Tag: Steve McCabe

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Steve McCabe on 2016-06-06.

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what progress has been made on the National Litter Strategy which was announced on 5 December 2015.

Rory Stewart

Defra and the Department for Communities and Local Government are working on the Litter Strategy for England to improve the way we all tackle the scourge of litter. We have an ambitious goal, to substantially reduce litter and littering in England, ensuring that our communities, natural landscape, roads and highways are clean and pleasant.

The Strategy will focus on three key themes: education and awareness; punishing offenders; and better cleansing and litter infrastructure. These will be backed up by specific actions under each objective.

We have established a Litter Strategy Advisory Group. We held a Litter Forum earlier this year to gather stakeholder views for the Strategy’s content and have begun working with a wide range of stakeholders to develop our approach. We will publish the Strategy this year and a great deal of work will be taken forward in the coming months.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Steve McCabe on 2016-06-07.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what estimate he has made of the cost to the NHS of patients with long-term health conditions who cannot afford to pay the charges associated with their prescribed medication and subsequently require additional treatment.

Alistair Burt

We have made no such estimate. This information is not available in the format requested.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Steve McCabe on 2016-06-28.

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, if he will request that the UN Human Rights Council establishes an international commission of inquiry to investigate alleged violations of human rights and international humanitarian law in Yemen by all parties to the conflict in that country.

Mr Tobias Ellwood

The UK supported a UN Human Rights Council resolution in October 2015, which called on the UN to provide technical assistance to the Government of Yemen, assist the Yemeni National Independent Commission of Inquiry, and report back to the next session of the Human Rights Council in September. The UK welcomes Yemen’s commitment to cooperate with the UN on protection of human rights

We are aware of reports of alleged violations of International Humanitarian Law (IHL) by actors in the conflict and take these very seriously. It is important that all sides conduct thorough and conclusive investigations into all incidents where it is alleged that IHL has been breached. We regularly raise the importance of compliance with International Humanitarian Law with the Saudi Arabian Government and other members of the military Coalition. The Saudis have their own internal procedures for investigations and they announced more detail of how they investigate such incidents of concern on 31 January.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Steve McCabe on 2016-09-02.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, pursuant to the Answer of 20 July 2016, to Question 42888, how many clinical commissioning groups were rated as inadequate for 2015-16; and how many such inadequate ratings given in relation, at least in part, to poor IVF provision.

David Mowat

There were 26 clinical commissioning groups rated as inadequate for 2015-16. The ratings do not go into such a degree of granularity as to reference specific services or treatments (for example IVF provision).

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Steve McCabe on 2016-09-02.

To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, what recent steps his Department has taken to encourage local authorities to consider minor and major planning applications with equal priority.

Gavin Barwell

Every planning application should be determined in a timely and efficient manner, irrespective of the scale of the proposed development. We took powers in the Housing and Planning Act 2016 to enable us to extend to non-major planning applications the successful performance regime for major applications that has been running, which has seen the proportion of major applications determined on time rising from 57 per cent in July to September 2012, the quarter in which the performance regime was first announced, to 82 per cent in the most recent quarter. We have also announced our intention to tighten the Planning Guarantee for minor applications, with the applicant being eligible for a refund of their fee after 13 weeks instead of the current 26 weeks.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Steve McCabe on 2016-09-08.

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, pursuant to the Answer of 25 July 2015 to Question 42913, on Yemen: Armed Conflict, what representations he has received from Saudi officials on the timescale for that investigation.

Mr Tobias Ellwood

The UK welcomes the release by Joint Investigation Assessment Team of the outcome of eight investigations into incidents of alleged breaches of international humanitarian law in Yemen.

The UK regularly encourages the Saudi-Arabian led Coalition to conduct thorough and conclusive investigations into reports of alleged violations of international humanitarian law.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Steve McCabe on 2016-10-07.

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, (a) how many and (b) what proportion of staff employed by his Department are non-UK nationals.

Joseph Johnson

All Government Departments are bound by legal requirements concerning the right to work in the UK and, in addition, the Civil Service Nationality Rules.

Evidence of nationality is checked at the point of recruitment into the Civil Service as part of wider pre-employment checks, but there is no requirement on departments to retain this information beyond the point at which it has served its purpose.

More broadly, the Government will be consulting in due course on how we work with business to ensure that workers in this country have the skills that they need to get a job. But there are no proposals to publish lists of the number or proportion of foreign workers.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Steve McCabe on 2016-10-07.

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how the current executive MSc in security sector management programme, run in Ethiopia with oversight from his Department, differs from the Department for International Development’s similar MSc programme which was closed in June 2015.

Mike Penning

The MSc programme was restarted in 2015-16 under the Conflict Security and Stability Fund, reflecting the security focus of the syllabus. It differs from the DFID-funded programme as it draws students from across the region, thereby contributing to the National Security Council (NSC) objective of enhancing regional peace and security in East Africa, whereas the previous MSc was primarily for Ethiopians. There are ongoing efforts to improve the diversity profile of the student intake, in terms of age, gender and military/civilian balance; and to identify more students from African Union countries, in support of the NSC objective to build the African Union’s capacity to reduce, manage and resolve conflict and crises in Africa.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Steve McCabe on 2016-10-07.

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, (a) how many and (b) what proportion of the staff employed by her Department are non-UK nationals.

Dr Phillip Lee

All Government Departments are bound by legal requirements concerning the right to work in the UK and, in addition, the Civil Service Nationality Rules. Evidence of nationality is checked at the point of recruitment into the Civil Service as part of wider pre-employment checks, but there is no requirement on departments to retain this information beyond the point at which it has served its purpose.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Steve McCabe on 2016-10-07.

To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, pursuant to the Answer of 12 September 2016 to Question 44306 and with reference to ONS figures detailing the record amount of bonuses paid in Great Britain last year, released in Average weekly earnings, bonus payments in Great Britain: financial year ending 2016, on 15 September, what assessment he has made of the effectiveness of his policies in curbing excessive performance bonuses; and what plans he has to tackle inequality in performance bonuses between industry sectors.

Simon Kirby

The UK is at the forefront of global efforts to tackle unacceptable pay practices in the banking sector and has the toughest regime on pay of any major financial centre.

Firms are now required to have policies in place to defer, reduce, cancel or clawback bonuses in the event that poor performance or misconduct comes to light and the Government expects firms to be proactive in their application of these policies. Used in this way bonuses can be an effective incentive for staff to act in the long term interests of a business.

The Government’s efforts have resulted in a restructuring of pay including a significant reduction in cash bonuses, and a better alignment of risk and reward in the financial sector.

Outside the financial services sector, it is for businesses to decide how they remunerate their employees provided minimum legal requirements are met. The ONS statistics show that bonuses as a percentage of total pay for sectors other than finance and insurance have remained relatively stable since 2000 at an average of 4.0%.

The Government intends to publish a consultation document later this year that will set out a range of options for strengthening corporate governance and the way executive pay is set and reported, including greater disclosure of the targets that trigger bonus payments to company directors.