Tag: Greg Mulholland

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Greg Mulholland on 2015-10-21.

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, pursuant to his letter of 9 September 2015 to the hon. Member for Leeds North West, what additional training and guidance has been given to staff administering disability living allowance.

Justin Tomlinson

Between July and October 2015, training was delivered to all DLA Child decision makers on the award duration in progressive neurological conditions with special reference to Batten Disease. Guidance has also been updated to reflect the training.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Greg Mulholland on 2015-10-22.

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, with reference to paragraph 88 of the Counter-Extremism Strategy, published on 19 October 2015, what support was given to the 700 individuals.

Karen Bradley

Channel is a multi-agency process and support can be provided from a range of local agencies. The support programme is tailored to the individual based on an assessment of their vulnerabilities. It can include: ideological and theological mentoring; anger management; education skills; and family or health support. Further information is provided on page 17 of the Channel Duty Guidance, available on www.gov.uk.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Greg Mulholland on 2015-10-26.

To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, pursuant to the Answer of 26 October 2015 to Question 12724, on the Anti-Muslim Hatred Working Group, what the achievements of that group have been.

Mr Marcus Jones

Since 2012, the Anti-Muslim Hatred Working Group has advised Ministers on issues including training for journalists to tackle the negative portrayal of Muslims in the media; encouraging increased reporting and recording of anti-Muslim incidents and online abuse; supporting social media workshops to build the capacity of community organisations to promote positive narratives; and facilitating a number of regional road shows to engage communities on integration and tackling anti-Muslim hatred. The group also worked on the issue of disaggregation of anti-Muslim hate crime, as is done with anti-semitic hate crime. Last month, my Rt Hon Friend, the Prime Minister announced that police forces in England and Wales would be required to disaggregate religion based hate crime data.

The Working Group meets quarterly and uses this forum to advise Ministers on issues relating to anti-Muslim hatred rather than through official submissions.

The independent members of the Working Group volunteer their own time to take part in the group and can claim basic travel expenses for the meetings. As part of a broader role, one official in the Department provides secretariat support to the group and officials from across Government Departments attend quarterly meetings.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Greg Mulholland on 2015-10-19.

To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, how much his Department has spent on marketing the Right to Buy scheme’s extension to housing associations since 8 May 2015.

Brandon Lewis

The Department recently set up a ‘register of interest’ to promote extended Right to Buy using our existing Right to Buy website and we also signposted the register across other channels, resulting in over 2,000 expressions of interest to date from existing housing association tenants. As the set up costs have been borne from existing Right to Buy website hosting services, it would not be possible to disaggregate the costs of marketing extended Right to Buy alone but it is a very small proportion of the overall costs.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Greg Mulholland on 2015-10-19.

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what recent representations he has received from local authorities, charities and disability groups on pavement parking.

Andrew Jones

Local authorities are best placed to assess the need for pavement parking controls in their area and the effectiveness of any restrictions in place. It would be for the relevant traffic authorities to conduct an assessment of legislation specific to London.

Last year this Department received around a thousand communications from Guide Dogs campaigners in support of two Private Members’ Bills on pavement parking. Departmental officials met with Guide Dogs officials as recently as 13 October this year.

Local authorities already have the powers to introduce enforceable pavement parking restrictions where they consider it appropriate. My Department’s guidance to local authorities makes clear that, during the appraisal of their parking policies, an authority should consider whether pavement parking is problematic in any part of its area. If it is, and is not covered by an existing Traffic Regulation Order, the authority should consider amending the existing Order or making a new one. We have issued councils with authorisation to place specifically designed traffic signs without the need for Whitehall approval.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Greg Mulholland on 2015-10-21.

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what training is given to staff in his Department’s Personal Independence Payment Directorate on dealing sensitively with disabled people; and what assessment he has made of the effectiveness of that training.

Justin Tomlinson

The Department is committed to dealing with disabled claimants sensitively, adjusting to individual needs where appropriate. All frontline DWP staff are provided with Disability Awareness training on induction into DWP. This includes Equality and Diversity Essentials, Introduction to Mental Health Conditions and Supporting Vulnerable People, with some courses being tailored to Telephony staff. All staff can also access dedicated internal web pages that provide further guidance and details of additional training and support for working with vulnerable claimants. Following training, there is a consolidation process to ensure that it has been successful and a robust quality checking regime in place.

Additional training and consolidation on dealing with claims from disabled people is provided to staff processing Personal Independence Payment (PIP) claims within the benefit specific training modules. Including dedicated learning on Special Rules for Terminally Ill including the dedicated SRTI claims line. All these build on the skills developed in the previous learning, supported by access to medical advice where needed.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Greg Mulholland on 2015-10-22.

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, with reference to paragraph 117 of the Counter-Extremism Strategy, published on 19 October 2015, what the timescale is for introducing the Extremism Community Trigger.

Karen Bradley

The Extremism Community Trigger will be introduced in due course.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Greg Mulholland on 2015-10-26.

To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, pursuant to the Answer of 26 October 2015 to Question 12724, on the Anti-Muslim Hatred Working Group, if he will place in the Library a copy of all advice that group has submitted to Ministers of his Department.

Mr Marcus Jones

Since 2012, the Anti-Muslim Hatred Working Group has advised Ministers on issues including training for journalists to tackle the negative portrayal of Muslims in the media; encouraging increased reporting and recording of anti-Muslim incidents and online abuse; supporting social media workshops to build the capacity of community organisations to promote positive narratives; and facilitating a number of regional road shows to engage communities on integration and tackling anti-Muslim hatred. The group also worked on the issue of disaggregation of anti-Muslim hate crime, as is done with anti-semitic hate crime. Last month, my Rt Hon Friend, the Prime Minister announced that police forces in England and Wales would be required to disaggregate religion based hate crime data.

The Working Group meets quarterly and uses this forum to advise Ministers on issues relating to anti-Muslim hatred rather than through official submissions.

The independent members of the Working Group volunteer their own time to take part in the group and can claim basic travel expenses for the meetings. As part of a broader role, one official in the Department provides secretariat support to the group and officials from across Government Departments attend quarterly meetings.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Greg Mulholland on 2015-10-19.

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what steps he is taking to support the mental health of armed forces veterans; and how much funding his Department allocated to that purpose in (a) 2014-15 and (b) 2015-16.

Mark Lancaster

The provision of veterans healthcare, including mental healthcare, is primarily the responsibility of the National Health Service in England and the Devolved Administrations who work in close partnership with the Ministry of Defence (MOD) and service charities to ensure that veterans get the best possible care.

The MOD is determined to ensure that veterans who require help are provided with appropriate support including through the Veterans UK helpline; Veterans Welfare Service (VWS) and the Veterans and Reserves Mental Health Programme (VRMHP) which provides mental health assessments for veterans with operational Service since 1982. For these services it is not possible to disaggregate specific costs incurred in support of veterans’ mental health from wider budgets.

In addition to the support outlined above, MOD funding is provided for remedial treatment at Combat Stress homes for war pensioners with service related mental illnesses caused before 6 April 2005. In Financial Year (FY) 2014-15 the MOD spent almost £690,000 on this treatment and for FY 2015-16 we have allocated some £665,000.

NHS England spends £1.8 million per year on mental health services for veterans, including 10 veterans’ mental health teams. Up to a further £18 million of NHS England funding is in place to provide the Combat Stress six-week intensive post-traumatic stress disorder programme for veterans, and an additional £2 million of LIBOR funding is being provided to Combat Stress to help veterans with alcohol problems, which can be indicative of underlying mental health issues. Help for Heroes has received £2 million of LIBOR funding for its "hidden wounds" work which offers low-level improving access to psychological therapies services to veterans.

Subject to the forthcoming spending review, a further £8.4 million of Government funding will be provided over the next five years to help the most vulnerable veterans who have mental health problems.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Greg Mulholland on 2015-10-19.

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps he is taking to tackle vehicle parking on pavements.

Andrew Jones

Local authorities are best placed to assess the need for pavement parking controls in their area and the effectiveness of any restrictions in place. It would be for the relevant traffic authorities to conduct an assessment of legislation specific to London.

Last year this Department received around a thousand communications from Guide Dogs campaigners in support of two Private Members’ Bills on pavement parking. Departmental officials met with Guide Dogs officials as recently as 13 October this year.

Local authorities already have the powers to introduce enforceable pavement parking restrictions where they consider it appropriate. My Department’s guidance to local authorities makes clear that, during the appraisal of their parking policies, an authority should consider whether pavement parking is problematic in any part of its area. If it is, and is not covered by an existing Traffic Regulation Order, the authority should consider amending the existing Order or making a new one. We have issued councils with authorisation to place specifically designed traffic signs without the need for Whitehall approval.