Tag: Steve McCabe

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

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, pursuant to the Answer of 13 September 2016 to Question 45660, what estimate he has made of the number of general practices that require assistance from the new practice resilience programme.

David Mowat

Following the launch of the General Practice Resilience Programme in July 2016, NHS England’s local teams have been working to finalise a range of offers that can be put in place to support practice sustainability and resilience. This includes selecting which practices will receive this support, by using nationally published criteria.

NHS England was initially due to set out which practices would be included in the first cohort to receive support through this programme, on 30 September 2016. The deadline for this assessment and report has been revised to 18 October 2016, to allow greater opportunity for practices to self-refer for assessment. The Department cannot provide an estimate of the number of general practices requiring assistance from the new practice resilience programme until this date, when NHS England will have completed its assessment and report.

Identifying practices in need of support is challenging, as there are elements which are subjective and it can be hard to measure the nature, severity and weight of issues facing individual practices. The national criteria seek to chart a middle route between those aspects that are measurable and those less tangible issues. The nature of the issues facing a practice can be generally grouped as follows; demand, capacity and internal issues. The national criteria acknowledges the importance of local input from clinical commissioning groups and local medical committees, as well as how self-referral of general practices is legitimate as a self-declaration of their support needs.

An earlier NHS England programme, the Vulnerable Practice Programme, launched in December 2015, identified around 900 practices as potentially vulnerable and in need of support.

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

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what account his Department took of the suspension by the Department for International Development of a security sector management programme in Ethiopia in deciding to oversee an executive MSc programme in such management.

Mike Penning

The Regional MSc in Security Sector Management was restarted in financial year 2015-16 following discussions between the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, the Ministry of Defence and the Department for International Development (DFID) reviewing the aims, objectives and performance of the previous DFID-funded programme. The new MSc differs from the previous programme as it draws students from across the region and wider African Union countries, thereby contributing to the National Security Council (NSC) objectives of enhancing regional peace and security in East Africa and building the African Union’s capacity to reduce, manage and resolve conflict and crises in Africa. The MSc is now funded from the Conflict Security and Stability Fund, which better reflects the security focus of the syllabus.

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

To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, (a) how many and (b) what proportion of staff employed by his Department are non-UK nationals.

Simon Kirby

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 2016-10-17.

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, what recent representations his Department has made to the government of Sri Lanka on the persecution of Tamil people in that country; and if he will call for an international investigation into that persecution.

Alok Sharma

​The Sri Lankan government has taken a number of positive steps to improve the human rights situation in that country, but we recognise that there remains much to be done. In our statement to the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) in June we set out the areas we felt were important for Sri Lanka to focus on. These included further land returns in the north of the island, the repealing of the Prevention of Terrorism Act, the devolution of political authority through constitutional reform and the creation of credible justice mechanisms. I most recently raised Tamil issues with Sri Lanka’s Foreign Minister in September. We will continue to work with the UN, Sri Lanka and our other international partners to ensure full implementation of UNHRC resolution 30/1, co-sponsored by the UK in October 2015, while recognising the scale of the challenge this represents and allowing time for credible, well thought out transitional justice mechanisms to be developed and implemented.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Steve McCabe on 2015-11-23.

To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, how much HM Revenue and Customs spent on discretionary payments in respect of administrative errors in each financial year since 2010-11.

Mr David Gauke

Information relating to complaints handling can be obtained from the HMRC Annual Report and Accounts.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Steve McCabe on 2016-01-26.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, whether he plans to amend current charging rules for veterans injured in service before 5 April 2015 on compensation awarded under the War Pensions Scheme being taken into account in assessing the cost of their social care support.

Alistair Burt

Armed forces veterans injured in service receive payments either through the War Disablement Pension (WDP) or the Armed Forces Compensation Scheme (AFCS). The AFCS applies to veterans injured from 6 April 2005. These payments are divided into a personal injury compensation element and other payments. Traditionally, only the personal injury compensation payment has been fully disregarded.

Since October 2012 Guaranteed Income Payments made to veterans under the AFCS have been disregarded. The Department has been in discussion with the Royal British Legion about how WDP payments are treated. Currently the first £10 per week of WDP payments is disregarded. The Government is considering how WDP payments to veterans should be treated in the financial assessment for social care charging in future.

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

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what assessment he has made of the effect of the closure of walk-in centres on patient waiting times in local A&E departments.

Jane Ellison

Decisions about the provision of urgent care centres, including walk-in centres and minor injuries units, are a matter for local commissioners.

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

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, pursuant to the Answer of 29 January 2016 to Question 24142, what the average length of time per case has been that his Department has taken to complete the child maintenance arrears cleansing or validation process following the ending of liability on a CSA case in the current year.

Priti Patel

The Information requested is not routinely recorded for management information purposes and could only be provided at disproportionate cost.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Steve McCabe on 2016-03-03.

To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, what plans he has to modernise the HM Revenue and Customs payment system to allow people to make payments via BACS bank transfers.

Mr David Gauke

HM Revenue and Customs’ (HMRC) payment systems allow customers to make payments via BACS or Faster Payment bank transfers for the vast majority of taxes and regimes. In 2014/15, HMRC received just under 16 million BACS and Faster Payments, totalling £186 billion, which equates to almost a quarter of all payments made to HMRC in that year. Customers can also pay electronically using HMRC’s Online Payment Service, by Direct Debit or CHAPS.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Steve McCabe on 2016-03-15.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, pursuant to the Answer of 8 February 2016 to Question 25758, how much of the £1.25 billion additional Government investment for children and young people’s mental health services has been allocated to the Think Ahead scheme.

Alistair Burt

The Think Ahead scheme is not funded from the £1.25 billion additional Government investment for improving children and young people’s mental health. Think Ahead is a funded from a separate programme budget within the Quality and Workforce Group.