Tag: Parliamentary Question

  • Helen Hayes – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    Helen Hayes – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Helen Hayes on 2016-02-08.

    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what the smallest geographical unit is for which data on the performance of the Disclosure and Barring Service is gathered for enhanced Disclosure and Barring Service checks.

    Karen Bradley

    The performance data that the Disclosure and Barring Service gathers routinely is at national level and is published here:

    https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/dbs-dataset-1-disclosure-progress-information-disclosed-and-update-service-subscriptions

    Also published on the website is the performance of individual police forces in processing applications referred to them by the DBS:

    https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/dbs-dataset-5-police-disclosure-unit-performance

    The DBS works continually to improve its response to data requests. I will write separately to the Honourable Member about recent work on constituency data.

  • Dan Jarvis – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

    Dan Jarvis – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Dan Jarvis on 2016-02-26.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, if his Department will produce a strategy on how the UK’s steel requirements will be met over the next (a) 12 months and (b) five years.

    Anna Soubry

    The Government’s believes that the best way to meet the UK’s steel needs over the next twelve months and five years is to ensure a viable future for the steel industry in Britain, as well as to work for fair and open global steel markets. To this end we have taken action on the five short-term asks of the steel industry, for example on unfairly-traded imports, energy costs, procurement, and emissions regulations.

    A new Steel Council will provide a forum for industry, unions and government to consider how to improve the competitive position of the UK steel sector in the longer term. We will continue to work actively with partners in this sector, local taskforces and the EU and International Community to support our steel industry.

  • Emily Thornberry – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Defence

    Emily Thornberry – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Defence

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Emily Thornberry on 2016-04-20.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how many (a) serving military personnel and (b) civilian staff were seconded to (i) the Joint Intelligence Organisation’s Assessments Staff and (ii) the National Security Secretariat within the Cabinet Office during 2015.

    Mark Lancaster

    The Ministry of Defence is able to confirm that one member of civilian staff was seconded to the Joint Intelligence Organisation’s Assessments Staff and two members of civilian staff were seconded to the National Security Secretariat within the Cabinet Office during 2015. For information on Service personnel seconded to these bodies, I will write to the hon. Member shortly.

  • Barry Gardiner – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Energy and Climate Change

    Barry Gardiner – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Energy and Climate Change

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Barry Gardiner on 2016-05-23.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, how many times the National Emissions Target Board has met since April 2013.

    Andrea Leadsom

    Some of the governance arrangements related to carbon budgets were amended last year. The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster now chairs an Inter-Ministerial Group (IMG) on Clean Growth, which considers issues relating to air quality and decarbonisation, where these have a cross-departmental aspect. The group meets as and when required. Its members include ministers and officials from the relevant departments, including Defra, DECC, DfT, DCLG and BIS.

  • Lord Alton of Liverpool – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for International Development

    Lord Alton of Liverpool – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for International Development

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Alton of Liverpool on 2016-07-19.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the humanitarian needs of the civilians living in the rebel-held areas of Aleppo, and of reports that those civilians are facing starvation.

    Baroness Anelay of St Johns

    The UK is at the forefront of the humanitarian response to the Syria crisis. We have pledged over £2.3 billion to date, our largest ever response to a humanitarian crisis.

    The Syrian regime and Kurdish forces have cut the main access route into opposition-held eastern Aleppo City. The UN reports that up to 300,000 people are trapped there, with humanitarian assistance unable to get in. The UN and humanitarian partners have prepositioned some food supplies and rationing of supplies has begun. Further life-saving aid is needed urgently. In other areas of Syria prolonged denial of humanitarian access has led to cases of acute malnutrition and, in some cases, starvation.

    There is no excuse for not allowing humanitarian supplies into east Aleppo City and doing so is a violation of International Humanitarian Law. The Syrian Regime approved the UN’s request to deliver humanitarian supplies to East Aleppo City as part of its July humanitarian convoy plan. We call on the Regime to live up to this commitment. We are working with the UN and other humanitarian partners to find ways to alleviate the situation.

  • Andrew Rosindell – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

    Andrew Rosindell – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andrew Rosindell on 2016-10-10.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, whether (a) Ministers and (b) officials of his Department have met the administrator of Norfolk Island since 1 July 2016.

    Alok Sharma

    Foreign and Commonwealth Office Ministers have not met the Administrator. The Department’s officials have met the Administrator of Norfolk Island, most recently on 7 October.

  • Carol Monaghan – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Carol Monaghan – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Carol Monaghan on 2015-11-10.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what plans he has to improve the availability of off-patent drugs for novel uses through non-legislative measures.

    George Freeman

    Clinicians can already prescribe off-patent drugs off-label on clinical grounds if they judge this is the right thing to do to meet the individual clinical needs of their patients.

    The Government is keen to accelerate the adoption of innovative medicines and increase the innovative use of existing medicines where the evidence reports clinical benefits and cost effectiveness to patients. To that end, we are seeking a number of initiatives to provide innovation but whilst supporting the aims of the Private Member’s Bill on this subject, we do not believe the proposed mechanism is either practicable and desirable.

    We are working with NHS England, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence, the General Medical Council and the Medicines and Health products Regulatory Agency to ensure that there is better information available to support clinicians who wish to prescribe off-patent drugs for off-label indications, and to ensure that new evidence is picked up more quickly and reliably and translated into clinical practice and can be fed through into licensing applications.

    A huge amount of work is also going on in the Accelerated Access Review which will support the “pull” of innovation through to clinical practice.

    As part of the debate on the Access to Medical Treatments Bill, we are working with officials in the Department, the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency, and the Health and Social Care Information Centre to see how the power in the Bill, if it were to pass, could address the lack of provision of information on new uses for existing medicines via the power to create a database of innovations in order to support evidence-based prescribing.

  • Emma Lewell-Buck – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

    Emma Lewell-Buck – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Emma Lewell-Buck on 2015-12-02.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, what assessment his Department has made of the (a) effect to date and (b) potential future effect on the UK skills base of the outsourcing of UK manufacturing and energy supply chain contracts to other EU member states.

    Anna Soubry

    I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave on 7 December 2015 to Question UIN 18533.

    “

  • Luciana Berger – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    Luciana Berger – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Luciana Berger on 2016-01-13.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many children of parents with mental illnesses there are in (a) pre-primary, (b) primary and (c) secondary schools in the most recent period for which figures are available.

    Mr Sam Gyimah

    The Department does not collect information on the number of children at any stage of school whose parents are suffering from mental illness.

  • Louise Haigh – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

    Louise Haigh – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Louise Haigh on 2016-02-08.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, pursuant to the oral contribution of the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice, 26 January 2016, Official Report, column 146, when the Parliamentary Under-Secretary plans to write to the hon. Member for Sheffield, Heeley, on breaches of contracts and fines at G4S-run establishments.

    Andrew Selous

    I committed to write to the honorable lady on this point at the latest Justice Orals. The Ministry of Justice are currently considering the honorable lady’s question and I will provide her with a written response shortly.