Tag: Parliamentary Question

  • Lord Falconer of Thoroton – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

    Lord Falconer of Thoroton – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Falconer of Thoroton on 2015-10-28.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government what has been the total value of criminal courts charges (1) issued by the courts, and (2) collected to date; and what estimate they have made of the total cost of enforcement to date.

    Lord Faulks

    Information on the enforcement of financial impositions is contained within an annex to Criminal Court Statistics Quarterly statistical bulletin published quarterly by the Ministry of Justice.

    Data relating to the criminal courts charge for the period April to September 2015 will be published on 17 December 2015. This will separately identify the monetary values of the criminal courts charge imposed and collected since 13 April 2015.

    The cost of enforcing the criminal courts charge cannot be separated from the total cost of enforcing all types of court ordered financial impositions. Enforcement action is taken against the total amount an offender owes and offenders are often ordered to pay more than one type of financial imposition.

  • Derek Thomas – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for International Development

    Derek Thomas – 2015 Parliamentary Question to the Department for International Development

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Derek Thomas on 2015-11-24.

    To ask the Secretary of State for International Development, what support her Department is giving to strengthening water, sanitation and hygiene services in countries affected by Ebola.

    Mr Nick Hurd

    Prior to, during and following the Ebola outbreak, DFID has provided funding and technical assistance to increase access to water, sanitation services and hygiene education (WASH) in Sierra Leone and Liberia. Between 2012-2016, DFID has committed through our country programmes up to £71.3m for WASH programmes in Sierra Leone and £4.75m for Liberia. We have no bilateral programme in Guinea.

    During the Ebola outbreak our existing WASH programmes were adapted to help Sierra Leone and Liberia respond to the crisis. The above figure includes DFID assistance to improve water and sanitation facilities in schools and health facilities as part of our support to the post-Ebola recovery.

    The President of Sierra Leone has identified water as one of his top six priorities for the post Ebola recovery period. DFID has committed to support delivery of this agenda and we are working with them to define high quality programmes that will increase access to clean water.

  • John Healey – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Communities and Local Government

    John Healey – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Communities and Local Government

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by John Healey on 2016-01-05.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, with reference to the announcement of 4 January 2016, The Government will directly build affordable homes, whether a new college and innovation centre is intended to open at the same time as the first of the 249 residential units at the direct commissioning site at Daedelus Waterfront.

    Brandon Lewis

    The direct commissioning pilots will follow the normal planning and commercial processes for determining the phasing of homes and associated facilities.

  • Norman Lamb – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Norman Lamb – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Norman Lamb on 2016-02-01.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many times there were no tier four child and adolescent mental health services beds available in (a) England and (b) each region in the last 12 months.

    Alistair Burt

    Since 1 April 2015, there have always been tier four Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services beds available in England as a whole.

    Since 1 April 2015, there were a total of 26 days when no beds were available in the South East and 52 days when no beds were available in the South West. In all other regions there have always been tier four beds available since April 2015.

    Accurate data is only available from 1 April 2015 due to the introduction of a more effective bed status database from that date.

  • Bridget Phillipson – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Bridget Phillipson – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Bridget Phillipson on 2016-02-23.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, whether his Department has allocated funding to defend a legal challenge against his decision to impose a new junior doctors contract.

    Ben Gummer

    The Department has an allocated budget to fund the legal services it requires, which would include funding for any challenge in relation to the junior doctors’ contract.

  • Mark Garnier – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Mark Garnier – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Mark Garnier on 2016-03-18.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what provision the Government has in place to provide extra funding for clinical commissioning groups to deal with increasing local pressures on social care resulting from limits on local authority resources and NHS trusts being placed on special measures.

    Alistair Burt

    The Better Care Fund gives flexibility to local areas to determine how best to invest a joint budget. Local authorities are required to agree with their local health partners how funding is best used within social care in order to best serve local people and reduce pressures on the health service.

    The total value of the Better Care Fund in 2015/16 is £5.3 billion, which includes monies provided by local authorities and health partners in 151 local areas.

    From April 2017, the Spending Review makes available additional social care funds for local government, rising to £1.5 billion by 2019/20, to be included in the Better Care Fund.

  • Lord Hunt of Kings Heath – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    Lord Hunt of Kings Heath – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Hunt of Kings Heath on 2016-04-18.

    To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the comments by the President of the Royal College of Ophthalmologists that hundreds of patients are going blind because hospitals cannot meet the demand for appointments.

    Lord Prior of Brampton

    Given the size of England, and the diversity of the health needs of different communities, we believe commissioning needs to be owned and managed locally.

    Therefore, there are no plans to develop a national strategy for eye care.

    Clinical commissioning groups (CCGs) are responsible for commissioning hospital eye services and for holding their providers to account in terms of contract performance. CCGs are also able to commission eye care services from community optometrists where they judge them to be needed in their areas over and above the sight tests commissioned by NHS England. Such services could include post cataract surgery reviews, glaucoma monitoring and low vision services which may reduce pressure on hospital eye departments, reduce waiting times and make patient care pathways more accessible in the community.

    There is scope for further work to be done by community optometrists and the Clinical Council for eye health commissioning is working with commissioners to develop commissioning guidelines in this area.

    CCGs have the ability to develop alternatives to hospital care. We would expect patients who require further planned stages of treatment in line with their agreed care plan, to receive this treatment without undue delay and in line with when it is clinically appropriate.

  • Greg Knight – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Cabinet Office

    Greg Knight – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Cabinet Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Greg Knight on 2016-05-25.

    To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, if he will take steps to allow postal voting ballot papers to be counted separately in order to more easily detect fraud.

    John Penrose

    The law provides for the checking of the integrity of completed postal ballots prior to them being included in the count. Returning Officers are required to check 100% of postal vote identifiers (signatures and dates of birth) returned with completed postal votes against those supplied by the elector when they applied for a postal vote. Any that do not match will not be counted in order to prevent any attempt at electoral fraud. The law requires that postal ballot papers are mixed with ballot papers from a ballot box before they can be counted as a necessary step in order to help protect the secrecy of the ballot.

  • Thangam Debbonaire – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    Thangam Debbonaire – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Thangam Debbonaire on 2016-07-21.

    To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what timetable she has set for resettling 20,000 Syrian refugees in the UK; and if she will make a statement.

    Mr Robert Goodwill

    Work continues with local authorities and international partners to deliver the Government’s commitment to resettle 20,000 Syrian refugees over the lifetime of this Parliament and we are on track to do this.

  • Alex Chalk – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    Alex Chalk – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

    The below Parliamentary question was asked by Alex Chalk on 2016-10-07.

    To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what financial support the Government has made available for local authorities to commission new nursery places in the event of current providers withdrawing or reducing their delivery of subsidised places.

    Caroline Dinenage

    The Government is committed to extending the free entitlement to childcare from 15 to 30 hours a week for working parents. We are clear that we need to get the funding right to ensure that providers are funded on a fair and sustainable basis. Our recent consultation set out our proposals to allocate our record level of funding fairly and transparently, with the maximum amount reaching providers. We will publish our response this autumn.

    We have recently made a substantial capital investment to support the creation of new 30 hours childcare places and our recently closed capital bid round made £40million available to local authorities working in partnership with providers in their area. We intend to announce successful project bids in mid-December 2016. We will also shortly be announcing the outcome of a competition to appoint a delivery contractor, who will provide support to ensure that all local authorities are ready to deliver the required number of free places in September 2017.