Tag: Holly Lynch

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Holly Lynch on 2016-01-07.

To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, what support the Financial Conduct Authority has offered to people affected by the recent administration of Brightsource Debt Management; and what steps his Department is taking to ensure that debt consolidation companies make timely payments to creditors so that their customers’ loans are paid down as quickly as possible.

Harriett Baldwin

The Government has fundamentally reformed the regulation of the debt management market, transferring regulatory responsibility from the Office of Fair Trading to the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) a more robust and better resourced regulator.

The FCA is directing the clients of Brightsource Debt Management towards free debt advice and is engaging with the administrator to ensure the interests of clients are protected.

The FCA require debt management firms which receive client money for the purposes of paying off client debts to pay that money to creditors as soon as is reasonably practical, normally within 5 business days, unless the firm has disclosed to the client that it will hold the money for a longer period in its terms and conditions.

The FCA supervises the market; it has a broad enforcement toolkit to punish breaches of its rules and there is no limit on the fines it can levy.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Holly Lynch on 2016-02-24.

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment he has made of the effect of changes to employment and support allowance for new claimants in the work-related activity group on the mental health of those affected.

Priti Patel

We have fully assessed the impacts on equality of the welfare measures in the Bill and the wider budget, meeting our obligations as set out in the Public Sector Equality Duty. An impact assessment was published on 20 July last year.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Holly Lynch on 2016-09-02.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what support his Department is providing to those NHS trusts that are consolidating and transferring planned care services to neighbouring providers.

Mr Philip Dunne

The redesign and delivery of front-line health services is a matter for the local National Health Service – clinically led by front-line NHS organisations and clinicians who are closest to the needs of communities and therefore best placed to make decisions in the interests of their patients.

All such decisions are locally led and delivered.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Holly Lynch on 2016-01-07.

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment he has made of the extent to which jobseekers required to obtain a Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) check to take up new work can afford to do so; and if he will estimate the cost of jobcentres providing financial support for people in need of a DBS check.

Priti Patel

Employers have legal responsibility for ensuring that their current and future workforce is not barred from working with children or vulnerable adults. It is reasonable to expect employers to pay for these Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) and Protecting Vulnerable Groups (PVG) checks. DWP recognises there may be exceptional circumstances in which it is appropriate for Jobcentre Plus to reimburse the cost through the Flexible Support Fund if this will ensure a claimant can start a job.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Holly Lynch on 2016-02-24.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what the average waiting times are for access to talking therapies in (a) the UK, (b) Yorkshire and (c) Halifax.

Alistair Burt

We do not hold the data in the format requested. What data we do hold is provided in the following table:

The number of referrals entering treatment¹ in the year, with mean and median waiting times to first treatment (days), for Improving Access to Psychological Therapies (IAPT) services in 2014/15. Data shown for NHS Calderdale Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) and all Yorkshire CCGs combined².

Organisation code	Organisation name	Total number of referrals entering treatment3	Average (mean) waiting time to first treatment appointment (days)4	Median5 waiting time to first treatment appointment (days)
	All England	815,665	32	17
	All Yorkshire CCGs combined	71,690	39	21
02E	NHS Calderdale CCG	4,200	14	6

¹In order to enter treatment a referral must have a first treatment appointment (an appointment with a therapy type recorded) in the year.

²CCG is based on general practitioner (GP) Practice. Where GP Practice is not recorded, or cannot be assigned to a CCG, the referral is categorised as ‘Unknown’.

³In order to enter treatment a referral must have a first treatment appointment in the year.

⁴The mean was used as the average.

⁵Means and medians have been rounded to the nearest whole number.

Notes:

Waiting time is measured by counting the number of days between a referral being received and the first treatment appointment. For 2014/15, the presence of a valid therapy type is used as an indicator of whether treatment was provided in the course of the appointment.

Entering treatment figures are rounded to the nearest 5.

It is generally advised that the median is used as the more reliable measure of average waiting time, as this accounts better for any outliers in the data.

Source: IAPT

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Holly Lynch on 2016-09-02.

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment his Department has made of the efficacy of maximum workplace temperature regulations in protecting workers’ health and well-being.

Penny Mordaunt

A review of maximum workplace temperatures took place in 2010 and concluded that the legislation and supporting guidance is sufficient.

The existing law on workplace temperature, the Workplace (Health, Safety and Welfare) Regulations 1992, places a legal obligation on employers to provide a ‘reasonable’ temperature in the workplace. A meaningful figure is not set out in regulations due to the factors, other than air temperature, which determine thermal comfort (for example, the radiant temperature, humidity and air velocity). These factors become more significant and the interplay between them more complex as the temperature rises.

Detailed guidance on workplace temperature and thermal comfort is available on the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) website (http://www.hse.gov.uk/temperature/). This includes how to undertake a thermal comfort assessment and measures that can be taken to improve thermal comfort.

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The below Parliamentary question was asked by Holly Lynch on 2016-01-11.

To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, whether she attends the Cabinet committee on flooding.

Andrea Leadsom

The Cabinet Office regularly publishes lists of Cabinet Committees and their membership on their website – https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/the-cabinet-committees-system-and-list-of-cabinet-committees.

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The below Parliamentary question was asked by Holly Lynch on 2016-02-24.

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, when he plans to respond to Question 18949, tabled by the hon. Member for Halifax on 7 December 2015.

Mr Shailesh Vara

I can confirm that the answer to PQ 18949 was given on the 29^th February 2016.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Holly Lynch on 2016-09-14.

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment she has made of the effect on police safety of the distinction between the offences of assault on a police officer or police community support officer and resisting arrest.

Brandon Lewis

I want to be clear that an assault of any kind on a police officer or Police Community Support Officer is wholly unacceptable. The choice of which is the most appropriate offence to charge an offender with is one that the Crown Prosecution Service must take.

Sentencing guidelines already provide for assault of a police officer to be treated more severely in appropriate cases. The courts need to be able to take into account all the circumstances of each case.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Holly Lynch on 2016-01-11.

To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, what discussions she has had with the Bank of England regarding risks to financial stability that arise as a consequence of climate change.

Andrea Leadsom

The Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change met the Governor of the Bank of England on 18 September 2015. They discussed: the Bank of England’s work on financial stability and climate change with regard to its report ‘The impact of climate change on the UK insurance sector’ commissioned by the Department of Food and Rural Affairs; and the Financial Stability Board’s work on disclosure of climate risk.