Tag: Barry Sheerman

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Barry Sheerman on 2016-03-07.

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what funding will be available for third-sector training providers to support young people who are not in education, employment or training once the Youth Contract comes to an end.

Nick Boles

Local authorities have a duty to track, support and encourage young people to participate in education and training, with a particular focus on those who are not in employment, education or training (NEET). The Department for Education supports local authorities in meeting this duty by: providing a secure portal for them to exchange data about young people’s activities; collating and publishing data about young people’s activities; sharing good practice; and publishing a NEET Scorecard to help local authorities manage their performance.

Local authorities decide how they will work with and support education and training providers, the Voluntary and Community Sector (VCS), and other agencies in meeting these requirements.

Local authorities receive funding from central government to enable them to meet their statutory obligations including this duty, but it is up to them to determine exactly how much they spend on these activities, and whether and how much funding should be provided to VCS organisations to help with this. Reflecting its continued commitment to supporting young people NEET, the government has allocated £30 million for the Youth Engagement Fund and Fair Chance Fund Social Impact Bond (SIB) schemes, and the recent Spending Review settlement saw over £100 million for further SIBs, tackling issues such as youth unemployment, homelessness and mental health.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Barry Sheerman on 2016-04-08.

To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, how many workers his Department estimates will be financially worse off as a result of the recent increase in the minimum wage.

Damian Hinds

The introduction of the National Living Wage on April 1^st marked a pay rise for low paid workers across the UK. Our objective is for it to reach over £9 by 2020. This means an employee aged 25 or over working full-time on the National Minimum Wage will earn over £4,200 a year more by 2020 in cash terms, or £3,800 after taking into account inflation. 2.9m low wage workers are expected to benefit directly, and up to 6m could see a pay rise as a result of a ripple effect up the earnings distribution.

The independent Office for Budget Responsibility estimated that the NLW would have, in their words, only a “fractional” effect on unemployment. And taking into account the NLW, the OBR forecast that employment would rise by 1.1 million by 2020.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Barry Sheerman on 2016-04-08.

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what estimate her Department has made of the proportion of free schools that have participated in local authority pupil place planning in each of the last three years.

Edward Timpson

Data reported at May 2015 showed that local authorities (LAs) already had plans in place to deliver more than 80,000 new places in 2016/17, and we know many more will have been planned and delivered since then, including through central programmes.

Free schools can play an important part in helping LAs meet place pressures, and every free school has been opened in response to either the need to provide extra school places, the need to provide parents with greater choice or the need to provide more high quality school places. 85% of mainstream free schools approved since January 2014 are in areas where there was a basic need for additional school places. An additional group of schools were approved on the basis of more up-to-date LA data on future need for places and where section 106 agreements suggest need related to new housing developments. There are currently 117 mainstream free schools in the pipeline.

Many local authorities are recognising the opportunity that the free schools programme provides and are encouraging new and existing high quality education providers to apply to set up a new school in their area. We encourage all local authorities to do likewise.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Barry Sheerman on 2016-04-19.

To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, what steps she is taking to ensure that people in receipt of Government administered free cavity wall insulation schemes do not suffer damp in their houses after insulation.

Andrea Leadsom

Under the Energy Company Obligation, which is the primary government support for measures of this type, the insulation of a cavity wall must be accompanied by an appropriate guarantee, approved by Ofgem. Amongst other criteria, the guarantee must include an assurance framework for the quality of the installation and the product used in the installation. As the administrator of ECO, Ofgem assess the suitability of this framework.

Alongside this, the Department for Communities and Local Government has begun research into dampness in buildings caused by both internal moisture and wind-driven rain and related to insulation. This project is due for completion later this year. We are also aware of the recent publication of BBA Technical report No. 3, Full fill cavity wall insulation in areas of very severe exposure to wind driven rain.

The results of both projects, together with any other relevant information, will be considered as part of any review of the regulations and associated statutory guidance. DECC and DCLG have also commissioned Dr Peter Bonfield to conduct a wider independent review of consumer advice, quality and standards and consumer protection for energy efficiency and renewable installations. The findings of this review will cover installations of Cavity Wall insulations. This report will be published in due course.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Barry Sheerman on 2016-05-24.

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps the Government is taking to deter young people from committing cyber crime.

Mr John Hayes

The Government’s Serious and Organised Crime Strategy (2013) sets out our approach to deterring people from becoming involved in serious and organised crime, including cyber crime.

In March 2015, the Home Office published additional guidance to support local partners to understand pathways into serious and organised crime and put in place Prevent interventions for individuals at risk. The Home Office works closely with law enforcement, in particular the National Crime Agency (NCA) , to understand the drivers behind young people committing cyber crime.

Working to the Serious and Organised Crime Strategy, the NCA aims to prevent young people from becoming involved in cybercrime in the first place, moving deeper into cyber crime and/or reoffending. The NCA works with both domestic and international partners to raise awareness of what activity is illegal, what are the consequences and the many positive career pathways available for those with technical cyber skillsets.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Barry Sheerman on 2016-09-02.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what recent discussions he has had with NHS England on the allocation of funding for second stem cell transplants.

David Mowat

My Rt. hon. Friend the Secretary of State has not had any discussions related to the allocation of funding for second stem cell transplants.

NHS England has announced that the second stem cell transplants will be included as part of a re-run of the prioritisation process by the Specialised Commissioning Oversight Group to be completed later this year.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Barry Sheerman on 2016-09-12.

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps he is taking to ensure that public transport is adequately equipped for people with sensory loss.

Andrew Jones

The Government recognises how important improving access to public transport is for people with visual impairments and is committed to making transport more inclusive.

Buses and coaches subject to the Public Service Vehicles Accessibility Regulations (PSVAR) must incorporate a range of features to make bus travel more accessible for visually impaired people, including priority seating, colour-contrasting hand-holds and step edges, and destination blinds using clear typefaces. PSVAR applies to single-deck buses already, and double-deck buses must comply from 1^st January 2017.

The Bus Services Bill will specifically allow enhanced partnership schemes to require all buses within a local area to provide audible and visual next stop information. Authorities using the new franchising powers will be able to place similar requirements on affected operators. The Government has also agreed to consider amendments on this issue which were tabled during the Bill’s committee stage in the House of Lords.

We are also aware that positive interactions with bus drivers can make a big difference to the experience of visually impaired people taking the bus. We are working with the bus industry and disabled people to design best practice guidance in delivering disability awareness training which, we hope, will help to give bus drivers the skills and knowledge to assist every disabled passenger.

The Government also intends to publish an Accessibility Action Plan for consultation by the end of the year which will present its ambition for further progress on this agenda.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Barry Sheerman on 2016-10-07.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many hospital-borne cases of MRSA were recorded in England in (a) 2000, (b) 2005, (c) 2010 and (d) 2015.

Mr Philip Dunne

In April 2013 Public Health England took over the surveillance of methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) bacteraemia, formerly undertaken by the Health Protection Agency. We do not hold the data for 2000 and 2005.

Cases are published according to both trust apportionment and trust assignment. For the purpose of answering this question trust apportionment or assignment can be considered as “hospital borne” cases.

The assignment process was added to the MRSA surveillance in 2013 superseding the previously used apportionment method. The assignment process utilises individual case review and therefore allows for a much more considered categorisation of a case and associated learning to prevent similar cases occurring in the future, than was previously possible. The assignment process was only introduced in 2013 as MRSA numbers were previously considered to be too high to make this resource demanding method viable.

The total number of trust apportioned and trust assigned cases are displayed in Tables 1 and 2 respectively.

Table 1: Trust apportioned counts of MRSA bacteraemia in 2008, 2010 and 2015.

April 2008 to March 2009	April 2010 to March 2011	April 2015 to March 2016
1,606	688	297

Table 2: Trust assigned counts of MRSA bacteraemia in 2015.

April 2015 to March 2016

302

Notes:

1. Cases are published on a financial year basis.
2. Trust apportioned data are not available for the years 2000 and 2005.
3. Trust assigned are not available for the years 2000, 2005 and 2010.
4. Cases are deemed to be Trust apportioned if the following criteria are met:-

– The location where the specimen was taken is given as ‘acute trust’ or is not known;

– The patient was either an ‘In-patient’, ‘Day-patient’, in ‘Emergency assessment’ or is not known.

– Patient’s specimen date is on, or after, the third day of the admission (or admission date is null), where the day of admission is day 1.

1. Cases are deemed to be trust assigned on the basis of Post Infection Review (PIR) assignment and relevant cases are assigned to acute trusts.
2. The trust assignment method supersedes the apportionment one post 2013 and utilises case review by the teams caring for the patient.

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The below Parliamentary question was asked by Barry Sheerman on 2016-10-17.

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps the Government plans to take to increase the number of household waste recycling centres that accept liquid paint.

Dr Thérèse Coffey

The Government has been engaging constructively with the British Coatings Federation on making better use of leftover paint, including identifying potential regulatory barriers to its recycling and remanufacture and how these might be overcome.

The Waste and Resources Action Programme (WRAP) encourages consumers to recycle and re-use household paint by providing information through the Recycle Now website. This includes a postcode locator which helps pinpoint local Household Waste Recycling Centres (HWRCs) that accept leftover paint. The Government’s Innovation in Waste Prevention Fund has also supported a pilot paint re-use project in Cheshire involving local charities, working with HWRCs and housing associations to increase paint donation and minimise disposal. WRAP will publish a summary of the project, lessons learned and a video case study later in the year.

In terms of public procurement, it is for each Government department to consider sustainability and put this into practice in its own procurement activity. Government Buying Standards do not currently include remanufactured paint. WRAP has recently published a guide on ‘How to Include Re-use in Local Authority HWRC Procurement’.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Barry Sheerman on 2015-11-13.

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, what steps he is taking to promote joint work between special needs assessors and disability advisers within universities on ensuring that appropriate support is given and provision made for disabled students and for students with dyslexia.

Joseph Johnson

Higher education institutions are responsible for meeting their legal obligations under the Equality Act 2010, including for students with dyslexia.

The legal duty to provide reasonable adjustments applies to all disabled students. In addition Disabled Students Allowances (DSAs) are available where the needs of the student cannot be met by the institution by way of such a reasonable adjustment. A consultation on DSAs closed on 24 September and the Government response will be published in due course.