The below Parliamentary question was asked by Joan Ryan on 2015-11-10.
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether 18 to21 year olds in supported housing services will still be able to claim housing benefit after April 2017.
Justin Tomlinson
I refer the Hon. Member to the answer I gave the Rt Hon. Member for East Ham, Stephen Timms, on the 14 September 2015, to Question UNI 9834
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The below Parliamentary question was asked by Luciana Berger on 2015-12-09.
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, if he will make it his policy to collect information centrally on how many specialist midwives have been trained in mental health.
Ben Gummer
The Department does not have any plans to collect this information.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Mendelsohn on 2016-01-19.
To ask Her Majesty’s Government which ministers have reviewed sections or drafts of the impact assessment for the Trade Union Bill, and when.
Baroness Neville-Rolfe
The Government has published detailed Impact Assessments for the Bill – on the Trade Union Bill, on the Reporting of Facility Time in the Public Sector, and on the Prohibition on Deduction of Union Subscriptions from Wages in the Public Sector. At a meeting with Peers in December, Ministers committed to publishing prior to the Lords Committee stage of the Bill, and they were published in good time on 21 January.
The Trade Union Bill’s impact assessment has been subject to scrutiny by the independent Regulatory Policy Committee, and its opinion has been published alongside the impact assessment.
They were reviewed and approved by the relevant Ministers in the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills and the Cabinet Office. The Permanent Secretary has been kept informed of progress on all stages of the Bill.
Policy officials and analysts in both Departments have worked together to produce the impact assessments as quickly as possible while ensuring that the analysis was thorough.
We have not asked civil servants working on the Bill in the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills and the Cabinet Office to fill out time sheets.
We do not record which particular documents each special adviser reads. Special advisers have access to departmental papers in line with the Special Advisers’ Code of Conduct and provide advice to Ministers.
I am placing copies of the relevant documentation in the Library.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by David Hanson on 2016-02-11.
To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, what the average hourly earnings of (a) female, (b) male, (c) full-time and (d) part-time employees of her Department were in each of the last five years.
Mrs Theresa Villiers
This information is not held and to provide it would incur a disproportionate cost.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Daniel Zeichner on 2016-03-03.
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, if he will bring forward proposals to give bus and coach passengers statutory rights to compensation for delays in their bus or coach service.
Andrew Jones
Bus and coach passengers already have statutory rights under the services provisions of the Consumer Rights Act 2015. If the bus or coach service is not provided with reasonable care and skill or in line with certain information the transport operator has given about it then the passenger may be due compensation, including compensation for delays and cancellations.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Baroness Jowell on 2016-04-12.
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what is their estimate of the number of people who are street homeless in London for each year since 2010.
Baroness Williams of Trafford
One person without a home is one too many and we are committed to doing all we can to prevent homelessness. That is why we have increased central investment to tackle homelessness over the next four years to £139 million.
This will include a new national £10 million programme to support innovative ways to tackle rough sleeping, and will build on the success of our No Second Night Out initiative, which saw two-thirds of rough sleepers in London come off the streets after a single night.
DCLG publishes regular statistics on rough sleeping. These are available (the latest figures are attached) at:
https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/rough-sleeping-in-england-autumn-2015
The GLA collects more detailed statistics on rough sleeping in London. These are available at: http://data.london.gov.uk/dataset/chain-reports
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The below Parliamentary question was asked by Alex Chalk on 2016-05-05.
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, whether his Department plans to review the length of maximum sentence for animal cruelty offences.
Dominic Raab
We keep maximum penalties under review. This includes sentencing trends, and whether the courts may be finding their sentencing powers inadequate.
Data on the average sentence length for animal cruelty can be found in the Outcomes by offence table at the attached link:
https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/criminal-justice-system-statistics-quarterly-december-2014
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The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Cunningham on 2016-06-27.
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, pursuant to the Answer of 27 June 2016 to Question 40542, what estimate he has made of the number of his Department’s civil servants that will be based in Coventry in each of the next five years; and if he will make a statement.
Mr Robert Goodwill
The Department for Transport currently consists of a central department and four executive agencies as follows:
The Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency has not made an estimate of the number of civil servants it plans to base in Coventry over the next five years. All other areas of the Department do not currently have any plans to base any staff in Coventry.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Oliver Dowden on 2016-09-13.
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, if the Government will consider reinstating clothing grants for care homes for elderly residents who have just arrived from hospital.
David Mowat
Despite a welcome shift towards more care provision in community settings, our ageing population means a growing number of people require care in care and nursing homes, with an increasing level of acuity and complexity of need.
The Enhanced Health in Care Homes vanguards, implemented by NHS England, are beginning to show how addressing this inequity in access to services can reduce unnecessary, unplanned and avoidable admissions to hospital, shorten the length of hospital stays and improve peoples’ quality of life, wellbeing and clinical outcomes.
NHS England is also leading the multi-agency Community Services and Hospital Discharge programme, which will deliver a series of interventions to transform community services and improve discharge of older people from hospital. These include initiatives such as “discharge to assess”, which will increase the number of patients who are discharged quickly and safely to their usual place of residence.
The Department is not aware of a clothing grant for people who enter care homes and is therefore unable to consider reinstatement. Where a local authority arranges care and support to meet an adult’s eligible needs, it may charge them. Where care is arranged in a care home, a local authority must not, through charges, reduce the adult’s income below the Personal Expenses Allowance of £24.90 per week.
The allowance means that local authority supported care home residents have money to spend as they wish on personal items, including clothing. It must not be spent on meeting their eligible care needs.
Local authorities have discretion to be more generous where they think this would be appropriate.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Kate Green on 2015-11-10.
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what guidance has been issued to Jobcentre Plus staff on the application of benefit sanctions where a parent is unable to comply with the conditions for that benefit because of lack of suitable childcare.
Priti Patel
This Government spent £5bn on childcare in 2014-2015 – more than any previous administration and an increase of £1bn since 2010. We are now going further still, with a new package of support designed to improve the affordability and accessibility of childcare for working families. We are extending the free entitlement for 3 and 4 years from 15 hours to 30 hours per week for working parents, from September 2017, worth £5,000 per child per year. We are also introducing Tax-Free Childcare for working parents from early 2017, with a Government contribution of up to £2,000 per child.
Guidance for Jobcentre Plus staff makes it clear that the Jobseeker’s Allowance requirements should be tailored to the individual circumstances of each claimant and may be varied if those circumstances change.