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 Jobcentre Plus staff are taking to ensure that universal credit applicants are aware that council tax reduction should be claimed separately to universal credit.

Priti Patel

When a Universal Credit claimant attends their first interview with their Work Coach they are asked if they pay council tax and if they are already receiving a reduction. If not, they are advised and signposted to make the claim through their Local Authority.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Stephen Timms on 2016-01-28.

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, pursuant to the Answer 27 January 2016 to Question 23759, whether there is scope for the Work Coach to pass on details of the claimant’s universal credit application to their local authority in order to begin automatically the application for council tax reduction.

Priti Patel

A process to automate the sharing of data between Universal Credit and Local Authorities to support applications to Local Council Tax Reduction Schemes will be implemented in the next month.

There are no plans to automate applications for Council Tax Reduction through Universal Credit. This must be done separately by the claimant with the Local Authority.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Stephen Timms on 2016-02-09.

To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, what measures are in place to provide housing support to care leavers; and what additional support his Department plans to provide after April 2017.

Mr Marcus Jones

Ensuring that young people leaving care have accommodation and support that is suitable for their needs is a priority for this Government. The homelessness legislation provides a strong safety net for vulnerable people. Care leavers aged 18-21 facing homelessness have a priority need for accommodation, as do vulnerable care leavers who are older than 21.

We have funded youth homelessness agency St Basils to develop and support the roll-out of the Positive Pathway Framework. This supports local authority children’s services and housing teams and other local partners to work together to prevent homelessness and meet the housing and support needs of vulnerable young people, including care leavers. To build on this, we supported St Basils to develop a specific Care Leavers Accommodation and Support Framework, in partnership with Barnardo’s, in 2015.

We have also invested £15 million in the Fair Chance Fund, a payment by results programme which aims to test new approaches to improving accommodation, employment and training outcomes for vulnerable homeless 18-25 year olds. Over 200 of the young people on the programme have previously been looked after.

We will ensure that vulnerable young people who are in need of support for their housing needs continue to receive it.

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

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department plans to take to publish performance data for academy chains.

Edward Timpson

In March 2015 the Department published a consultative statistical working paper proposing performance measures for multi-academy trusts[1].

In addition, the Department’s school performance tables now allow parents and others to more easily see which academies are within a multi-academy trust and the information for each academy, including their academic performance and Ofsted judgements[2].

Ofsted also carries out focused inspections of groups of academies within multi-academy trusts and these outcomes are published[3].

[1] https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/schools-in-academy-chains-and-las-performance-measures

[2] http://www.education.gov.uk/schools/performance/

[3] http://reports.ofsted.gov.uk/resources/local-authority-school-improvement-arrangements-inspections-and-focused-school-inspections

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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

Quarters	All hearings (%)	First Tier (%) 3	Upper Tier (%) 3	Deportation (%) 2
2012 Q1	83%	80%	100%	100%
2012 Q2	83%	80%	100%	100%
2012 Q3	87%	85%	100%	100%
2012 Q4	94%	93%	100%	100%
2013 Q1	95%	94%	100%	100%
2013 Q2	98%	97%	100%	100%
2013 Q3	98%	98%	100%	100%
2013 Q4	99%	99%	100%	100%
2014 Q1	99%	98%	100%	100%
2014 Q2	99%	99%	100%	100%
2014 Q3	99%	99%	100%	100%
2014 Q4	99%	99%	100%	100%
2015 Q1	97%	97%	100%	100%
2015 Q2	86%	83%	100%	100%
2015 Q3	85%	82%	100%	100%
2015 Q4	98%	97%	100%	100%

	Appeal Representation Rates
1	The percentage of appeal hearings at first tier/upper tier/deportation where the Home Office was represented.
2	Deportation appeals show both first tier and upper tier representation rates.
3	The first tier/upper tier information excludes entry clearance appeals and deportation appeals.
4	All figures quoted have been derived from management information and are therefore provisional and subject to change.
5	This information has not been quality assured under National Statistics protocols.
6	Data refers ONLY to those cases recorded on the Casework Immigration Database.

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.