Tag: Jim Shannon

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Shannon on 2016-04-21.

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, if he will make representations to the President of Indonesia on the protection of religious minorities in that country.

Mr Hugo Swire

We take freedom of religion or belief seriously. Our Ambassador in Jakarta has raised these issues with the Minister of Religious Affairs, Indonesian civil society, and religious leaders. He urged them to ensure the rights of all individuals to practise their religion or belief freely were fully respected and protected.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Shannon on 2016-05-09.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what assessment he has made of the effect of rising school rolls on the number of school nurse training places required.

Jane Ellison

In April 2014, Public Health England and the Department published guidance to commissioners for services to school aged children, Maximising the school nursing team contribution to the public health of school-aged children.

Each year Health Education England (HEE) provide local and national forecasts of the supply that will arise over the next five years and use these forecasts to discuss with stakeholders whether this supply will match the system’s view of future demand including the extent to which any current shortages will be addressed. This analysis and discussion is then used to identify whether any changes are required to the volumes of training commissioned by HEE.

Consideration of the impact of rising school rolls will feed into HEE’s planning, though the final training settlement for 2017/18 is under negotiation.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Shannon on 2016-05-19.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what steps his Department is taking to maintain the level of funding for specialist nurses.

Ben Gummer

It is Health Education England’s (HEE) responsibility to ensure that there is sufficient future supply of staff, including those needed in specialist fields, to meet the workforce requirements of the English health system.

HEE publishes an annual Workforce Plan which is built upon the needs of local employers, providers, commissioners and other stakeholders who, as members of its Local Education Training Boards (LETBs), shape the 13 local plans.

The Workforce plan is predominately an aggregate of the local LETB plans, but the final national plan is only agreed with the advice and input of its clinical advisory groups and Patients’ Advisory Forum, as well as the Royal Colleges and other stakeholders.

Once staff are qualified, it is for individual employers to ensure their staff remain up to date with, or acquire, specialist skills to provide safe and effective patient care through Continuous Professional Development and provide sufficient funding locally to ensure this occurs.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Shannon on 2016-05-23.

To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, what steps her Department is taking to help tackle increases in energy costs for manufacturing companies in (a) Northern Ireland and (b) the rest of the UK.

Andrea Leadsom

The Government is ensuring the continued international competitiveness of energy intensive industries in Northern Ireland and across the United Kingdom by providing relief to mitigate the impact of energy and climate change policy on electricity bills. In addition to the £160 million of compensation already provided since 2013, Government began paying compensation to eligible companies for renewable energy policy costs earlier this year, following state aid clearance. Companies in Northern Ireland are eligible to apply for this compensation. A Great Britain-wide consultation on replacing this compensation with an exemption was launched on 1 April and the Northern Ireland Executive will consult separately on this in the future.

We are also acting to reduce electricity costs at the most fundamental levels through both short-term cost control measures and investment in new energy infrastructure.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Shannon on 2016-06-06.

To ask the Attorney General, if he will take steps to offer incentives to encourage more solicitors to offer pro bono work.

Robert Buckland

Pro Bono is a voluntary commitment made by lawyers who understand that the service they provide is invaluable to those individuals who would otherwise be denied access to justice.

As pro bono champions of the Government, the Law Officers support a number of projects through our co-ordinating committees. The Government has also provided funding for several projects, such as the Litigants in Person package run by the Ministry of Justice.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Shannon on 2016-06-08.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many people under the age of 18 have died after receiving the HPV vaccination in the last three years.

George Freeman

The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) collects reports of suspected side effects to vaccines and medicines via the Yellow Card Scheme. It is important to note that a report of a suspected side effect does not necessarily mean the vaccine or medicine was the cause of the reported event, and coincidental illness can also be a factor. Such reports remain under continual review by the MHRA in order to detect possible new risks.

The MHRA has received one suspected side effect report with a fatal outcome temporally associated with human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine which occurred in the last three years. A link with the vaccine has not been established. There has been no suggestion from safety monitoring so far in the United Kingdom that the vaccine has been responsible for any deaths.

More than three million girls have been vaccinated in the UK with HPV vaccine since 2008, and tens of millions more have been vaccinated globally. As with all vaccines, safety remains under continual review, and HPV vaccine has a very good safety record.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Shannon on 2016-06-08.

To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, what discussions he has had with the Local Government Association on the effect of charges on local authorities of changes to funding over the next five years announced in the Spending Review and Autumn Statement 2015.

Mr Marcus Jones

The 2015 Spending Review confirmed a historic four year settlement for local government, including making councils responsible to local people for their financing, rather than central government. It delivers a long-held ambition for councils to be financed from locally raised resources. And it means that by the end of this Parliament, councils will benefit from 100 per cent business rates retention – something they have been calling for, for over a quarter of a century.

It is a settlement which has been subject to extensive consultation, including with the Local Government Association, which welcomed the offer of a four year planning horizon. A range of additional funding flexibilities were sought during the consultation, especially on fees for planning and licensing.

In February 2016, proposals were outlined to link future increases in councils’ fees for processing planning applications to performance in terms of speed and quality of decisions.

By the end of this Parliament, local government will be able to retain 100 per cent of local taxes, including up to £13 billion of revenue from business rates, to spend on local government services. In order to ensure that the reforms are fiscally neutral, these new powers must come with new responsibilities, as well as phasing out grants from Whitehall. The government is working closely with the Local Government Association to design the reforms.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Shannon on 2016-06-27.

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, if he will make representations to the government of Bahrain on the protection of the civil and political rights of the Shia population in that country.

Mr Tobias Ellwood

We follow the political situation closely in Bahrain, including issues related to the country’s Shia population. We regularly discuss civil and political rights with the highest levels of Government of Bahrain. The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, my Right Honorable Friend the Member for Runnymede and Weybridge (Mr Hammond) did so most recently with his Bahraini counterpart, Sheikh Khalid Bin Ahmad Al Khalifa on 14 June 2016. We encourage the Government of Bahrain to respect the rights of political groups to operate and to seek an inclusive political dialogue.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Shannon on 2016-07-07.

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what her Department is doing to help reduce the price of food for people on low incomes.

George Eustice

It is not the Government’s role to set retail food prices. The main drivers of food prices are commodity prices, exchange rates and oil prices. Anything that affects these will have an impact on food prices.

Defra does monitor retail food prices through The Consumer Prices Index. Year on year food prices have continued to fall with an annual rate of inflation of minus 2.8 per cent in the year to May 2016. Following a period of higher food price inflation retail food prices have fallen by 7.0% since their peak in February 2014.

We also monitor trends in household expenditure on food through the Family Food Survey. This includes monitoring the percentage of household expenditure which is spent on food, including for households with the lowest 20% income, which was 15.4% for 2014 compared with an average of 16.1% over the last 10 years.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Shannon on 2016-07-13.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what discussions he has had with pharmaceutical companies on steps to reduce the cost of cancer drugs for the NHS.

Nicola Blackwood

The Department has frequent discussions with representatives of the United Kingdom pharmaceutical industry as well as with individual pharmaceutical companies on a range of topics. We want to see the latest and most advanced drugs made available to National Health Service patients in a way that ensures value for money.