The below Parliamentary question was asked by Roger Godsiff on 2016-09-05.
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what the average time taken is for family reunification of unaccompanied refugee children in Europe.
Mr Robert Goodwill
For unaccompanied refugee children accepted for transfer to the UK, transfer requests are generally processed within 10 days and children transferred within weeks.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Hunt of Kings Heath on 2016-10-13.
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what action they are taking to ensure that Clinical Commissioning Groups do not arbitrarily restrict treatments for obese people and smokers.
Lord Prior of Brampton
Arbitrary restrictions on treatment by clinical commissioning groups (CCGs) are unacceptable. Treatment decisions should always be made by doctors based on a patient’s individual clinical needs. For instance, major surgery poses much higher risks for severely overweight patients and those who smoke. So, where it is clinically appropriate, local general practitioner-led CCGs are right to ensure these patients first get support to lose weight and try to stop smoking before their operation.
NHS England must ensure that CCGs are not breaching their statutory responsibility to provide services that meet the reasonable needs of the local population, including obese people and smokers. In doing so, CCGs need to ensure that the services they provide are fit for purpose, reflect the needs of the local population and are based on the available evidence and take into account national guidelines.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Stuart C. McDonald on 2016-01-06.
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what recent assessment has been made of the health and wellbeing of refugees and asylum seekers who arrived at the UK Sovereign Base Areas in Cyprus (a) in 1998 and (b) in October 2015; and what steps are being taken to support their health and wellbeing.
Penny Mordaunt
There is no requirement to carry out assessments of the refugees and asylum seekers who arrived in 1998 as arrangements for these individuals were made some time ago to have access to health facilities in the Republic of Cyprus as and when they require. Those occupying the Sovereign Base Areas (SBA) Transit Facility located in Dhekelia who arrived in the SBA on 21 October 2015 have regular access to medical, dental and other health facilities as required. Local non-governmental organisations have engaged with the migrants and offered psycho-social support including access to social workers and refugee specialists. The Republic of Cyprus has recently commenced an education package for children and adults at the facility. Separately, the International Committee of the Red Cross, British Red Cross and Cyprus Red Cross assessed health and wellbeing in November 2015.
We have also had an official from the Department for International Development providing advice on the ground, to help us meet the refugees needs.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Black of Brentwood on 2016-02-01.
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what steps the East Midlands Strategic Clinical Network is taking to diagnose atrial fibrillation and prevent atrial fibrillation-related strokes.
Lord Prior of Brampton
NHS England’s Sustainable Improvement Team, which has taken over the work of NHS Improving Quality, is taking action to promote the use of GRASP-AF (Guidance on Risk Assessment and Stroke Prevention for Atrial Fibrillation) within general practitioner (GP) practices in England. GRASP-AF is an audit tool developed by and trialled in the National Health Service, which greatly simplifies the process of identifying patients with AF who are not receiving the right management to help reduce their risk of stroke. The Sustainable Improvement Team is currently collaborating with partner organisations, including charities, to support the nationwide roll-out of GRASP-AF.
To support this work, an analysis of the costs and benefits of using the anticoagulant drug warfarin to help prevent stroke in people with AF was recently published. A copy of this analysis is attached.
The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence also published a Quality Standard on AF in July 2015, which sets out what a high quality AF service should look like and will help drive improvement locally. A copy of this Quality Standard is attached.
There is also a wealth of information available on the detection and management of people who have AF. The NHS Atlas of Variation includes such data and similarly Public Health England (working with stakeholders) has produced information for clinical commissioning groups (CCGs) to enable them to identify and encourage poorly performing areas to improve their detection and management of people with AF. The Atlas is an online tool and therefore it is not possible to attach a copy.
These resources are available to Strategic Clinical Networks to help them with their work to improve the prevention and diagnosis of AF locally.
AF related stroke prevention has been a significant area of focus for the East Midlands Cardiovascular Strategic Clinical Network in recent years. Actions include:
– providing individual advice to CCGs in the area, supporting CCGs to implement AF training for GPs;
– supporting CCGs to implement GRASP-AF;
– developing a non-valvular AF anticoagulation algorithm which has informed updates to local AF guidelines;
– developing an electronic clinical template for the diagnosis and management of AF; and
– promoting the use of the warfarin patient safety audit tool.
AF is also covered as in the National Cardiovascular Intelligence Network’s masterclass programme aimed at all NHS health professionals within CCGs, local authorities and clinical services with an interest in cardiovascular disease data tools and information.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Chris Heaton-Harris on 2016-02-25.
To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, pursuant to the Answer of 11 January 2016 to Question 20697, on national insurance: EEA Nationals, when HM Revenue and Customs will publish the information referred to in that Answer.
Mr David Gauke
I refer the honourable members to the recent HMRC release.
https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/tax-credit-statistics-on-eea-nationals
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The below Parliamentary question was asked by Nicholas Soames on 2016-04-08.
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, who is responsible for litter clearance on the A1.
Andrew Jones
Under the Environmental Protection Act 1990, Highways England is responsible for litter clearance on all England’s motorways and a few selected A roads or trunk roads for specific operational reasons. Local authorities are responsible for litter on all local roads, including the vast majority A roads on the strategic road network.
Highways England is responsible for litter clearance on all sections of the A1(M). All sections of the A1 in England are cleared by the relevant local authorities, with the exception being of a short section of the A1 from the A1(M) junction 1 to the boundary between the Borough of Hertsmere and the London Borough of Barnet.
Litter clearance of the A1 within the Greater London Authority boundary is the responsibility of Transport for London or the relevant London Boroughs. Litter clearance of the A1 in Scotland is a matter for the devolved administration.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by James Cartlidge on 2016-04-26.
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, how much revenue was raised from fines levied on heavy goods vehicles for exceeding weight restrictions on weight restricted roads in the last year for which figures are available.
Andrew Jones
Penalties related to heavy goods vehicles exceeding weight restrictions on weight restricted roads in England outside London are applied under the criminal justice system. I have been advised by the Ministry of Justice that this specific information is not held. Collating this information would incur a disproportionate cost, because individual cases would need to be looked at. My Department does not hold figures for the civil enforcement fines for this infringement applied by local authorities in London.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jonathan Ashworth on 2016-06-07.
To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, whether he has met with Mr Mark Samworth in the last six months.
Harriett Baldwin
Treasury Ministers and officials have meetings with a wide variety of organisations in the public and private sectors as part of the process of policy development and delivery. Details of ministerial and permanent secretary meetings with external organisations on departmental business are published on a quarterly basis and are available at:
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The below Parliamentary question was asked by Luciana Berger on 2016-09-05.
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what steps he is taking to ensure the efficient and timely transfer of prisoners to hospitals under the provisions of the Mental Health Act 1983; and how many prisoners have waited for more than 14 days for such a transfer in each quarter since April 2015.
Nicola Blackwood
Department of Health guidance was published in 2011 on best practice to achieve urgent transfers within 14 days. NHS England continues to work with prison healthcare and secure mental health providers to improve processes so that this can be achieved.
NHS England has provided information on transfers as detailed below.
|
Period |
Transfers |
Transfers >14 days |
|
Quarter 1 Financial Year (FY) 2015-16 |
72 |
232 |
|
Quarter 2 FY 2015-16 |
136 |
238 |
|
Quarter 3 FY 2015-16 |
92 |
213 |
|
Quarter 4 FY 2015-16 |
112 |
458 |
|
Quarter 1 FY 2016-17 |
92 |
209 |
Note: the numbers above are reported transfers in the time period, an individual prisoner may be represented in more than one time period
Data for this indicator has improved since data collection began in April 2015. NHS England have since improved the data collection and quality under the Health and Justice Indicators of Performance and the information above now represents data from all prisons.
NHS England intends to publish data collected through Health and Justice Indicators of Performance since April 2016 in future, but a firm date for publication is not yet available.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Baroness Thomas of Winchester on 2016-10-13.
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the impact of inflation on those who rely on benefits.
Lord Freud
Central to the Government’s long term economic plan is the creation of jobs and making work pay. We know that work is the best route out of poverty so our welfare reforms are focussed on supporting those people who can work to find and keep work rather than rely on benefits, ensuring fairness and affordability for the tax payer. We are committed to balancing incentivising work with protecting pensioners and those who cannot work, and help with the costs of additional needs. That is why benefits for the additional costs of disability, and for carers, are up-rated each year in line with prices, and the basic and new State Pensions are up-rated with our triple lock guarantee.