Tag: Stephen Timms

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Stephen Timms on 2016-01-22.

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps he is taking to ensure that all residual legacy benefit caseloads will move onto universal credit by 2021 as forecast in the policy costings of the Spending Review and Autumn Statement 2015.

Priti Patel

Testing of the migration of legacy claimants onto Universal Credit will take place during 2017. Following this national migration will commence in 2018 and by 2020/21 the move to Universal Credit will be complete.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Stephen Timms on 2016-02-01.

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, pursuant to the Answer of 28 January 2016 to Question 23991, whether calls to make a claim for benefit are free for all (a) pay-as-you-go mobile telephones, (b) monthly contract mobile telephones and (c) landline telephones.

Justin Tomlinson

All benefit new claims lines have 0800 numbers and are therefore free whether claimants call from mobile phones or landlines, with the exception of Universal Credit which has an 0345 number as the expectation is that claims are made online.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Stephen Timms on 2016-02-04.

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many universal credit claimants there were in (a) Tameside, (b) Oldham, (c) Wigan and (d) Warrington in the most recent period for which figures are available.

Priti Patel

The information you have requested is available in the official Universal Credit statistics: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/universal-credit-statistics

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The below Parliamentary question was asked by Stephen Timms on 2016-02-11.

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what proportion of (a) maintained primary schools, (b) maintained secondary schools, (c) primary academies and (d) secondary academies provide at least two hours of physical education per week.

Edward Timpson

Information on the proportion of schools providing at least two hours of physical education (PE) per week is not held by the Department.

Through the primary PE and sport premium, primary schools have received over £450m of ring-fenced funding to improve PE and sport. We have committed to continue this funding until 2020. In December 2015, we published a report looking at how schools used the primary PE and sport premium and the impact of the fund on PE and sports provision. Primary schools reported spending around 2 hours per week on curricular PE in both 2013/14 and 2014/15[1]. 87% of schools also reported that the quality of PE teaching had increased since the introduction of the premium.

We do not hold information on how much time is spent on curricular PE for secondary schools.

[1] https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/pe-and-sport-premium-an-investigation-in-primary-schools

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The below Parliamentary question was asked by Stephen Timms on 2016-02-29.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many graduates have begun the Think Ahead programme in each year since its formation; and how many have been enrolled to start in 2016.

Alistair Burt

Conditional offers have been made for the first cohort of 80-100 participants, who will begin the Think Ahead programme in July 2016.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Stephen Timms on 2016-03-08.

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, pursuant to the Answer of 7 March 2016 to Question 29565, what extra training has been provided to Jobcentre Plus staff to enable them to participate in the Jobcentre Plus support for schools initiative.

Priti Patel

Comprehensive training for all Jobcentre Plus staff participating in the Jobcentre Support for Schools initiative has been arranged. This includes instruction facilitated by the Careers Development Institute (experts in the careers sector) covering:

• How careers work in schools is organised, the respective roles of different partners and how schools operate; and

• Insights and key skills required for working with groups of learners in a classroom environment.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Stephen Timms on 2016-03-15.

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, for what reasons sex and relationships education is statutory in maintained secondary schools and not in other secondary schools.

Edward Timpson

Academies do not have to follow the national curriculum but are required to provide a ‘broad and balanced’ curriculum. This allows them to have the maximum possible freedom to personalise learning for all their pupils, including the most able pupils and those needing additional support.

The Government believes that all children should have the opportunity to receive a high quality and appropriate sex and relationship education (SRE). SRE is compulsory in all maintained secondary schools and many primary schools also teach it in an age-appropriate way. The Government also expects academies and free schools to deliver relationship education as part of their provision of a broad and balanced curriculum.

Any state-funded school teaching SRE must have regard to the Secretary of State’s SRE guidance (2000) which makes clear that all sex and relationship education should be age-appropriate and that schools should ensure young people develop positive values and a moral framework that will guide their decisions, judgements and behaviour.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Stephen Timms on 2016-03-24.

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, to how many appeal hearings her Department did not send a representative at (a) First-tier Tribunal (Immigration and Asylum) and (b) Upper Tribunal (Immigration and Asylum) in (i) 2012-13 (ii) 2013-14 and (iii) 2014-15.

James Brokenshire

The Government publishes the percentage of appeal hearings at which the Secretary of State for the Home Department was represented on a quarterly basis. Below is a table covering the 2012-2015 period.

Appeal Representation Rates

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Stephen Timms on 2016-04-14.

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether the Youth Obligation can be extended beyond six months for a participant who is not work-ready at the end of that period.

Priti Patel

The Youth Obligation will be introduced from April 2017 for 18-21 year old Universal Credit claimants (UC) in the all work related requirements conditionality group.

At the 6 month stage, UC claimants who are not in work, on an Apprenticeship or participating in work-related training, will be required to go on a mandatory work placement to give them the skills they need to get on in work.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Stephen Timms on 2016-04-19.

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether she plans for local authorities to continue to receive basic need allocations of capital for new school places under her proposals for all schools to become academies.

Edward Timpson

Local authorities will continue to be responsible for ensuring there are enough school places to meet demand and supporting them to do this will remain one of the government’s top priorities for this Parliament. That is why we allocate funding to local authorities based on their own estimates of the number of places they will need and will continue to do so. 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.

Local authorities have always relied on their strong relationships with local schools to deliver the places needed and this will not change as more schools convert to become academies.