Tag: Parliamentary Question

Lilian Greenwood – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lilian Greenwood on 2015-10-28.

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, with reference to his Department’s press release, Government to overhaul young driver rules in bid to improve safety and cut insurance costs, issued 25 March 2013, when heplans to publish the Green Paper on young drivers referred to in that press release.

Andrew Jones

Every death is a tragedy and is one too many. However, there is a difficult balance to strikebetween the safety and the freedom of our young drivers, and we are currentlyundertaking research into how to make our roads safer. We will explore optionsaround how to improve learning to drive and encouraging people to practice morebefore they take their test.

01/01/2023
Chris Stephens – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Defence

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Chris Stephens on 2015-11-24.

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what plans he has to procure ships for the Royal Fleet Auxiliary; and if he will make a statement.

Mr Philip Dunne

As stated in the Strategic Defence and Security Review 2015, we plan to procure three Fleet Solid Support logistic ships, in addition to the four Military Afloat Reach and Sustainability Tide Class tankers currently under construction. The Tide Class will enter service from 2016, and it is planned that the logistic ships will enter service from the mid-2020s.

01/01/2023

John Spellar – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

The below Parliamentary question was asked by John Spellar on 2016-01-06.

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what assessment his Department has made of the costs and benefits of ending the paper vehicle tax disc.

Andrew Jones

The changes to the administration of vehicle excise duty are expected to save the public purse £13.8m per year. These savings are made up of the elements shown in the table below:

No longer having to print or store tax discs.	£1.3m pa
No longer having to post tax discs to customers.	£7.9m pa
No longer having to process applications for vehicle excise duty refunds (which are now paid automatically without the need for an application) or handle enquiries about lost or missing tax discs.	£1.2m pa
Reduction in Post Office Ltd costs as they no longer issue paper tax discs, but offer an assisted digital service instead.	£3.4m pa

Business will also save an estimated £8.6m per year from the changes. The savings arise from leasing companies no longer having to post tax discs to customers or businesses having to apply for refunds of vehicle excise duty and paying to replace lost or stolen tax discs.

There are also one-off costs of £5.7m made up of the elements shown in the table below:

DVLA IT and systems changes/updates,	£4m
Familiarisation costs to the General Public and Business in understanding the changes	£1.7m

01/01/2023

Steve McCabe – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Steve McCabe on 2016-01-26.

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to page nine of her Department’s response to the Education Committee’s Fifth Report of Session 2014-15, Life Lessons: PSHE and SRE in schools, published in July 2015, CM 9121, when her Department plans to report back to the Committee on its full consideration of the arguments made by the Committee on introducing PSHE and SRE as statutory subjects in primary and secondary schools.

Edward Timpson

The Government wants all young people to leave school prepared for life in modern Britain. High quality personal, social, health and economic (PSHE) teaching has an important role to play in providing young people with a ‘curriculum for life’, which equips them with the skills and understanding they need to manage their lives, to succeed and to stay safe.

We have committed to improving the quality of PSHE and intend to make significant progress on this issue during this Parliament. The Department for Education is currently working with headteachers and other experts to identify how we can improve the quality of PSHE for every pupil.

01/01/2023

Emily Thornberry – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Defence

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Emily Thornberry on 2016-02-23.

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how many UK (a) military and (b) civilian personnel are deployed on UN peacekeeping operations in each operational theatre.

Penny Mordaunt

The tables below show the numbers of military and civilian personnel the UK has deployed to UN mandated peacekeeping and special political missions in the last six years, as at 26 February 2016:

Military Personnel

	2011	2012	2013	2014	2015	2016
UNFICYP (Cyprus)	271	273	270	274	274	274
MINUSMA (Mali)			1	2	2	2
UNMISS (South Sudan)		3	2	4	3	3
MONUSCO (Democratic Republic of Congo)	5	4	5	5	5	5
UNSOM (Somalia)					2	2
UNSMIL (Libya/Tunisia)					1	1
TOTAL	276	280	278	285	287	287

Civilian Personnel

	2011	2012	2013	2014	2015	2016
MONUSCO	1	1	1	1	1
UNMISS		4	4	2
UNSMIL					1	1
MINUSTAH (Haiti)				3	3	3
UNMIL (Liberia)					1	1
TOTAL	1	1	1	8	10	7

The civilian figures represent deployments from the Stabilisation Unit; other Government Departments also deploy civilians on UN Peacekeeping missions.

The figures do not include deployments to UN Agencies.

01/01/2023

Lord Myners – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the HM Treasury

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Myners on 2016-03-21.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of (1) the impact on economic and financial stability of increasing private sector debt as a percentage of GDP and aggregate personal income, and (2) the level at which those ratios would be judged to be too high.

Lord O’Neill of Gatley

The Government does not have an explicit target for the level of private sector debt. However, we established the independent Financial Policy Committee (FPC), within the Bank of England, which is empowered to identify, assess, monitor and take action in relation to risks across the UK financial system. This includes risks from private sector debt. The FPC actively monitors developments in the aggregate level of credit extended to UK households and private non-financial corporations, and has the macroprudential policy tools required to address any risk it identifies.

01/01/2023
Steve McCabe – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Steve McCabe on 2016-04-20.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, pursuant to the Answer of 31 March 2016 to Question 31789, how many people were (a) newly diagnosed and (b) already diagnosed as suffering from inflammatory bowel disease in each year since 2010.

Jane Ellison

The two main forms of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) are Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis. Ulcerative colitis only affects the large intestine whereas Crohn’s disease affects the whole of the digestive system. Data relating to the total number of people newly and already diagnosed with IBD in each year since 2010 is not collected.

The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence guidance indicates that ulcerative colitis has an incidence in the United Kingdom of approximately 10 per 100,000 people annually, and a prevalence of approximately 240 per 100,000. This amounts to around 146,000 people in the UK with a diagnosis of ulcerative colitis. In addition to this, there are currently at least 115,000 people in the UK with Crohn’s disease.

01/01/2023
Fiona Bruce – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Fiona Bruce on 2016-05-23.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what assessment he has made of the effectiveness of the use of embryonic stem cell research for the development of treatments for patients.

George Freeman

Treatments based on the use of stem cells including those obtained by embryos must be demonstrated to be both safe and effective before they can receive authorisation.

01/01/2023
Lord Alton of Liverpool – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Alton of Liverpool on 2016-07-18.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what discussions they have held with the government of Rwanda about the visit to that country by Omar al Bashir, President of Sudan, who has been indicted by the International Criminal Court for genocide and crimes against humanity.

Baroness Anelay of St Johns

Rwanda is not a State party to the International Criminal Court (ICC). It is important that fugitives from international justice do not enjoy impunity and we note the UN Security Council Resolution (UNSCR 1593) has urged all States to cooperate fully with the ICC and its Prosecutor with regards to the situation in Darfur. We continue to follow closely developments in the ICC, including the level of States’ cooperation with the Court, and will consider further measures as appropriate.

01/01/2023
Ian Murray – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Ian Murray on 2016-10-10.

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether the Government has carried out a (a) policy equality statement, (b) equality impact assessment or (c) any equality monitoring on its contracts with Compass to provide accommodation to asylum seekers since those contracts were signed in 2012.

Mr Robert Goodwill

The Home Office is currently considering any equality impacts as part of the wider considerations as to whether to extend the asylum support and accommodation contracts for the period from 2017-19.

The Home Office takes its equality duty seriously and engages regularly with Non-Governmental Organisations and its contractors to ensure that support and accommodation for asylum seekers meets the needs of individual service users.

01/01/2023