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Tag: Gary Streeter

  • Gary Streeter – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    Gary Streeter – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Gary Streeter on 2016-01-21.

    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps his Department is taking to help tackle extremism in British young people.

    Karen Bradley

    Extremism poses a serious threat to this country including our young people. The Government’s Counter-Extremism Strategy aims to tackle extremism in all its forms and takes action in four areas:

    • Countering extremist ideology;

    • Building a partnership with all those opposed to extremism;

    • Disrupting extremists; and

    • Building more cohesive communities

    We have a responsibility to protect our young people from extremist views and build a safe environment priotising the safeguarding of children. That is why our local networks work with schools to help children know how to identify extremist narratives online [P.15 Strategy Q&A pack].

    We also have a responsibility to protect our young people from extremist views in school. That is why since 1 July 2015 all schools have been required to have due regard to the need to prevent people from being drawn into terrorism. To widen the protection of school children further we are consulting on a new system for registering and inspecting supplementary schools, to protect children and young people from harm, including exposure to extremist views. We have also launched ‘Educate Against Hate’, a new resource to provide parents and teachers with practical advice on protecting children from extremism and radicalisation.

  • Gary Streeter – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

    Gary Streeter – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Gary Streeter on 2016-03-08.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, what plans the Government has to implement the recent UN General Assembly Resolution on an Olympic truce during the Rio 2016 Olympic and Paralympic Games.

    James Duddridge

    The United Kingdom co-sponsored the General Assembly resolution “Building a peaceful and better world through sport and the Olympic ideal”, which calls for Member States to observe the Olympic Truce – a cessation of hostilities around the Olympic Games – within the framework of the Charter of the United Nations, and to promote peace through sport. As a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council, the UK already works to uphold the UN Charter and its commitment to the maintenance of international peace and security.

    For the 2012 Olympic Games in London the UK was the first ever nation to get all 193 UN Member States to sign the Olympic Truce. We are actively involved in building links between countries through sport. HM Government supported the successful London 2012 International Inspiration programme that reached 25m children in twenty countries through the power of sport and continues to support a range of other related initiatives around the world such as the British Council’s Premier Skills and Try Rugby programmes. Looking ahead to next year’s IAAF World Athletics Championships due to be hosted in London, the Government, through UK Sport, is supporting LEAP (Leadership and Excellence in Athletics Programme) which aims to develop youth athletics in a number of countries around the world.

  • Gary Streeter – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

    Gary Streeter – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Gary Streeter on 2016-03-23.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps she is taking to ensure that public bodies under the Environmental Protection Act 1990 comply with their duty to pick up roadside litter.

    Rory Stewart

    The Government is committed to localism and the transfer of power to local communities. This is particularly relevant in dealing with litter, which requires a local approach, tailored to the characteristics of the area and the community in which the problems occur.

    It is up to councils to decide how best to meet their statutory duty to keep their relevant land clear of litter and refuse and how to prioritise this against other local services.

    Councils are responsible for keeping their “relevant land” clear of litter and refuse, including local roads. Highways England (formerly the Highways Agency) is responsible for clearing litter from motorways and some trunk roads. Standards of cleanliness for litter and refuse are set out in the Code of Practice on Litter and Refuse, which provides a practical guide to the discharge of councils’ cleansing duties under the Environmental Protection Act 1990 (EPA).

    If a litter authority which is responsible for publicly-accessible land fails to keep land clear of litter and refuse, it can be taken to court. If the court agrees that the complaint is justified, it can issue a Litter Abatement Order (LAO) requiring the litter authority to clear land of litter within a certain time. The litter authority can also be ordered to pay the complainant’s costs.

    It is a criminal offence not to comply with an LAO – anyone not complying can be fined up to £2,500. They can also get further fines of up to £125 a day for each day the offence continues after conviction. Court action can be avoided if litter authorities clear the land within five days of being notified of the complainant’s intention to seek a Litter Abatement Order.

  • Gary Streeter – 2022 Speech on the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill

    Gary Streeter – 2022 Speech on the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill

    The speech made by Gary Streeter, the Conservative MP for South West Devon, in the House of Commons on 13 December 2022.

    I rise to speak to new clauses 8 to 11 in my name and the names of other hon. Members.

    As chair of the national parks all-party parliamentary group, and with a delightful corner of Dartmoor in my constituency, I am pleased to propose these new clauses. As we all know, national parks provide many benefits to nature, climate, heritage and culture. However, they are underpinned by an outdated legislative framework, which prevents them from realising their full potential for people, nature’s recovery, the 30×30 initiative and the Government’s net zero goals.

    The Glover review of protected landscapes in 2019 highlighted these issues and put forward a package of recommendations to address them, the majority of which, to be fair, were accepted by the Government in their response to the review. But it is time that we implemented them to make best use of the rich natural heritage that we have been blessed with in our country. The new clauses that I have tabled could act as a vehicle to take forward the Glover review’s recommendations.

    National parks play a key role in furthering the Government’s levelling-up mission, particularly in having a positive impact on our health, wellbeing and pride of place. Given this Bill’s focus on environmental matters and the planning system, it provides the perfect opportunity to implement the Glover recommendations to strengthen national parks as planning authorities. We must take this opportunity as these next few years are vital for meeting the commitment to protect 30% of England for nature by 2030, for halting the decline in species abundance and for making progress towards net zero.

    New clause 8 delivers on proposal 1 in the Glover review to give national parks a renewed mission to recover biodiversity and nature. Natural England has found that only 26% of the protected habitat area inside national parks is in favourable condition, compared with 39% for England as a whole. The new clause seeks to address this disparity by recognising that we have a role not just in protecting national parks, but in actively strengthening and recovering them. It also delivers on proposal 7 of the Glover review, which proposed a stronger mission to connect all people with our national landscapes.

    National parks have invaluable potential to improve people’s connection with nature and our levelling-up goals require that we should all enjoy equal access to nature across the country. During the lockdown, we learnt that, if we did not already know it. Natural England has shown that, if everyone has access to a green space, we could save the NHS more than £2 billion a year.

    New clause 9 implements two recommendations from the Glover review to give national park authorities a new duty to address climate change and to strengthen the existing duty on public bodies to further national park purposes. The Government have already said that national park management plans should contain

    “ambitious goals to increase carbon sequestration”

    and

    “set out their local response to climate adaptation”.

    New clause 10 helps in setting out realistic goals for national park improvement. That would deliver other key elements of proposal 3 in the Glover review, that strengthened management plans should set clear priorities and actions for nature’s recovery and climate in national parks, and that legislation should give public bodies a responsibility to help prepare and implement management plans.

    New clause 11 seeks to address Glover’s ambition to increase skills and diversity on national park authority boards. The Government’s response to Glover committed to measures to ensure that boards

    “have more flexibility to balance diversity and expertise”

    and proposes

    “a more merit-based approach”.

    So let us get on with it. The new clause would deliver this flexibility, removing the restrictive legislation referred to in the Government’s response, and ensure that boards are better equipped to deliver national park purposes. I am supported in these new clauses by the Better Planning Coalition, representing 27 organisations across the key sectors of the environment, housing, planning, and heritage.

    I had a positive meeting last week with the Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, my hon. Friend the Member for Copeland (Trudy Harrison), who is responsible for national park policy. She is committed to working with national parks to bring about the bright new future that Glover anticipates and I hope that those on the Front Bench today will assist her in that vital mission.

  • Gary Streeter – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Gary Streeter – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Gary Streeter on 2015-10-15.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what assessment he has made of the adequacy of referral times for Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service appointments in Plymouth and Devon; and if he will make a statement.

    Alistair Burt

    Neither the Department nor NHS England has made any such assessment. Clinical commissioning groups (CCGs) are responsible for commissioning services locally. Northern, Eastern and Western Devon CCG states that their Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service provider met their locally agreed target of 70% of referrals being within 18 weeks by March 2015. There has been a significant reduction in the number of children and young people waiting more than 18 weeks for treatment at the same time as a 20% increase in referral rates. Discussion has been ongoing to understand the capacity and resources needed to meet the full contract target of 95% of patients being seen within 18 weeks.

    On 3 August 2015, NHS England published guidance, developed with partners across the system, to CCGs for developing their Local Transformation Plans for children and young people’s mental health with their local partners, in line with the proposal in Future in mind. These plans will be developed by CCGs working closely with their Health and Wellbeing Boards and partners from across the National Health Service (including NHS England Specialised Commissioning), Public Health, Local Authority, Youth Justice and Education sectors. The plans will clearly articulate the local offer and cover the whole spectrum of services for children and young people’s mental health and wellbeing, from health promotion and prevention work, to support and interventions for those who have existing or emerging mental health problems, as well as transition between services.

  • Gary Streeter – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Gary Streeter – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Gary Streeter on 2015-10-15.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what the average waiting time for an autism diagnosis in Devon was in each of the last three years.

    Alistair Burt

    The Department has discussed with NHS England the difficulties that people on the autistic spectrum can have in getting an appropriate diagnosis in a timely manner. With support from the Department, NHS England and the Association of Directors of Social Services will undertake a series of visits to clinical commissioning groups to discuss good practice in meeting the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) Quality Standard 51 Autism, and those that do not, with the aim of supporting more consistent provision. These NICE guidelines already recommend that there should be a maximum of three months between a referral and a first appointment for a diagnostic assessment for autism. We expect the National Health Service to be working towards meeting the recommendations. Information on the average waiting time for an autism diagnosis in Devon in each of the last three years is not collected centrally.

    General practitioners (GPs) are required to keep adequate records of their attendance on, and treatment of, their patients and this should include details of autism where it is known. For this to work successfully locally services undertaking autism diagnosis should pass information back to the GP who has made the original referral. This is outlined in the recent Autism Statutory Guidance for local authorities and the NHS.

  • Gary Streeter – 2022 Statement Confirming Standing Down at the Next General Election

    Gary Streeter – 2022 Statement Confirming Standing Down at the Next General Election

    The statement made by Gary Streeter on 25 November 2022.

    Today I’ve announced that I will not be seeking re-election at the next general election. It has been an honour and privilege to serve the people of South West Devon and I will continue to do so until the next election.

  • Gary Streeter – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

    Gary Streeter – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Gary Streeter on 2015-09-16.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what infrastructure upgrades, other than the Reading rebuilding project, are being undertaken or planned to gain journey time benefit for the South West Peninsula from the new high-speed AT300 trains when they are introduced in December 2018.

    Claire Perry

    As part of the long-term economic plan to increase growth and create jobs in the South West, this Government has a commitment to £7.2 billion investment in transport infrastructure in the South West over this Parliament.

    As the Secretary of State for Transport set out in his oral statement to the House on 25 June, he has asked the new Chair of Network Rail, Sir Peter Hendy, to re-plan the enhancements programme. A full assessment of the delivery of the enhancements programme will be a specific task of the re-plan, which is due to report back in the autumn.

  • Gary Streeter – 2022 Comments on Boris Johnson Returning as Prime Minister

    Gary Streeter – 2022 Comments on Boris Johnson Returning as Prime Minister

    The comments made by Gary Streeter, the Conservative MP for South West Devon, on Twitter on 22 October 2022.

    David Frost nails it: we cannot go back to Boris [Johnson].

  • Gary Streeter – 2022 Comments Calling for Resignation of Liz Truss

    Gary Streeter – 2022 Comments Calling for Resignation of Liz Truss

    The comments made by Gary Streeter, the Conservative MP for South West Devon, on Twitter on 20 October 2022.

    Sadly, it seems we must change leader BUT even if the angel Gabriel now takes over, the Parliamentary Party has to urgently rediscover discipline, mutual respect and teamwork if we are to (i) govern the UK well and (ii) avoid slaughter at the next election.