Tag: Jamie Reed

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jamie Reed on 2015-10-22.

To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, if he will make it his policy in the forthcoming Comprehensive Spending Review to provide ring fenced funding for a feasibility study into the trunk road section of the A595.

Greg Hands

Highways England will soon start a new programme of Route Strategies, aiming to develop an investment programme for the years 2020-25. These will be the forum where MPs and members of the public can make the case for improvements in their area. If improvements to the A595 are proposed through this process, they will be considered carefully for investment in the next Road Investment Strategy.

Further details of Spending Review decisions will be announced on 25 November.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jamie Reed on 2015-10-19.

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, what assessment he has made of the skills gap in Cumbria.

Nick Boles

It is not for central government to assess local skills needs. Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEPs) are working in collaboration with local authorities, colleges and providers in the area to jointly agree key local skill needs and develop a local skills offer that is responsive to local labour market conditions and contributes to improving our productivity.

Cumbria LEP and the Cumbria Employment and Skills Commission are currently refreshing the area skills strategy and this will be finalised in December 2015. It will include a review of the skills needs of the four key sectors denoted in the Cumbria Strategic Economic Plan: Nuclear and Energy; Advanced Manufacturing; Rural and Visitor Economy; and, Infrastructure Improvements. The Skills Commission has noted that the future skills needs of the nuclear sector and BAE Systems Submarine will create significant pressure for skilled labour, particularly in advanced manufacturing and engineering. This will create displacement challenges in other manufacturing businesses in the area.

In September the government announced a programme of area reviews, which will be locally led and will involve key stakeholders. They will be based on the best available evidence of skills requirements and establish a local post-16 education and training offer which is high quality and responsive to employer need. The reviews will support local involvement in the ongoing commissioning of provision, putting responsibility in the hands of people who are best placed to tailor provision to local economic needs. Cumbria will be included in the area review process, due to be completed by March 2017 and an announcement on the date for the review will be announced in due course.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jamie Reed on 2015-10-22.

To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, how many official visits he has made to (a) Copeland constituency and (b) Cumbria as part of the Northern Powerhouse initiative.

Greg Hands

Last week the Chancellor of the Exchequer was in Manchester, Newcastle and Teesside and would hope to visit Cumbria in due course.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jamie Reed on 2015-10-19.

To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, what estimate he has made of the proportion of people in receipt of tax credits who will have their income reduced as a result of the proposed government changes to tax credits.

Damian Hinds

The government set out its assessment of the impacts of the Summer Budget policies in the Welfare Reform and Work Bill on 20^th July 2015. Taken together, the introduction of the National Living Wage, increases in the personal allowance and welfare changes mean that 8 out of 10 working households will be better off as a result of the Summer Budget.

The Summer Budget offered a new deal for working people. It means Britain moving from a high welfare, high tax, low wage economy to a lower welfare, lower tax, higher wage society.

A new National Living Wage for workers aged 25 and above, initially set at £7.20 per hour from April 2016, will directly benefit 2.7 million low wage workers, and up to 6 million could see a pay rise as a result of a ripple effect up the earnings distribution. The new National Living Wage will boost pay for those currently earning the National Minimum Wage by £4,800 a year by 2020 when the National Living Wage is expected to rise to over £9 per hour.

To help working families keep more of what they earn, the personal allowance will increase to £11,000 in 2016-17 and £11,200 in 2017-18. The government has committed to increase the personal allowance to £12,500 by 2020 which will mean that a typical basic rate taxpayer will see their income tax cut by £1,205 a year compared to 2010.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jamie Reed on 2015-10-22.

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what investment in the road network the Government plans to make in (a) Copeland constituency and (b) Cumbria as part of the Northern Powerhouse initiative.

Andrew Jones

The Government is working with Transport for the North to determine future transport investment priorities for the next road and rail investment periods in the North of England. This work builds on the “Northern Powerhouse: one Agenda, One economy, One North” report published in March this year with a further report focussing on investment priorities due in March 2016.

In the meantime, Government is undertaking a Northern Trans-Pennine strategic study to examine the case for improving or dualling one or both of the A66 and A69 between the A1(M) and M6.Improvements to either of these routes would benefit the economy of Cumbria and further help the development of a northern powerhouse.

Government is also providing £7.638m for integrated transport improvements and £75.981m for highways maintenance to Cumbria council for the three years 2015/16 to 2017/18, both of which can be used to invest in the road network in Cumbria and Copeland. Over £8m of Local Growth Funding has been provided to the Cumbria Local Enterprise Partnership for three local road projects in Kendal, Ulverston and Workington, although none of these are in the Copeland.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jamie Reed on 2015-10-19.

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what the current status is of schools placed in special measures in Cumbria.

Nick Gibb

As of 30 September there are three schools in Cumbria judged by Ofsted as requiring special measures. Of these:

Two are local authority maintained; the first, a PRU is judged to be making reasonable progress towards the removal of special measures. The second, a small community

primary school, is making reasonable progress towards the removal of special measures.The third, a sponsored academy has recently been re-inspected. We are awaiting Ofsted’s report from this inspection.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jamie Reed on 2015-10-22.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what steps his Department has taken to ensure the healthcare chapter of the Armed Forces Covenant has been implemented.

Ben Gummer

The Department and NHS England are committed to meeting the health commitments of the Armed Forces Covenant and have established a number of services specifically tailored to meet the needs and requirements of the armed forces community. There are regular communications on the Covenant commitment to National Health Service trusts, clinical commissioning groups (CCGs) and health professionals.

As set out in the NHS Mandate for England CCGsare responsible for general healthcare for veterans and for the delivery of the health commitments of the Armed Forces Covenant. NHS England assuresCCGs’ delivery of their commitments and many CCGs are joint signatories to their local community covenants.

The NHS Constitution has recently been updated to strengthen this accountability by stating that ‘the NHS will ensure that in line with the Armed Forces Covenant, those in the armed forces, reservists, their families and veterans are not disadvantaged in accessing health services in the area they reside.’

The Department and the NHS in England are held to account by the Ministry of Defence and UK Departments of Health Partnership Board and the Armed Forces Covenant Reference Group.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jamie Reed on 2015-10-19.

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how much funding was allocated to further education in (a) Copeland and (b) Cumbria in (i) 2014-15 and (ii) 2015-16.

Mr Sam Gyimah

The Department does not hold the information requested. Published funding allocations are available on GOV.UK at: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/16-to-19-education-funding-allocations

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The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jamie Reed on 2015-10-22.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many hospital admissions occurred due to consumption of legal highs in (a) Copeland constituency, (b) Cumbria and (c) England in each of the last five years.

Jane Ellison

There is no separate classification for this type of drug, so it is not possible to separate out admissions from new psychoactive substances from other types of drugs.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jamie Reed on 2015-10-19.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many people have been admitted to hospital with malnutrition in each of the last five years.

Jane Ellison

The information is not available in the format requested, however the Health and Social Care Information Centre has provided a count of finished admission episodes (FAEs)¹ with a primary diagnosis² of malnutrition in England for 2009-10 to 2013-14.

Admissions do not represent the number of patients, as a person may have more than one admission within the period. This information is provided in the following table:

Year	FAEs
2009-10	465
2010-11	531
2011-12	652
2012-13	667
2013-14	621

Notes:

¹ An FAE is the first period of admitted patient care under one consultant within one healthcare provider. FAEs are counted against the year in which the admission episode finishes.

² The primary diagnosis is the first of up to 20 diagnosis fields in the Hospital Episode Statistics data set and provides the main reason why the patient was admitted to hospital.