Tag: Parliamentary Question

Susan Elan Jones – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the HM Treasury

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Susan Elan Jones on 2016-02-19.

To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, what steps the Government is taking to improve access to mortgages for self-employed people.

Harriett Baldwin

The Government is committed to ensuring that the mortgage market delivers for creditworthy borrowers.

On 1 December 2015 the Government launched the Help to Buy: ISA to help all first time buyers saving for their first home.

Beyond the requirements set out in the regulations, decisions around the availability of individual mortgage loans are commercial decisions for lenders, including what evidence is required to validate income. The Government does not seek to intervene in these decisions.

01/01/2023
Amanda Milling – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Amanda Milling on 2016-03-16.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what steps his Department is taking to maintain the position of the UK internationally in dementia research and the design of dementia-friendly communities.

Jane Ellison

We will spend more than £300million on dementia research this parliament, aiming to double overall investment by 2025. Additionally, we have spearheaded the £130million Dementia Discovery Fund and plan to invest up to £150million to develop a national Dementia Research Institute by 2020. By 2020, over half of people will be living in dementia friendly communities – of which there are already 147 such communities across England.

01/01/2023
Henry Smith – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Henry Smith on 2016-04-20.

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what plans her Department has to increase the number of school places in Crawley.

Edward Timpson

Local authorities are responsible for planning and securing sufficient school places in their area, and supporting them to do so is one of this Government’s top priorities. That is why we have committed to spending £7 billion on school places up to 2021, which along with our investment in the free schools programme we expect to deliver 600,000 new places.

Basic need funding is allocated to local authorities to help them to create new school places. West Sussex received £113 million of basic need funding between 2011 and 2015, which helped to create almost 10,000 new places between 2010 and 2015. These new places include over 1,000 provided by the Gatwick School, an all-through free school in Crawley.

West Sussex has also been allocated a further £85 million to create the places needed by 2019, including in Crawley.

Information on basic need allocations can be found on GOV.UK at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/basic-need-allocations

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01/01/2023
Andrew Percy – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andrew Percy on 2016-05-23.

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what the timetable is for her Department’s assessment of applications for emergency authorisation of neonicotinoid seed treatments; and whether she plans to remove restrictions on the use of neonicotinoids.

George Eustice

The timetable for assessing an application for emergency authorisation varies from case to case. It needs to enable expert scientific assessment and a decision to be made against the legal criteria in time for any authorisation to be of value to users.

Two recent applications for emergency authorisation of neonicotinoids as seed treatments for oilseed rape were turned down on 12 May following expert advice that they did not meet the criteria for authorisation.

The UK has fully implemented restrictions on the use of three neonicotinoids. UK experts are contributing to a review of the risks to pollinators from neonicotinoids being led by the European Food Safety Authority, which is due to complete by January 2017. The European Commission will then consider whether to propose changes to the current restrictions.

01/01/2023
Lord Inglewood – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Exiting the European Union

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Inglewood on 2016-07-19.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of whether holding a second referendum is an essential constitutional precondition to invoking Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty.

Lord Bridges of Headley

Article 50 explicitly recognises that a Member State may decide to withdraw “in accordance with its own constitutional requirements”. It is for the Member State concerned to determine what those constitutional requirements are. The Government does not consider that a second referendum is necessary, or required to invoke Article 50.

01/01/2023
Gareth Johnson – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Gareth Johnson on 2016-10-10.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many people have had stem cell transplantation procedures interrupted in England in each of the last five years.

Nicola Blackwood

Stem treatments may be discontinued due to a range of clinical reasons or patient choice. NHS England does not hold information on the number of patients that start but do not complete this form of treatment.

01/01/2023
Lord Grocott – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Cabinet Office

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Grocott on 2015-11-19.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government, further to the Written Answer by Baroness Stowell of Beeston on 12 November (HL3120), on which occasions since 2010 the House has withheld its agreement to an affirmative instrument.

Baroness Stowell of Beeston

The House of Lords has withheld its agreement to an affirmative instrument on two occasions since 2010: on 3 December 2012 (Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012 (Amendment of Schedule 1) Order 2012) and on 26 October 2015 (Tax Credits (Income Thresholds and Determination of Rates) Regulations 2015).

Prior to 2010, the House had withheld its agreement to an affirmative instrument on three occasions since World War II.

01/01/2023

Graham Brady – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Graham Brady on 2015-12-17.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, on average, how many patients were admitted to A&E on a (a) Monday, (b) Tuesday, (c) Wednesday, (d) Thursday, (e) Friday, (f) Saturday and (g) Sunday in the last 12 months for which data is available.

Jane Ellison

The average (mean) number of patients who died in accident and emergency (A&E) and who attended A&E on a (a) Monday, (b) Tuesday, (c) Wednesday, (d) Thursday, (e) Friday, (f) Saturday and (g) Sunday in 2013-14 is shown in the following table. These figures are taken from the Health and Social Care Information Centre’s Hospital Episode Statistics (HES). Final data for 2014-15 will be published on 28 January 2016.

Weekday	Average (mean) deaths in A&E department	Average (mean) attendances at A&E
Monday	59.3	55,212.7
Tuesday	54.0	49,660.8
Wednesday	56.0	48,667.0
Thursday	53.7	48,600.3
Friday	55.6	47,932.3
Saturday	55.8	48,614.6
Sunday	57.1	50,202.9

Source: (HES), Health and Social Care Information Centre

Notes:

1. The table shows the mean of A&E attendances, and the mean of A&E attendances where the patient died in the department, by weekday for 2013-14. The HES A&E database is recorded at attendance level, not patient level.

2. The data cannot be described as an average number of people as the same person may have had more than one A&E attendance within the time period presented.

3. The data excludes planned follow-up attendances.

01/01/2023

Tom Tugendhat – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the HM Treasury

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Tom Tugendhat on 2016-01-27.

To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, what steps his Department has taken to ensure transparency of commission and other charges levied by financial advisers on individual pension plans.

Harriett Baldwin

Adviser remuneration is regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA). Through the Retail Distribution Review (RDR), introduced at the end of 2012, the FCA has taken a number of steps to ensure that adviser remuneration on retail investment business is disclosed in advance of any services required. Product providers no longer have any influence over the remuneration received for advising on investments. Where commission remains on investments sold prior to the RDR, this will have been disclosed as required by the rules in force at the time the product was sold.

01/01/2023
Chuka Umunna – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Communities and Local Government

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Chuka Umunna on 2016-02-19.

To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, what assessment he has made of the potential effect of proposals to impose mandatory rent reductions on social landlords of one per cent each year for four years on housing co-operatives which have had a policy of maintaining low levels of rent.

Brandon Lewis

The Housing Benefit bill for England in the social sector now has risen by a quarter over the last 10 years, reaching £13.2 billion in 2014/15. Rising rents in the social housing sector are fuelling this increase in Housing Benefit, with average social rent increases of 55% over the last ten years, compared to 23% in the private rented sector. In the interests of fairness the Government plans to bring rent increases within the social sector back into line with the private rented sector by cutting rents for social housing tenants by 1% a year, for four years.

The Government recognises that rent reductions may have a bigger impact on some providers and some specific types of housing and has decided to put in place a one-year exception from the rent reduction for fully mutual co-operative housing, almshouses, community land trusts and supported housing while we consider the approach for the second year of the reductions onwards.

01/01/2023