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Tag: Parliamentary Question

  • David Morris – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

    David Morris – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by David Morris on 2016-04-13.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, what assessment he has made of the implications for his policy on the Falkland Islands of the recent decision by the UN to grant rights over waters surrounding those Islands to Argentina.

    Mr Hugo Swire

    The UN Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf (CLCS) has no jurisdiction to consider areas subject to competing claims and therefore has no locus to make recommendations in relation to the Falkland Islands. The UN itself has acknowledged that the CLCS could not consider those parts of the original Argentine submission of 2009 that were subject to dispute. This would include the Falkland Islands.

  • Tulip Siddiq – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

    Tulip Siddiq – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Tulip Siddiq on 2016-05-20.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, with reference to the Answer of 31 March 2016 to Question 31997, on employment: telephone services, if he will provide that data for financial years (a) 2010-11, (b) 2011-12, (c) 2012-13 and (d) 2013-14.

    Nick Boles

    The table below shows the number of referrals (complaints) from the Pay and Work Rights Helpline (PWRH) to relevant enforcement authorities for the 2010/11 to 2013/14 financial years.

    Table 1: Referrals from the PWRH to each enforcement agencies, 2010/11 to 2013/14

    2010/11

    2011/12

    2012/13

    2013/14

    HMRC

    2,080

    2,440

    2,610

    3,690

    EAS

    490

    530

    600

    630

    HSE

    200

    250

    210

    250

    DEFRA

    280

    210

    200

    150

    GLA

    60

    70

    50

    50

    *The Pay and Work Rights Helpline opened in May 2009

    Notes

    1. Numbers are rounded to the nearest 10.

    2. Calls can be referred to more than one agency so the sum does not amount to the total number of calls referred for the period.

    3. Calls referred to agencies include complaints, complex queries and calls where intelligence was passed to other agencies.

    4. Figures include referrals via all PWRH communication channels, including telephone calls, post and online complaints.

    5. These figures are based on final data submitted by BSS on closure at the end of March 2015. They may not reconcile with provisional data provided while the old helpline was operational.

  • Ian Lavery – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Ian Lavery – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Ian Lavery on 2016-07-06.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what the estimated cost to the public purse is of prescribing methadone to prisoners in the last 12 months for which figures are available; and if he will make a statement.

    Ben Gummer

    This information is not collected centrally.

  • Martyn Day – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the HM Treasury

    Martyn Day – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the HM Treasury

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Martyn Day on 2016-09-15.

    To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, what assessment he has made of the potential benefits to the economy of reducing both fuel duty and VAT on all fuels.

    Jane Ellison

    Fuel duty was frozen for its sixth successive year at Budget 2016, saving the average driver £75 every year compared to the pre-2010 fuel duty escalator plans. Like all taxes, the government keeps fuel duty under review, with all options considered and announcements made at fiscal events. Under the current legal framework there is no scope to apply a reduced rate of VAT to all fuels.

  • Madeleine Moon – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for International Development

    Madeleine Moon – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for International Development

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Madeleine Moon on 2015-11-18.

    To ask the Secretary of State for International Development, what assessment she has made of the relationship between clean water and sanitation in schools and girls’ school attendance in developing countries; and if she will make a statement.

    Grant Shapps

    Clean water and adequate sanitation in schools ensure safe and hygienic environments for learning. The UK Government supports the view that providing toilets at schools for girls is necessary to provide privacy and dignity. There is some evidence that WASH interventions in schools do improve attendance by girls but much evidence points to other important factors as well.

    In 2011, DFID published a systematic review of this issue. This determined that separate facilities for girls were likely to encourage their attendance at school, but insufficient alone to increase attendance and that there are many influential factors, including social and economic pressures on poor families. DFID therefore takes a holistic approach to this issue.

    The UK played a key role in ensuring that the recently agreed Sustainable Development Goals include a dedicated goal on water which aims to ensure universal access to water and sanitation by 2030.

  • Lord West of Spithead – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Defence

    Lord West of Spithead – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Defence

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord West of Spithead on 2015-12-10.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether the embarked carrier air wing of Sea Lightnings, Merlins, Crowsnest aircraft, and Wildcats will be under Maritime Task Force command.

    Earl Howe

    Command of embarked aircraft will be dependent on a variety of factors such as but not limited to, the specific task, whether it is a national or coalition commitment, threat levels and theatre of operations.

  • David Crausby – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    David Crausby – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by David Crausby on 2016-01-21.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what monitoring his Department is undertaking to ensure that the level of service to the public is not negatively affected by the transfer of responsibilities from the Child Support Agency to the Child Maintenance Service.

    Priti Patel

    The government has introduced a new statutory Child Maintenance Service for parents who are unable to make a family-based arrangement. It will bring speedier processing of applications, simpler calculations and faster enforcement action for those that choose not to pay. This will help increase the number of payments reaching children on time and in full and will result in a better use of taxpayers’ money.

    We are contacting parents 6 months before their CSA case closes to allow them the opportunity to access the support services available to them. They receive a reminder 1 month before their CSA case ends, and a confirmation once it has actually ended. We do not transfer cases automatically to the Child Maintenance Service. We close them in a way that minimises the risk of disruption to child maintenance payments.

    Cases on the previous CSA schemes are being closed in an order determined by case characteristics. This includes the micro-management of the phases of case closure using our tried and tested pathfinder approach; sequencing and prioritising case closure to minimise disruption for clients.

    The Department set out an evaluation strategy in December 2014 which can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/387584/child-maintenance-reforms-evaluation-strategy.pdf

    “

  • Steve McCabe – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Steve McCabe – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Steve McCabe on 2016-02-19.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what recent assessment he has made of the provision of mental health care services for children in the care system.

    Alistair Burt

    The Government has made no such central assessment. It is for local areas to consider and commission services based on the needs of their local population. Local transformation plans produced in each area of the country set out how they plan to meet the full spectrum of needs of children and young people with mental health problems including the needs of the most vulnerable, such as children in the care system.

    At the Education Select Committee hearing on the mental health and wellbeing of looked-after children held on 3 February 2016, it was announced that the Department of Health and Department for Education will set up an Expert Group, working with NHS England, Health Education England, and sector partners, to develop care pathways to support an integrated approach to meeting the needs of looked-after children with mental health difficulties. By summer 2016 the expert group will be established to lead the development of models of care for looked-after children’s mental health. Members of this expert group will be drawn from across the health, social care and education sectors, with input from children, young people, carers and families with experience of the care system.

  • David Amess – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    David Amess – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by David Amess on 2016-03-14.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, with reference to the findings of the Annual Report of the National Clinical Audit for Rheumatoid and Early Inflammatory Arthritis, published on 22 January 2016, on timely access to patient education, what steps he is taking to provide patients with rheumatoid and early inflammatory arthritis self-education and self-management tools.

    Jane Ellison

    National Clinical Audits are commissioned and managed on behalf of NHS England by the Healthcare Quality Improvement Partnership (HQIP). Audits help drive improvement by providing local trusts with individual benchmarked reports on their performance against a range of measures, feeding back comparative findings to help participants identify necessary improvements for patients

    The first annual report of the national clinical audit of rheumatoid and early inflammatory arthritis was published on 22 January 2016. The report identifies that although most services offer prompt educational support and agree targets for treatment with their patients, performance against criteria for referral and assessment could be improved. Since the audit, HQIP has reported that a number of trusts have successfully reconfigured their services in order to improve patient care. More information can be found at the following link:

    www.hqip.org.uk/national-programmes/a-z-of-nca/arthritis-rheumatoid-and-early-inflammatory

    To help clinicians to identify the symptoms of rheumatoid arthritis (RA) and make prompt referrals to specialists, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) published Rheumatoid arthritis: The management of rheumatoid arthritis in adults, in 2009. This best practice guideline sets out the signs and symptoms of the disease and emphasises the need for early diagnosis with urgent referral to a specialist rheumatologist on suspicion of RA. For those diagnosed with the condition, the guidance also recommends they should be offered the opportunity to take part in educational activities, including self-management programmes.

    The NICE RA quality standard (QS), published in 2013, is based on the NICE guideline, and one of the seven quality statements recommends that people with suspected RA are assessed in a rheumatology service within three weeks of referral. However, whilst providers and commissioners must have regard to these standards in planning and delivering services, they do not provide a comprehensive service specification and are not mandatory.

    Regarding the establishment of early arthritis clinics, the configuration of services, including decisions to such arthritis clinics, is a matter for the local National Health Service.

    The latest monthly workforce statistics published by the Health and Social Care Information Centre showed that, as of November 2015, there were 563 full time equivalent rheumatology consultants employed in the NHS. This is an increase of 119 (26.8%) since May 2010. The recruitment and retention of staff is matter for local NHS services.

  • Luciana Berger – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Luciana Berger – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Luciana Berger on 2016-04-13.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, (a) how many and (b) what proportion of pregnant women had a mental health assessment in each year since 2010.

    Alistair Burt

    The information requested is not collected.