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, 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.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Greg Mulholland on 2015-10-20.

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, what support his Department is providing to former workers at Redcar Steel Works to help them find alternative employment.

Anna Soubry

The Government has announced a package worth up to £80m to support people who have lost their jobs as a result of SSI’s liquidation, and mitigate the impacts on the local economy. The funding will include support for workers to retrain and help for local firms to grow and create jobs. In addition, we have established a locally led task force which has submitted proposals on how it will use this funding which the Department is looking at closely. The task force has quickly mobilised local partners and delivered a successful jobs fair last week which attracted 1817 people and 53 local employers with another one planned for next week.

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

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what independent oversight arrangement has been established to monitor the Channel programme.

Mr John Hayes

We continue to monitor and evaluate the Channel programme to ensure that it is as effective as it can be and that good practice is shared across the country. Channel evaluation is based on comprehensive monitoring systems which track outcomes over time and robust evaluation techniques that assess effectiveness.

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, how much (a) funding and (b) staffing resource is currently dedicated to that group.

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 Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, what discussions he has had with Interserve about members of his Department’s cleaning staff facing disciplinary action over a pay dispute.

Mr David Lidington

Foreign and Commonwealth Office officials asked Interserve to comment in light of allegations from Citizens UK that Interserve cleaners had been disciplined because of a letter written to The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, my right hon. Friend the Member for Runnymede and Weybridge (Mr Hammond) in July about the London Living Wage. Interserve replied to to say that they had carried out an investigation to establish whether the letter had breached their confidentiality agreement with their staff. Interserve has since confirmed that their investigation has concluded and that no disciplinary action will be taken against the staff members concerned.

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

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what recent estimate he has made of the cost of the public inquiry into the New Generation Transport trolleybus scheme; and what he expects the final cost of that inquiry to be.

Claire Perry

Leeds City Council and the West Yorkshire Combined Authority as promoters of this scheme are responsible for providing the inquiry venue and facilities; paying for professional experts to present their case; and meeting the Planning Inspectorate’s costs in providing an Inspector. The Planning Inspectorate charged £157,162 for this inquiry, based on the time spent by the Inspector preparing for, travelling to and holding the inquiry; the time spent by the Inspector writing his report; and his travelling and subsistence. Other parties to the inquiry were responsible for meeting their own costs.