Tag: 2016

  • Rachael Maskell – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

    Rachael Maskell – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Rachael Maskell on 2016-07-07.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what progress she has made on publishing the Food and Farming Plan.

    George Eustice

    Following the result of the EU Referendum, we now have an opportunity to consider our long term vision for food and farming outside of the EU.

    It remains essential that the UK has a thriving food and farming industry with high animal welfare and environmental standards, access to international markets and a long term commitment to boosting productivity through innovation and skills. We are now focused on taking forward the actions that support these objectives, in order to develop our long term vision. To do this, we will continue to work with a wide range of interests to develop that vision, and to work together to deliver it.

  • Lord Foulkes of Cumnock – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

    Lord Foulkes of Cumnock – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Foulkes of Cumnock on 2016-10-03.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government by whom the Governor of St Helena is appointed; to whom she is responsible; and to whom she reports on issues concerning the airport.

    Baroness Anelay of St Johns

    ​The Governor is Her Majesty’s representative on St Helena and is responsible for administering the St Helena Government. The Governor is appointed on the advice of, and reports on all matters to, the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, acting on behalf of Her Majesty, in order to represent the interests of the people of St Helena.

  • Jo Stevens – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

    Jo Stevens – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jo Stevens on 2016-01-22.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many cases have been transferred from community rehabilitation companies to the National Probation Service for risk escalation.

    Andrew Selous

    Offenders managed under the statutory Multi-Agency Public Protection Arrangements and those who present a high risk of serious harm are managed by the National Probation Service (NPS), while medium- and lower-risk offenders are managed by the 21 Community Rehabilitation Companies (CRCs).

    Risk is a dynamic factor, and in many cases the degree of risk presented by an offender will change during the course of his or her sentence. The new probation structure that was put in place by the previous Government is designed to respond to this by providing for management of offenders initially allocated to a CRC to transfer to the NPS if their risk increases to the higher level.

    In the first eight months following the handover of the CRCs to their new owners, 5281 offenders have been transferred from CRCs to NPS, out of a total of 234,229 offenders managed by the CRCs and NPS.

  • Philip Davies – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Wales Office

    Philip Davies – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Wales Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Philip Davies on 2016-02-10.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Wales, how many staff in his Department receive (a) home to work travel allowance, (b) a car allowance and (c) subsidised health insurance.

    Alun Cairns

    No staff in the Wales Office receive these allowances.

  • Lord MacKenzie of Culkein – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Defence

    Lord MacKenzie of Culkein – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Defence

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord MacKenzie of Culkein on 2016-03-08.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government, further to the Written Answer by Earl Howe on 22 October 2015 (HL2638), whether the study into the remuneration package for officers has been completed, and if so, whether they will publish the findings.

    Earl Howe

    The process of stakeholder engagement to support the study into the remuneration package for the Royal Fleet Auxiliary and wider Royal Naval engineering officers is complete. The study report is now being finalised. Once the report is accepted, consideration will be given to its publication, in part or in full.

  • Louise Haigh – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

    Louise Haigh – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Louise Haigh on 2016-04-13.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, what meetings (a) Ministers and (b) special advisers in his Department have had with Hanover Communications International Ltd in the last year on behalf of which clients.

    Joseph Johnson

    Departments publish details of Ministers’ and Permanent Secretaries’ meetings with external organisations, and Special Advisors’ meetings with senior media figures. BIS transparency data is published online at www.gov.uk/government/collections/bis-quarterly-publications-april-to-june-2012 and https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/bis-special-advisers.

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  • Andy McDonald – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

    Andy McDonald – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andy McDonald on 2016-05-18.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what recent discussions (a) he and (b) officials in his Department have had with the Rail North Board.

    Andrew Jones

    Since the start of the new Northern and TPE franchises on 1st April 2016, the Rail North Partnership Director (who is responsible for the management of those franchises on behalf of Rail North and the Department) has had one meeting with the Board of Rail North Ltd at which he presented his monthly report.

  • The Earl of Clancarty – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    The Earl of Clancarty – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by The Earl of Clancarty on 2016-07-07.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government, further to the remarks by Baroness Neville-Rolfe on 28 June (HL Deb, col 1490) that the military and police need to have adequate resources, how many police staff in the UK are exclusively dedicated to the recovery of stolen art and antiques; whether there are plans to increase that number; and what sources of funding are available for those posts.

    Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon

    The Home Office does not hold information on the police workforce engaged in the recovery of stolen art and antiquities. Ultimately decisions on the size, composition and deployment of a police force’s workforce are operational matters for individual chief constables, working with their democratically elected Police and Crime Commissioners. Specific funding is not provided centrally for this area of operations, and it is for the individual forces concerned to decide how best to allocate their available resources according to local and national priorities.

    The 2016-17 funding settlement for the police ensures that the police have adequate funding to do their work. In 2016/17, direct resource funding to Police and Crime Commissioners (PCCs), including council tax precept, has been protected to at least flat cash levels. This means that no PCC who chose to maximise precept is facing a reduction in cash funding in 2016/17 compared to 2015/16 and the majority are seeing marginal cash increases in their spending power.

  • Baroness Humphreys – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    Baroness Humphreys – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Baroness Humphreys on 2016-10-03.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government what percentage of children born between (1) 1 September and 30 April, and (2) 1 May and 31 August, were admitted to academy schools in each of the last three years for which figures are available.

    Lord Nash

    The department does not hold a dataset which contains both a child’s date of birth and the type of school they attend. The amount of data linkage across datasets for separate years that would be required to answer the question would incur disproportionate costs.

  • Lord Browne of Belmont – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

    Lord Browne of Belmont – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Browne of Belmont on 2016-01-21.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government what resources and schemes are being targeted at those who lack the basic levels of literacy and numeracy.

    Baroness Neville-Rolfe

    This Government understands the importance of English and maths and makes these subjects a priority for support within the adult skills system. Adults who improve their literacy and numeracy are more likely to experience better health and well-being, increase their chances of employment and progress to better jobs.

    We fully fund, through a statutory entitlement, all adults to achieve their first English and maths GCSE at grade C or above as well as other qualifications which help them get to that level. The total funding for English and maths for academic year 2013/14 (including for apprenticeships, English for Speakers of Other Languages and prisoners) was £563,961,000. Of this £142m was spent on English and maths in apprenticeships. (905,600 learners participated in English and maths courses in 2013/14)

    We fund a wide range of learners to study English and maths including:
    • Prisoners, through the Offender Learning and Skills Service
    • Learners in the community, including through Family English, Maths and Language
    • People who need English for Speakers of Other Languages
    • Trainees as part of their traineeship
    • Apprentices as part of their apprenticeship
    • Jobseekers

    We have increased our expectations of what learners should achieve in order to increase the standard of literacy and numeracy. To do this we have embedded English and maths at the heart of all our major programmes. This means:
    • Learners who did not achieve a good GCSE pass in English and/ or maths by the age of 16 are now required to continue to study those subjects post-16;
    • Since 2014/15, the English and maths requirement for Intermediate Apprenticeships has been stronger, with all apprentices who have already achieved level 1 English and maths having to work towards level 2;
    • Since 2014/15, young people undertaking a traineeship have been required to study English and maths unless they already have level 2 qualifications in these subjects;
    • In August 2014, we introduced mandatory assessment of maths and English for all newly-received prisoners to ensure that all offenders, not just those that go into learning, receive a learning assessment (focused around English and maths, but also covering learning difficulties and disabilities)

    We have reformed GCSEs to ensure they are more stretching and provide greater assurance of core literacy and numeracy than the old GCSEs. We also recognise that some people are not ready to take GCSE so we are also improving the rigour and relevance of English and maths Functional Skills qualifications, which are taken by many students and apprentices aged 16 and over. We have commissioned the Education and Training Foundation to revise the National Literacy and Numeracy Standards and reform Functional Skills. The foundation has launched a consultation which will run until April and which will involve employers, teacher and subject experts.

    We recognise the need to improve the quality of English and maths teaching in further education. We have invested over £30m over the past 3 years to fund a range of measures to improve the workforce in areas such as leadership, governance, teaching and learning, with a particular focus on maths and English. This has resulted in over 1,000 bursaries to attract graduates to teach in further education and over 3,800 teachers have benefited from training to improve the quality of their English and maths courses.
    We are undertaking a range of research to best understand where Government investment in English and maths has the greatest impact and delivers value for money. This includes:
    • Using behavioural insights to identify how to motivate adults to improve their English and maths and encourage learners to keep studying once enrolled on a course; ;
    • Longitudinal research into skills gain and skills atrophy of adult English and maths learners
    • Comparing the impact of blended and more traditional classroom learning.