s Business Council, suggests that affordable, flexible childcare is key to enabling women to participate in the labour market, if they want to.

  • Madeleine Moon – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

    Madeleine Moon – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Madeleine Moon on 2016-01-05.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, if he will make representations to his Colombian counterpart on the status of the request for protection measures for Gustavo Adolfo Rengifo.

    Mr Hugo Swire

    Officials from the Our Embassy in Bogotá have raised the case of Gustavo Adolfo Rengifo with the Colombian government’s Presidential Advisor for Human Rights.

  • Karen Buck – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

    Karen Buck – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Karen Buck on 2016-02-01.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what change there was in the number of (a) mortgage and (b) landlord possession orders in each local authority between 2010 and 2015.

    Mr Shailesh Vara

    The data is published quarterly at https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/mortgage-and-landlord-possession-statistics under ‘Mortgage and landlord possession statistical data (zip file).

  • Virendra Sharma – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Northern Ireland Office

    Virendra Sharma – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Northern Ireland Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Virendra Sharma on 2016-02-23.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, what her Department’s wellness strategy is.

    Mrs Theresa Villiers

    The Northern Ireland Office’s wellness strategy is to promote and sustain a healthy, safe and supportive working environment for all our people. We do this by:

    • Providing absence and welfare policies and workplace support services;
    • Maintaining a zero tolerance policy towards discrimination, bullying and harassment in the workplace;
    • Ensuring the working environment is safe and meets Health and Safety legislative requirements;
    • Promoting an open-minded, respectful and inclusive workplace.

    As a small department the Northern Ireland Office has also secured access to the Ministry of Justice’s networks and services for our staff to use.

  • John Healey – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Communities and Local Government

    John Healey – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Communities and Local Government

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by John Healey on 2016-03-17.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, with reference to the oral contribution of Baroness Williams of Trafford, 1 March 2016, HL Deb column 809, if he will place in the Library a copy of the research referenced in that contribution on the affordability of starter homes.

    Brandon Lewis

    This is a finding from DCLG analysis of the estimated lower quartile of prices paid by first time buyers in 2014, and the total income of households in the private rented sector, considered by region.

  • Marion Fellows – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    Marion Fellows – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Marion Fellows on 2016-04-25.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what mechanisms his Department has put in place for redress and backdated payments to the parent with care in the event that it is found that the non-resident parent (a) provided false information about their income and (b) failed to inform the relevant body of an increase in their income under (i) the Child Support Agency scheme and (ii) the Child Maintenance Service scheme; and what the timescales are for such redress or payments.

    Priti Patel

    All three statutory maintenance schemes allow the Secretary of State to revise any maintenance liability decision found to be incorrect as a result of misrepresentation by either parent. There is no timescale within which the misrepresentation must be discovered, before a revision may be completed.

    Under the 2012 scheme, in the first instance maintenance is assessed using historic income information from HMRC. Annual reviews are carried out using HMRC income data and liabilities are adjusted accordingly. Over the lifetime of a case changes to income should therefore be reflected appropriately.

    Where an individual is assessed on current income, they are obliged to inform the Child Maintenance Service of any increase to their income of 25% or over. If they fail to do so and the Child Maintenance Service subsequently becomes aware of an increase in their income, the Secretary of State may still calculate a new assessment, taking effect at the point the income increased.

    Any arrears that result from such “retrospective” action will nonetheless be due and CMS will take enforcement action if the Paying Parent does not arrange to pay them themselves. The CMS has a comprehensive range of enforcement actions at its disposal, to help ensure that parents fulfil their obligations.

    All maintenance liability decisions carry an underlying right of appeal to an independent Tribunal.