The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jonathan Ashworth on 2016-05-09.
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, what the budget is for the Inter-Ministerial Group on Corruption.
Matthew Hancock
Budget for work to tackle corruption are held by departments. The work of the Inter-Ministerial Group is to co-ordinate and lead departmental activity.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by The Countess of Mar on 2016-06-29.
To ask Her Majesty’s Government, further to the Written Answer by Baroness Altmann on 16 June (HL502), what provision is made for claimants suffering severe myalgic encephalomyelitis or chronic fatigue syndrome who are housebound or bedbound and who are unable to attend a face-to-face consultation.
Baroness Altmann
A home consultation can be offered where a claimant is unable to travel to a consultation as a result of their health condition or impairment.
Situations where a claimant may need a home consultation can include where a person’s diagnosis suggests a significant disability that may make travel extremely difficult or the claimant provides evidence from a health professional that they are unable to travel due to their health condition or impairment.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Baroness Jones of Whitchurch on 2016-09-09.
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what criteria they will use to decide whether the National Food Crime Unit should have direct enforcement powers.
Lord Prior of Brampton
The review of the National Food Crime Unit (NFCU) will consider the following issues:
– Current and likely future reactive demand from food crime;
– Current and likely future proactive opportunities to disrupt and prevent food crime;
– Gaps between reactive/proactive demand and current response;
– The current and future role of local authorities, the police service, other government departments/agencies and the wider food crime response landscape, including the international response and cross border collaboration post European Union exit;
– Value for money of current and potential responses; and
– The current form and function of the NFCU, and whether this meets current and future demand.
In the first Food Crime Annual Strategic Assessment, the NFCU highlighted the limitations of current intelligence and reporting, and the difficulties in estimating the scale and impact of food crime. The review will therefore take these limitations into account when considering the current and future demands and opportunities, and make reasonable judgements where evidence is incomplete or lacking.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Gloria De Piero on 2015-11-10.
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, how many children have been registered as homeless in (a) Ashfield and (b) Broxtowe in each of the last five years.
Mr Marcus Jones
The numbers of households with dependent children (including expected children) accepted as homeless in Ashfield and Broxtowe in each of the last five years is shown in the table below. It is not possible to give precise numbers of children in accepted households.
The figure for Broxtowe for 2011/12 is less than five and has been suppressed to avoid the risk of disclosing personal information.
Data are collected on the numbers of households accepted as being in priority need as a result of the applicant being aged 16 or 17. There were less than 5 such cases in Ashfield and Broxtowe during the last five years combined.
|
Period |
Ashfield |
Broxtowe |
|
2010/11 |
15 |
6 |
|
2011/12 |
9 |
* |
|
2012/13 |
12 |
7 |
|
2013/14 |
40 |
5 |
|
2014/15 |
35 |
8 |
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Robert Flello on 2015-12-10.
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, what representations his Department has received from diplomatic representatives in the UK of states where the trade of dog meat for consumption is active subsequent to the debate in the House on the dog meat trade of 5 November 2015.
Mr Hugo Swire
Since the debate on 5 November my Department has not received any representations from any diplomatic missions in the UK on the dog meat trade, nor have Ministers made representations to their counterparts abroad. As highlighted during the debate by the Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, my hon. Friend the Member for Rochford and Southend East (James Duddridge), I am contacting our Ambassadors in the countries concerned to review our activities in this area.
The Government is committed to raising the standards of animal welfare at home and abroad. I raised animal welfare issues during my visit to the region in February and will continue to make representations when appropriate.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Kevin Brennan on 2016-01-14.
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, pursuant to the Answer of 30 November 2015 to Question 14108, if he will place in the Library a copy of the preliminary feedback on his announcement of the privatisation of the Green Investment Bank.
Anna Soubry
The preliminary feedback to which my earlier answer refers is the outcome of private informal conversations that the Green Investment Bank (GIB) and our financial advisers have had with a number of potential investors on an in‑confidence basis to help gauge market appetite for acquiring a stake in GIB. The substance of these conversations is commercially sensitive and not for publication. The Government does, though, intend to report to Parliament setting out our detailed plans for a sale and to provide a further report following completion of a transaction and any subsequent transactions.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Cunningham on 2016-02-09.
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment her Department has made of the general trends in the incidence of domestic violence across the UK in the last 10 years; and if she will make a statement.
Karen Bradley
Data showing the total number of women who have suffered domestic abuse in the last five years is set out in the Crime Statistics published on 11 February 2016: http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/rel/crime-stats/crime-statistics/focus-on-violent-crime-and-sexual-offences–2014-to-2015/index.html.
Since the 2004/05 Crime Survey for England and Wales (CSEW), the number of women aged 16 to 59 experiencing any domestic abuse in the last year has reduced from 1.71 million to 1.35 million (360,000 fewer victims and a fall of 21%) and the estimate of the number of women experiencing any domestic abuse in the last year is the lowest since the survey began.
Latest data published by the Office for National Statistics from the 2014/15 CSEW additionally show that in 46% of cases of partner abuse, a child was present in the household, of which 20% of children saw or heard the abuse.
Data on children referred to and assessed by local authority children’s social services in England in 2014/15 show that there were 197,700 assessments where domestic violence was identified as a relevant factor. This data is only available for 2014/15.
The Government works closely with charities, academics and statutory agencies to assess and address the impact of domestic abuse on children and wholly recognises the life changing impact domestic abuse can have on the lives of children. That is why we have expanded the Troubled Families Programme for a further five years (2015-2020) to work with an additional 400,000 families, including those affected by domestic abuse.
To further address the impact of domestic abuse on victims and their children, we have introduced a new domestic abuse offence to tackle coercive and controlling behaviour, and in England and Wales we have rolled out Domestic Violence Protection Orders and the Domestic Violence Disclosure Scheme. Improvements have been made to the police response to domestic abuse, and we are supporting multi-agency working which takes a whole family approach.
We will shortly publish a refreshed cross-Government Violence Against Women and Girls strategy setting out how we will do more still to support victims and their children. The Government has already announced £40 million of funding for domestic abuse services between 2016 and 2020, as well as a £2 million grant to Women’s Aid and Safelives to support early intervention programmes.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Philip Davies on 2016-03-04.
To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, whether the Government plans to make representations to EU institutions on EU plans to tax (a) e-cigarettes and (b) other reduced risk products at the same rates as combustible cigarettes.
Damian Hinds
There are no plans to mandate EU-level rules on taxing e-cigarettes and no legislative proposals have been submitted. As the EU Commission clarified last week, all that has happened is that the Commission has been asked to further analyse the issue of e-cigarettes as part of a wider review of the Tobacco Duties Directive (2011/64/EU). Any proposal would need the unanimous support of all 28 EU governments for it to be approved.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andrew Bridgen on 2016-04-08.
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what steps he has taken in response to the findings of the first set of operational data collected by NHS England on wheelchair services; and what steps he is taking to ensure that short-term wheelchair loans are available for people waiting for provision of NHS wheelchairs.
Alistair Burt
The national wheelchair services data collection was introduced by NHS England in July 2015 and requires clinical commissioning groups to submit quarterly data on their wheelchair services. Data has so far been published for quarter two and quarter three 2015/16. This is a new collection and therefore does not yet provide an opportunity to draw national or regional comparisons. The vast majority of short term wheelchair loans are provided through charities such as the Red Cross and not via the National Health Service.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Cunningham on 2016-05-09.
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, pursuant to the Answer of 5 May 2016 to Question 36169, how many taxi journeys his Department paid for in each of the last five years.
Mr Mark Francois
The Department records all travel spend under the category of travel and subsistence costs. This is reported in DCLG annual accounts. We are unable to break down the travel and subsistence costs to identify the number of taxi journeys in the last 5 years. This would involve manually analysing individual supplier transactions and could only be done at disproportionate cost.