Tag: Parliamentary Question

  • Yasmin Qureshi – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    Yasmin Qureshi – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Yasmin Qureshi on 2016-06-27.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to the press release of the Department for Education of 4 January 2016, entitled Parents to get greater say in the school admissions process, what assessment she has made of the potential effect that ensuring only local parents and councils can object to school admissions arrangements will have on overall levels of compliance with the School Admissions Code.

    Nick Gibb

    Our proposed changes are intended to ensure that the Adjudicator is able to focus on the concerns parents may have about the fairness of the admission arrangements of their local school, and is not held up by the need to consider objections referred by interest groups from outside the area.

    We do not believe that limiting who is able to refer objections to the Adjudicator will have a detrimental impact.

    Any changes will be subject to parliamentary scrutiny.

  • Lord Black of Brentwood – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

    Lord Black of Brentwood – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Black of Brentwood on 2016-09-14.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the proposal for all African lion populations to be transferred to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) Appendix I at the forthcoming CITES Convention in Johannesburg.

    Lord Gardiner of Kimble

    The Government’s current assessment of the lion uplisting proposal against the biological and other listing criteria under CITES is that the entire lion population of Africa does not meet the criteria for inclusion in Appendix I. This is notably the case for Southern African lion populations, which have an increasing population trend. Assessment and discussions are ongoing in advance of the CITES Conference, which is to be held in Johannesburg from 24 September to 5 October 2016.

  • Kate Green – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    Kate Green – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Kate Green on 2015-11-10.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what discussions he has had with his ministerial colleagues on the implementation of the family test throughout the Government.

    Priti Patel

    Officials from different Government Departments have had discussions with a view to aid the implementation of The Family Test across Government. Activity resulting from these discussions has included holding a series of seminars with key stakeholders and officials to raise awareness of the issues to consider when applying the Test and developing and disseminating relevant evidence, learning materials and best practice.

  • Luciana Berger – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Luciana Berger – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    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 much local clinical commissioning groups spend on independent sector providers.

    George Freeman

    This information is already collected centrally by the Department.

  • Lord Mendelsohn – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

    Lord Mendelsohn – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Mendelsohn on 2016-01-19.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government what was the original date set for the publication of the impact assessment for the Trade Union Bill.

    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.

  • Liz Saville Roberts – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

    Liz Saville Roberts – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Liz Saville Roberts on 2016-02-11.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many applications for Exceptional Case Funding there were in 2015; and how many of those applications were successful.

    Mr Shailesh Vara

    The Legal Aid Agency publishes this information as part of its official statistics, the most recent edition of which can be found at https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/legal-aid-statistics-quarterly-july-to-september-2015.

    Statistics covering the final quarter of 2015 will be published in due course.

    “

  • Mark Pritchard – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

    Mark Pritchard – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Mark Pritchard on 2016-03-03.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, if his Department will conduct research on the potential effect on the cost of legal aid of encouraging early guilty pleas by defendants in serious criminal trial cases.

    Mr Shailesh Vara

    We currently have no plans to do so. It has long been the practice to encourage early guilty pleas by offering reductions in sentence, and this is governed by the guideline Reduction in Sentence for a Guilty Plea, first issued by the Sentencing Guidelines Council in 2005. The Sentencing Council (as it now is) last month published for consultation a revised guideline, the purpose of which is stated to be ‘to encourage those defendants who are aware of their guilt to enter a plea as early in the court process as possible’. Increasing the incidence of early guilty pleas would be expected to result in savings in legal aid, as well as in other benefits.

  • Lord Hunt of Chesterton – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for International Development

    Lord Hunt of Chesterton – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for International Development

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Hunt of Chesterton on 2016-04-12.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether UK government agencies were providing remote sensing data to detect, forecast and provide warning of the recent earthquakes in Afghanistan to the affected communities and government agencies.

    Baroness Verma

    The science is clear on this matter – earthquakes cannot be forecast with any degree of reliability. Remote sensing does exist, but can only operate in extremely technically sophisticated environments, and even then can only provide limited warning of a few seconds or minutes in which to respond. As such the UK Government does not provide remote sensing data to detect, forecast, and provide warning of earthquakes in Afghanistan.

    When it comes to other forms of natural disaster, DFID funds a resilience and disaster risk reduction programme in Afghanistan which provides £9.6m over four years (2015-18) to an NGO consortium called Afghanistan Resilience Consortium (ARC). Implementation is focused in the eight northern provinces of Afghanistan which are the most disaster prone.

  • Philip Davies – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

    Philip Davies – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Philip Davies on 2016-05-05.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many (a) out-of-court restorative justice resolutions and (b) cautions were given to (i) people on suspended prison sentences and (ii) prisoners released on licence in the latest year for which information is held.

    Mike Penning

    The information requested, could only be obtained at disproportionate cost.

  • Nigel Evans – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

    Nigel Evans – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Nigel Evans on 2016-06-27.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, how much his Department provided in bus subsidies to Lancashire in 2015.

    Andrew Jones

    Lancashire receives almost £1.9 million of the £40m of Bus Service Operators Grant (BSOG) my Department provides directly to English local authorities each year to help deliver bus services.

    This is in addition to the £6.8 million Lancashire received in 2014-15 for local bus services via the block grant from the Department for Communities and Local Government, which is provided to all local authorities in England.