The below Parliamentary question was asked by Nic Dakin on 2016-01-25.
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many teachers have been recruited through the Troops to Teachers scheme.
Nick Gibb
One cohort has completed their training to date with a further two cohorts currently in training. In total, 144 teachers have been recruited through the scheme.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Freyberg on 2016-02-22.
To ask Her Majesty’s Government for those trusts carrying out radical prostate cancer treatments, what were the results for the following responses to the most recent National Prostate Cancer Audit: (1) the number of operations undertaken in the audit period, (2) the proportion of those operations with a hospital length of stay of over three days, and (3) the proportion of those operations requiring emergency readmission within 90 days.
Lord Prior of Brampton
The proportion of men diagnosed with locally advanced prostate cancer between 2010 and 2013 (the Audit period) who had radical treatment, and the proportion who had a hospital length of stay over three days and who required an emergency readmission within 90 days following an operation, are presented by health region in the attached headed Table 1.
It should be noted that the results presented are based on an analysis of data from the English Cancer Registry linked to the Hospital Episode Statistics. These data were collected before the start of the National Prostate Cancer Audit (NPCA) in April 2013.
The number of radical prostatectomies undertaken in men diagnosed between 2010 and 2013, and the proportion of men who had a hospital length of stay over three days and who had an emergency readmission within 90 days following an operation, are presented in the attached headed Table 2. The results of 56 men included in the data set used to generate Figure 8 in the NPCA Annual Report 2015 could not be included in Table 2. Of these men, 37 were treated in National Health Service trusts that treated fewer than five patients during the Audit period; and for 19 patients it was not possible to identify the NHS trust where they had undergone treatment without incurring disproportionate cost.
The first results for the patient-reported outcomes of men who were diagnosed with prostate cancer between 1 April 2014 and 30 September 2014, and who underwent radical treatment (prostatectomy, external beam radiation, brachytherapy, cryotherapy, and high-intensity focused ultrasound), will be included in the NPCA’s Annual Report 2016, which is due to be published in the last quarter of 2016. These results will include incontinence rates.
Men who had radical prostate cancer treatment were invited to complete a questionnaire about their experiences of care as well as about treatment outcomes, 18 months after the date of diagnosis. It was decided that questionnaires should be sent out at this time after diagnosis because it can take more than one year for men who have radiotherapy, in combination with androgen deprivation therapy, to complete their treatment. Subsequently, it will take at least three months for men to fully recover from the transient side effects of the radiotherapy. In order to include all men and to measure the final treatment outcome – rather than outcomes still affected by the transient side effects – an 18-month period was chosen.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Robert Jenrick on 2016-03-10.
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, if he will take steps to ensure disabled access on all platforms at Bingham railway station.
Claire Perry
I would like to assure the hon. Member that we are committed to improving accessibility at railway stations. However, many stations date from a time when the needs of disabled customers were simply not considered and at present only around 460 of our 2,500 stations have step free access to every platform. We have therefore continued with the Access for All programme, launched in 2006, which by 2019 will have provided step free access at more than 200 stations and has already delivered smaller scale access improvements at over 1200 stations.
In 2013 we asked the industry to nominate stations for the latest tranche of Access for All funding. 278 were put forward and we selected 68 of these to add to the programme. To ensure the best possible value for money, these were chosen based on their annual footfall, weighted by the incidence of disability in the area. We also took into account the priorities of the industry and other factors such as the availability of third party funding. Around a third were also chosen to ensure a fair geographical spread across the country.
Bingham was not among the 278 stations nominated.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Roberts of Llandudno on 2016-04-11.
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what is the smallest amount of unpaid tax that has led to a criminal prosecution in the UK in the last 10 years.
Lord O’Neill of Gatley
The information is not held in the form requested.
The smallest amount of revenue loss prevented in respect of individuals prosecuted between 2011/12 and 2014/15 is £162. The person prosecuted was a member of aircrew who attempted to bring 600 cigarettes into the UK without declaring them, thus attempting to evade the correct excise duty on them. Aircrew are deemed to hold privileged positions due to their unrestricted airport access and HM Revenue and Customs has a zero tolerance approach to prosecution should they not declare dutiable goods when entering the UK.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Hilary Benn on 2016-05-18.
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, what recent reports he has received on the detention of Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe in Iran; and if he will make a statement.
Mr Philip Hammond
We have repeatedly raised this matter with Iran. Iran does not recognise dual nationality and as such does not grant us consular access in these cases. We have therefore not been given any details about Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s detention. We understand that she has now been released from solitary confinement. The Parliamentary Under-Secretary for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, my Hon. Friend the Member for Rochford and Southend East (James Duddridge) raised our concerns this week with the Iranian Chargé d’affaires.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Neil Coyle on 2016-07-11.
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, if his Department will publish any research it holds on attendance allowance claimants and how such claimants use that funding.
Justin Tomlinson
The Department publishes its research and statistics on Gov.uk, with links to research available on https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/department-for-work-pensions/about/research. There are no current plans to publish any further research on Attendance Allowance claimants outside the regular statistical publications it produces.
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The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Stoddart of Swindon on 2016-09-13.
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to ensure the safety of users of the M4 motorway following the removal of the hard shoulders, and what arrangements will be made for the emergency services to have urgent and easy access to the motorway in the event of accidents and other incidents.
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon
The M4 Junctions 3 to 12 smart motorway scheme incorporates the following features to ensure safety is maintained:
This allows Highways England to create an emergency lane or lanes on any lane on the motorway, with signs and signals to provide access for the emergency services or traffic officers.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jim Shannon on 2015-11-23.
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what plans he has to introduce blood tests for the detection of ovarian cancer on the NHS.
George Freeman
I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave him on 23 November 2015 to Question 16523.
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The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Hunt of Kings Heath on 2015-12-14.
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what percentage of (1) all multi-academy trusts, and (2) multi-academy trusts with at least five schools, achieve above average value added.
Earl of Courtown
Value added scores are routinely published for individual schools as part of the department’s performance tables, which include the functionality to filter results by an academy sponsor.
The department does not publish a summary of value added scores for each academy chain or multi-academy trust. Simple aggregations of performance measures can lead to misleading conclusions about performance within a chain since they will often reflect the type of schools that have entered into the chain relationship.
Earlier this year, the department published a statistical working paper to consider how these issues may be addressed and invited comments from users. This can be found in the attachment to this answer.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Ian C. Lucas on 2016-01-25.
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, what steps the Government is taking to support the extension of democracy in Bahrain.
Mr Tobias Ellwood
Governance of Bahrain is a matter for all political parties in Bahrain. We encourage all political parties, to engage constructively in political dialogue in order to reach an inclusive political settlement. Although we were disappointed by the opposition’s decision to boycott the 2014 elections, we commended the participation of a broad range of candidates which saw 14 independent Shia candidates win seats, of which three were women.
We regularly discuss human rights and reform with the Government of Bahrain including at the biannual UK-Bahrain Joint Working Group meeting which was most recently held in November 2015. Reform programme activities delivered through the Causeway Institute have used lessons from Northern Ireland to improve community outreach and communication – particularly to a youth audience.