The below Parliamentary question was asked by Greg Mulholland on 2016-01-18.
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, what discussions he has had with the Home Secretary on amending immigration rules to support the curry industry.
Anna Soubry
My Rt hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills has regular discussions with the Home Secretary on a wide variety of issues.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Greg Mulholland on 2016-01-20.
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what guidelines are in place on the amount of time that should be taken to process reimbursement claims from UK citizens for health treatment in other European countries; and what data his Department holds on the average amount of time taken to process such claims.
Justin Tomlinson
The EU regulations do not provide set timescales for the processing of reimbursement claims. The DWP Overseas Healthcare Team work proactively with colleagues in the other EEA states to progress reimbursement claims on behalf of UK citizens. When all the appropriate information is received from the relevant EEA state, such claims are normally cleared for reimbursement within 10 days.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Greg Mulholland on 2016-01-28.
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, if he will take steps to introduce independent checks to ensure that rented properties are genuinely abandoned within the provisions of the Housing and Planning Bill.
Brandon Lewis
The new abandonment procedure will enable landlords to legally regain possession of their property where it has been abandoned, without the need to obtain a possession order. We have introduced a number of safeguards to ensure that tenants are adequately protected against potential misuse of the procedure. These include a requirement that at least 8 weeks or 2 months rent is unpaid and requiring the landlord to serve at least 3 warning notices before they can repossess the property.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Greg Mulholland on 2016-02-23.
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what representations he has received from war widows who remarried between 1973 and 2005 on reinstatement of their war widow’s pension.
Mark Lancaster
I met the War Widows Association earlier this year and during our meeting they put forward their case for the reinstatement of War Widow’s Pensions for those widows who had remarried or cohabited before 1 April 2015.
Our policy on retrospection remains the same. For those who have already surrendered their pension due to remarriage or cohabitation, if that relationship ends they can apply to have their pension restored for life.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Greg Mulholland on 2016-03-14.
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what recent steps she has taken to tackle stone theft.
Karen Bradley
Stone theft has a detrimental effect on towns and communities across England and Wales. The impact of these crimes includes both the economic cost to the victim, but there are also wider costs to the community, for example where schools, churches or heritage items are targeted by criminals.
We have received no recent representations from local authorities on this issue, nor have we had recent discussions with the police on stone theft specifically. However, the police are working with Historic England, the Crown Prosecution Service and others to share intelligence and shape good practice in tackling and preventing heritage crime, such as stone theft.
We would encourage all victims of stone theft, whether individuals or organisations, to report instances of these crimes to their local police, so that the crimes can be properly recorded and investigated. The local response is a matter for individual chief officers of police and Police and Crime Commissioners, taking into account the specific local issues and demands that they face.
We are satisfied that the existing legislation provides the police and courts with sufficient powers to respond to stone theft.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Greg Mulholland on 2016-03-15.
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what steps he is taking to notify war widows and widowers of support groups they can access.
Mark Lancaster
All widow(er)s of serving members of the Armed Forces are sent a letter of condolence and a comprehensive Bereavement Pack which is tailored to their family circumstances and provides full details of the support available to them.
When Veterans UK are notified of the death of a Veteran the Veterans Welfare Service send a leaflet to the widow(er) detailing support groups. The Veterans Welfare Service also visit and assist in accessing further support.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Greg Mulholland on 2016-03-23.
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what guidance his Department provides to medical practitioners on the similarities between Kawasaki disease and scarlet fever.
George Freeman
The Government published the UK Strategy for Rare Diseases in November 2013. The strategy contains over 50 commitments to ensure people living with a rare disease, such as Kawasaki disease, have access to the best evidence-based care and treatment that health and social services, working with charities, researchers and industry can provide.
It is the responsibility of the professional regulators to set the standards and outcomes for education and training and approve training curricular to ensure newly qualified healthcare professionals are equipped with the knowledge, skills and attitudes to provide high quality patient care. This includes training in both scarlet fever and Kawasaki disease.
Health Education England works with bodies that set curricula such as the General Medical Council and the Royal Colleges to seek to ensure training meets the needs of patients.
The Department and its arm’s length bodies have not published any specific guidance on the similarities between Kawasaki disease and scarlet fever.
The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence’s guideline on the assessment and initial management of fever in under 5s sets out the circumstances in which a diagnosis of Kawasaki disease should be considered, and Public Health England (PHE) has endeavoured to keep healthcare professionals, schools and the general public informed of the increased incidence of scarlet fever through timely information, news stories and updates on the PHE website and by using social and other media. These awareness raising measures assist general practitioners and other frontline healthcare professionals in reaching a correct diagnosis more quickly and encourage patients to seek medical advice early so that suspected cases receive prompt antibiotic treatment to reduce the risk of complications and limit further transmission.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Greg Mulholland on 2016-04-19.
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many interventions by the Forced Marriages Unit led to criminal prosecutions of people perpetrating forced marriages.
Karen Bradley
The jointly led Home Office and Foreign and Commonwealth Office Forced Marriage Unit (FMU) leads on the Government’s forced marriage policy, outreach and casework. Figures on the number of cases reported to the FMU via its public helpline and email inbox are published annually and are available on GOV.uk. The figures include a breakdown of cases by age range. The FMU acts in an advisory capacity, and information on the number of cases which resulted in prosecutions is therefore not collated centrally.
We made forced marriage a criminal offence in 2014 to send a clear message that this brutal practice will not be tolerated in the UK. We are encouraged by the first conviction in June 2015, and the Crown Prosecution Service’s (CPS) most recent report shows that the volume of referrals from the police to the CPS has risen from 67 in 2013-14 to 82 in 2014-15. But there is still work to be done, and we will continue to work with partners to lead efforts to tackle this abhorrent crime.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Greg Mulholland on 2016-05-10.
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what assessment he has made of the adequacy of the Children’s Act 1989 to protect children from the effects of Parental Alienation syndrome and implacable hostility.
Caroline Dinenage
Guidance on Parental Alienation Syndrome is not issued to family court judges as the ‘syndrome’ is not recognised as such by many professionals in this country.
The Children Act 1989 contains adequate provisions to protect against the effects of parental alienation or implacable hostility. These include the requirement for the court to ascertain the wishes and feelings of a child who is the subject of a parental dispute, commensurate with that child’s age and level of understanding and the power to request Cafcass to prepare a welfare report into any matters relevant to the child or the family.
Cafcass practitioners are aware of the potential for children to be influenced or alienated by parental views and are alert to this possibility throughout the case.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Greg Mulholland on 2016-05-24.
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, how the £40 million that was allocated to the Supertram scheme for Leeds that was cancelled in 2005 was spent.
Claire Perry
The Department of Transport did not provide any funding for the Leeds Supertram or Leeds New Generation Trolleybus schemes. Any expenditure committed so far is the responsibility of the promoters – West Yorkshire Combined Authority and Leeds City Council.