Tag: Lord Ouseley

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Ouseley on 2016-01-18.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government how they intend to tackle the shortage of skilled workers in the construction industry, and what assessment they have made of the implications of that shortage for their housing and infrastructure programmes.

Baroness Neville-Rolfe

The Government is undertaking a range of activities to support skills in the infrastructure and home building sectors. These include the reform of the apprenticeship system, the new apprenticeship levy, and the National Colleges Programme – which includes the National College for High Speed Rail. From April 2015 all government procurers of construction and infrastructure projects over £10 million are to include measures in pre-qualification and contract delivery to encourage skills development.

The Construction Leadership Council and Construction Industry Training Board (CITB) have separately undertaken work to encourage more people into the construction sector, including the launch of the GO-Construct website and work with the National Careers Service and Construction Ambassadors for schools. The CITB has also been working closely with the Department for Work and Pensions, the Armed Forces resettlement service and Local Enterprise Partnerships to encourage experienced individuals into the sector. In total, £42 million was invested by CITB, supporting 18,500 construction apprentices in 2015.

In addition, the Transport Infrastructure Skills Strategy, produced under the oversight of Terry Morgan, Chair of Crossrail, will set out further actions to be taken specifically to ensure the supply of skills to deliver transport infrastructure.

Assessments of demand for construction skills include the National Infrastructure Plan for Skills, which estimates that 250,000 construction and 150,000 engineering construction workers will be required to meet demand in the infrastructure sector by 2020. The CITB estimate that 224,000 new construction jobs are set to be created in the UK over the next five years.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Ouseley on 2016-04-25.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking in the light of NASUWT’s finding that 74 per cent of teachers are seriously considering leaving the profession in the next two years; and what assessment they have made of the implications of that finding for the education system.

Lord Nash

As the Secretary of State for Education outlined in her speech at the NASUWT conference on 26 March 2016, we want to see unions do everything they can to build morale, promote the teaching profession and tell people what a rewarding job teaching is. Approximately 90% of all teachers continue in the profession following their first year of teaching and this has been the case since 1996; and over 70% of those who qualified in 2009 were still in teaching five years later. Given the proportion of teachers leaving has remained stable over the last 20 years, we would not expect the proportion of teachers leaving the profession to increase to the levels reported by this survey.

We recognise that it is vital for schools to be able to retain good teachers. That is why we have made policy interventions in the areas teachers tell us matter most such as reducing unnecessary workload. We have recently published reports, addressing the three biggest issues emerging from the Workload Challenge – ineffective marking, use of planning and resources and data management. The reports set out clear principles about what should happen in schools, and make recommendations to be taken at every level in the school system.

We have accepted all the recommendations and will encourage the dissemination of the principles and messages clearly set out, to help enable the culture change the reports refer to.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Ouseley on 2016-10-10.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government, further to the Written Answer by Baroness Chisholm of Owlpen on 16 September (HL1556), how many young people participated in the National Citizen Service programmes during (1) 2014, and (2) 2015; how those participants were recruited; and how much expenditure was incurred in each year.

Lord Ashton of Hyde

In 2014, 57,789 young people took part in NCS throughout England. The number of young people who took part in the programme in 2015 will be released as part of the independent evaluation of the 2015 programme in due course.

Information on annual NCS expenditure can be found in the published NCS Trust accounts, which are available online through Companies House.

All recruitment is the responsibility of the NCS Trust, the independent organisation which delivers NCS. Recruitment is carried out through the NCS supply chain which includes more than 200 delivery organisations. NCS recruitment primarily takes place in schools, but young people can also sign up through the NCS website.

A range of other local channels support NCS recruitment, including partnerships with local authorities, youth groups, community and voluntary organisations, as well as NCS graduates.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Ouseley on 2015-10-19.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what action is proposed to prevent hospital beds being unavailable as a consequence of the number of elderly patients in hospital wards who cannot be sent home or moved to care homes because of the lack of necessary resources.

Lord Prior of Brampton

Since April local projects across the country have been using the Government’s £5.3 billion Better Care Fund to reduce non-elective admissions and get people out of hospital more quickly, as part of on-going work to bring health and social care services together. Local Better Care Fund plans for 2015-2016 should mean that there are 84,000 fewer days spent in hospital unnecessarily because of delayed transfers of care.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Ouseley on 2015-10-19.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government, in the light of the recent study by Shelter, what steps they are taking to address the problems faced by tenants in privately rented homes infested with vermin.

Baroness Williams of Trafford

Local authorities have a power under section 4 of the Prevention of Damage by Pests Act 1949 to require owners of premises infested by mice or rats to eradicate the problem and failure to do so is a criminal offence. Infestation by such pests is also a hazard under the housing, health and safety rating system in Part 1 of the Housing Act 2004. Where the infestation is a category 1 hazard the local authority must require the landlord to take action to eradicate the infestation or it may prohibit the property (or the affected part) from being occupied until the hazard has been eradicated. Through licensing schemes under Parts 2 or 3 of that Act an authority can impose licence conditions relating to privately rented homes that require landlords to take measures to prevent infestation of pests and a failure to do so would be a criminal offence.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Ouseley on 2015-10-19.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to ensure that workers in the United Kingdom currently earning below the minimum wage receive the minimum wage.

Baroness Neville-Rolfe

HMRC enforces the National Minimum Wage (NMW) and responds to every complaint it receives. It also conducts programmes of targeted enforcement in sectors of the economy which have a high risk of non-compliance with the NMW. The Government increased HMRC’s budget for enforcing the NMW by £4m for 2015/16 to £13.2m.

The Government announced in September an increase in HMRC’s enforcement funding for 2016/17, following the introduction of the National Living Wage in April 2016. The Government also announced a package of measures to strengthen NMW enforcement: increasing penalties from 100% to 200% of the arrears that employers owe; the setting up of a dedicated team in HMRC focused on tackling the most serious cases of wilful non-compliance; and the creation of a statutory Director of Labour Market Enforcement and Exploitation.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Ouseley on 2015-10-19.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government, in the light of the Prime Minister’s party conference speech, when and how they will provide details of policies and programmes aimed at achieving the elimination of inequalities in the United Kingdom.

Baroness Williams of Trafford

This government is determined to extend opportunity to everyone. We have announced a number of new initiatives that will help achieve equality of opportunity in the UK.

On 25^th October, the Prime Minister and the Minister for Women and Equalities announced new measures to eradicate gender pay inequality. The government now requires larger employers to publish information about their bonuses for men and women. We are also extending our plans for gender pay gap reporting to the public sector.

On 26^th October, the Prime Minister launched a public and private sector initiative to tackle discrimination in recruitment. A number of organisations, including KPMG, HSBC and Deloitte, together with the Civil Service and local government, have committed to using name-blind applications for all graduate and apprenticeship level roles.

In addition, on 22^nd October, the Home Secretary published diversity profiles on all police forces in England and Wales. These profiles showed that no force had a black and minority ethnic (BME) contingent equivalent to that of the local demographic. She has asked chief constables to use this information to help improve their recruitment, retention, and promotion of police officers from BME backgrounds.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Ouseley on 2015-10-21.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government how many incidents requiring the attendance of the police occurred on mental health wards in the past 12 months; what were the ethnic, gender and age characteristics of the patients involved; and what was the ratio of staff to patients at the time of each incident.

Lord Prior of Brampton

This information is not collected centrally.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Ouseley on 2015-10-21.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government how many patients detained under the Mental Health Act 1983 have been tasered in the past 12 months; what were the ethnicity, gender and age characteristics of the patients tasered; and what was the ratio of staff to patients at the time of each incident.

Lord Bates

Data is not recorded centrally on the number of individuals tasered who are detained under the Mental Health Act 1983 or on the monitoring of patients. A Taser record is completed by police officers on every occasion where a Taser is used. However, this record does not show whether individuals are detained or monitored after the incidents nor information on the ratio of staff to patients.

Police guidance specifies that all individuals who have been subjected to the discharge of a Taser should be examined by a forensic medical examiner.

To improve transparency around how force such as Taser is used by the police, the Home Secretary has asked Chief Constable David Shaw to carry out an in depth review of Taser data and other use of force. This will present options for collecting, collating and publishing data on how force including Taser is being used, who it is being used on and what the outcomes are.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Ouseley on 2015-10-21.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what monitoring takes place of the use of tasers on patients detained under the Mental Health 1983, and how that monitoring information is made accessible to the public.

Lord Bates

Data is not recorded centrally on the number of individuals tasered who are detained under the Mental Health Act 1983 or on the monitoring of patients. A Taser record is completed by police officers on every occasion where a Taser is used. However, this record does not show whether individuals are detained or monitored after the incidents nor information on the ratio of staff to patients.

Police guidance specifies that all individuals who have been subjected to the discharge of a Taser should be examined by a forensic medical examiner.

To improve transparency around how force such as Taser is used by the police, the Home Secretary has asked Chief Constable David Shaw to carry out an in depth review of Taser data and other use of force. This will present options for collecting, collating and publishing data on how force including Taser is being used, who it is being used on and what the outcomes are.