Tag: 2016

Paul Blomfield – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Paul Blomfield on 2016-06-06.

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, pursuant to the Written Statement of 26 May 2016 on BIS consultation, HCWS30, what difficulties his Department experienced with split-site working in response to the steel crisis and Eurozone contingency planning.

Joseph Johnson

HCWS30 cites the steel crisis as an example of where the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills has recently needed to redeploy large numbers of staff to address an urgent priority. As our policy function becomes more focused over the course of the Parliament, we expect to have to redeploy staff in this way more frequently than has so far been the case. Operating across split sites, in the context of a smaller workforce overall, would make it harder to quickly redeploy people to a different team or policy area, or for someone to be able to respond to an unpredictable or unusual demand for more intensive engagement with Ministers or Parliament.

01/01/2023
Greg Mulholland – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Greg Mulholland on 2016-09-02.

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what recent assessment she has made of the effectiveness of the Security Industry Authority’s processing of license applications.

Brandon Lewis

The Home Department receives regular performance updates from the SIA, including information around the processing of licence applications. In the last financial year the SIA met its performance target for processing licence applications. We are however aware of some delays in the issuing of SIA licences following the launch of its new IT system in July 2016. The SIA have introduced a series of measures to address the issues and we will continue to monitor its performance in this area.

01/01/2023
Gareth Thomas – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Exiting the European Union

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Gareth Thomas on 2016-10-11.

To ask the Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union, which agreed EU directives have not yet been transposed directly into UK law; and if he will make a statement.

Mr David Jones

Until exit negotiations are concluded, the UK remains a full member of the European Union and all the rights and obligations of EU membership remain in force. During this period the Government will continue to negotiate, implement and apply EU legislation.

There are no outstanding directives waiting to be transposed that fall under the jurisdiction of the Department for Exiting the European Union.

01/01/2023
Alex Cunningham – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Communities and Local Government

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Alex Cunningham on 2016-01-04.

To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, what his policy is on housebuilding on floodplains.

Brandon Lewis

National planning policy is designed to protect people and property from flooding. Local planning authorities are expected to avoid inappropriate development in areas at risk of flooding by directing development away from areas at highest risk, including floodplains. The policy is underpinned by planning guidance which makes clear that new house building should not be permitted in functional floodplains where water has to flow or be stored in times of flood.

Mitigation measures to make development acceptable in flood risk areas can be made a requirement of any planning consent.

All local planning authorities are expected to follow the strict tests set out in national planning policy and guidance. Where these tests are not met, national policy is very clear that new development should not be allowed.

01/01/2023
Kevin Brennan – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the HM Treasury

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Kevin Brennan on 2016-01-28.

To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, if he will consult public sector organisations which would be affected by the proposed exit payment cap on the technical considerations of that cap.

Greg Hands

The Government maintains that £95,000 is a significant amount of money for anyone to be receiving for an exit, while the large majority of exit payments are already significantly below the level of the cap. Voluntary redundancy and workforce restructuring is not contingent upon access to six-figure exit payments. As such, we do not expect the cap to have a widespread impact on the take-up of voluntary redundancy, and believe the cap will enable public sector employers to retain the tools to effectively make organisational changes to their workforce whilst offering those made redundant generous provisions for loss of employment.

The consultation on the public sector exit payment cap ran from 31 July to 27 August 2015, and received over 4000 responses. These responses included representations from public sector organisations. The Government will publish draft regulations and invite comment on them in due course.

01/01/2023

Holly Lynch – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Holly Lynch on 2016-02-24.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what the average waiting times are for access to talking therapies in (a) the UK, (b) Yorkshire and (c) Halifax.

Alistair Burt

We do not hold the data in the format requested. What data we do hold is provided in the following table:

The number of referrals entering treatment¹ in the year, with mean and median waiting times to first treatment (days), for Improving Access to Psychological Therapies (IAPT) services in 2014/15. Data shown for NHS Calderdale Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) and all Yorkshire CCGs combined².

Organisation code	Organisation name	Total number of referrals entering treatment³	Average (mean) waiting time to first treatment appointment (days)⁴	Median⁵ waiting time to first treatment appointment (days)

	All England	815,665	32	17

	All Yorkshire CCGs combined	71,690	39	21

02E	NHS Calderdale CCG	4,200	14	6

¹In order to enter treatment a referral must have a first treatment appointment (an appointment with a therapy type recorded) in the year.

²CCG is based on general practitioner (GP) Practice. Where GP Practice is not recorded, or cannot be assigned to a CCG, the referral is categorised as ‘Unknown’.

³In order to enter treatment a referral must have a first treatment appointment in the year.

⁴The mean was used as the average.

⁵Means and medians have been rounded to the nearest whole number.

Notes:

Waiting time is measured by counting the number of days between a referral being received and the first treatment appointment. For 2014/15, the presence of a valid therapy type is used as an indicator of whether treatment was provided in the course of the appointment.

Entering treatment figures are rounded to the nearest 5.

It is generally advised that the median is used as the more reliable measure of average waiting time, as this accounts better for any outliers in the data.

Source: IAPT

01/01/2023

Lord Shinkwin – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Shinkwin on 2016-03-17.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government how much has been invested in the last year in (1) Down’s Syndrome research, (2) Down’s Syndrome screening, and (3) support for people with Down’s Syndrome.

Lord Prior of Brampton

The information requested on total investment in Down’s syndrome research is not available. Spend on research funded directly by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) is categorised by Health Research Classification System (HRCS) health categories including ‘congenital disorders’. There are no HRCS health sub-categories, such as for Down’s syndrome or other specific syndromes.

To obtain how much the National Health Service invested in Down’s syndrome screening in the last year would incur a disproportionate cost.

Data on how much has been invested in the last year on support for people with Down’s syndrome is not held centrally.

01/01/2023
Tom Blenkinsop – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Tom Blenkinsop on 2016-04-22.

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps his Department is taking to help ensure that bus operators educate their drivers on wheelchair use of the accessible space on buses.

Andrew Jones

Buses subject to the Public Service Vehicles Accessibility Regulations (PSVAR) must incorporate a designated wheelchair space.

Priorities for the use of this facility are currently the subject of proceedings at the Supreme Court.

The assistance provided by drivers can be key to giving many disabled people the confidence to travel by bus however, and we have asked Mott MacDonald to review disability-awareness training from across the transport sector to inform the development of best practice guidance for bus operators. Our aim is to ensure that every bus driver has the skills and knowledge to provide disabled customers with a first class service.

01/01/2023
Louise Haigh – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the HM Treasury

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Louise Haigh on 2016-06-06.

To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, how much was spent on non-payroll staff in his Department in 2015-16.

Harriett Baldwin

As part of the government’s transparency agenda, the department publishes on a monthly basis, information on payroll and non-payroll staff. The link for the requested years can be found below:

https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/workforce-management–2?1

There are no civil servants contracted to the department who are paid through public limited companies.

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01/01/2023
Daniel Kawczynski – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Daniel Kawczynski on 2016-09-02.

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what the annual funding from the public purse is for English Speakers of Other Languages schemes.

Robert Halfon

Funding for English for Speakers of Other Languages is not ring-fenced but forms part of the Adult Education Budget (AEB). Providers will use their AEB allocation to put on appropriate provision based on their judgement of the economic and social needs of their local area. We expect that this will include ESOL where there is significant demand.

In addition, the Government has pledged up to £10 million over five years for a jointly funded DfE and Home Office programme to enable Syrian refugees across the UK to access language tuition and integrate into British society.

01/01/2023