Tag: Parliamentary Question

  • Mark Pritchard – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

    Mark Pritchard – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Mark Pritchard on 2016-03-03.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, if his Department will conduct research on the potential effect on the cost of legal aid of encouraging early guilty pleas by defendants in serious criminal trial cases.

    Mr Shailesh Vara

    We currently have no plans to do so. It has long been the practice to encourage early guilty pleas by offering reductions in sentence, and this is governed by the guideline Reduction in Sentence for a Guilty Plea, first issued by the Sentencing Guidelines Council in 2005. The Sentencing Council (as it now is) last month published for consultation a revised guideline, the purpose of which is stated to be ‘to encourage those defendants who are aware of their guilt to enter a plea as early in the court process as possible’. Increasing the incidence of early guilty pleas would be expected to result in savings in legal aid, as well as in other benefits.

  • Lord Hunt of Chesterton – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for International Development

    Lord Hunt of Chesterton – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for International Development

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Hunt of Chesterton on 2016-04-12.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether UK government agencies were providing remote sensing data to detect, forecast and provide warning of the recent earthquakes in Afghanistan to the affected communities and government agencies.

    Baroness Verma

    The science is clear on this matter – earthquakes cannot be forecast with any degree of reliability. Remote sensing does exist, but can only operate in extremely technically sophisticated environments, and even then can only provide limited warning of a few seconds or minutes in which to respond. As such the UK Government does not provide remote sensing data to detect, forecast, and provide warning of earthquakes in Afghanistan.

    When it comes to other forms of natural disaster, DFID funds a resilience and disaster risk reduction programme in Afghanistan which provides £9.6m over four years (2015-18) to an NGO consortium called Afghanistan Resilience Consortium (ARC). Implementation is focused in the eight northern provinces of Afghanistan which are the most disaster prone.

  • Philip Davies – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

    Philip Davies – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Philip Davies on 2016-05-05.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many (a) out-of-court restorative justice resolutions and (b) cautions were given to (i) people on suspended prison sentences and (ii) prisoners released on licence in the latest year for which information is held.

    Mike Penning

    The information requested, could only be obtained at disproportionate cost.

  • Nigel Evans – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

    Nigel Evans – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Nigel Evans on 2016-06-27.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, how much his Department provided in bus subsidies to Lancashire in 2015.

    Andrew Jones

    Lancashire receives almost £1.9 million of the £40m of Bus Service Operators Grant (BSOG) my Department provides directly to English local authorities each year to help deliver bus services.

    This is in addition to the £6.8 million Lancashire received in 2014-15 for local bus services via the block grant from the Department for Communities and Local Government, which is provided to all local authorities in England.

  • Greg Mulholland – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Greg Mulholland – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Greg Mulholland on 2016-09-13.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what treatment options are available to adults with uveitis to access anti-TNF treatment therapy who do not meet the exceptionality criteria of the individual funding request process.

    David Mowat

    Due to a lack of clinical evidence anti-tumour necrosis factor (TNF) to treat uveitis in adults is not currently routinely commissioned by the National Health Service. Therefore patients can only access the treatment through the individual funding request process.

  • Emily Thornberry – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    Emily Thornberry – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Emily Thornberry on 2015-11-10.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, with reference to paragraph 7.4 of the Explanatory Memorandum for the Rent Officers (Housing Benefit and Universal Credit Functions) (Local Housing Allowance Amendments) Order 2015 (S.I., 2015, No. 1753), when he plans for the first instalments of additional funding under the Targeted Affordability Fund to be made available to local authorities.

    Justin Tomlinson

    Since 2014/15 the Government has made available £140 million in Targeted Affordability Funding (TAF). Over the next five years TAF will be drawn from recycling a percentage of the savings from the freeze of Local Housing Allowance (LHA) rates. As a result of the level of savings produced by the freeze next year there will be no TAF available in 2016/17; however, there will be funding from 2017/18 to 2020/21.

    From 2017/18 around 30 per cent of the potential savings per year from the freeze to LHA will be used to support areas where higher rent increases are causing a shortage of affordable accommodation.

    The level of TAF in 2016/17 would have been the same if, as planned, LHA rates had been uprated by CPI inflation. This is because the CPI forecast in September was zero (0.01 per cent) and therefore LHA rates would not increase in 2016/17 but would remain at the 2015/16 levels.

    The amounts of TAF which will be available each year from 2017/18 and the plans to distribute it will be announced in due course.

  • Luciana Berger – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Luciana Berger – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Luciana Berger on 2015-12-09.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many specialist inpatient services for older adult mental health patients have closed in each of the last five years.

    Alistair Burt

    This information is not held centrally.

    In-patient services for older mental health patients are now included in the range of services provided by NHS mental health trusts and independent providers.

  • Lord Scriven – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Communities and Local Government

    Lord Scriven – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Communities and Local Government

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Scriven on 2016-01-19.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government what representations they have made to the Archbishop of Canterbury on the recent communiqué from Anglican Primates about homosexuality and same-sex marriage.

    Baroness Williams of Trafford

    The Government has made no representations to the Most Rev. and rt hon Archbishop of Canterbury, or the Anglican Community, regarding the recent communique from the Anglican Primates, issued on 15 January.

    The Government does not normally make comments in response to statements issued by the Church of England.

  • Jim Fitzpatrick – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

    Jim Fitzpatrick – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Fitzpatrick on 2016-02-11.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what assessment he has made of the effect of increased waiting times for driving tests for young drivers on (a) failure rates and (b) increased travel time and cost to examination centres.

    Andrew Jones

    Any comparison between waiting times and failure rates would be highly subjective as the Driving and Vehicle Standards Agency (DVSA) has no way of excluding other factors. DVSA also cannot identify the motivation of candidates choosing test centres for their practical test; therefore, DVSA is unable to assess what the costs would be.

  • Kelvin Hopkins – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

    Kelvin Hopkins – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Kelvin Hopkins on 2016-03-03.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what assessment his Department has made of potential cost savings from an extension of driver-only operation on Govia Thameslink Railways services.

    Claire Perry

    The potential cost savings from an extension of driver-only operation were included in Govia Thameslink Railway’s formal bid for the franchise. The Department assessed all bids for the franchise against the evaluation criteria in the Invitation to Tender which can be found at https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/245041/invitation-to-tender.pdf.

    “