Tag: Teresa Pearce

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Teresa Pearce on 2016-02-03.

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps she is taking to ensure that provision of high-quality early years education is included in the Government’s Life Chances Strategy.

Mr Sam Gyimah

Education plays a significant role in ensuring that children have the best start in life, and this government is committed to supporting families to give children a strong foundation in the earliest years.

The Prime Minister made clear in his recent speech that high quality early education will be a key part of the forthcoming Life Chances Strategy. We are working with other government departments to pursue this.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Teresa Pearce on 2016-02-19.

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, how many railway stations are (a) staffed and (b) unstaffed.

Claire Perry

The Department for Transport does not collect this information as station staffing is a matter for operators. They are not required to inform us of which stations are staffed beyond the obligations as set out in the Ticketing and Settlement Agreement.

We regulate Ticket Office opening times through the Ticketing and Settlement Agreement and a list of which stations have open ticket offices by operator can be seen at http://www.atoc.org/about-atoc/rail-settlement-plan/governance/ (Schedule 17 July 2015).

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The below Parliamentary question was asked by Teresa Pearce on 2016-02-19.

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, how many railway station ticket offices have (a) been closed and (b) had their opening hours reduced since 2010.

Claire Perry

Since May 2010, 125 railway station ticket offices have had their hours reduced and four have been closed.

By contrast, between 2005 and 2010 around 400 railway station ticket offices had their hours reduced and six closures were approved.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Teresa Pearce on 2016-02-19.

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what estimate his Department has made of the proportion of railway station ticket offices that will be closed by (a) 2020 and (b) 2025.

Claire Perry

The Ticketing and Settlement Agreement protects the opening hours of Ticket Offices. If an operator wishes to make such changes to Ticket Office opening times, there is an industry process to follow.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Teresa Pearce on 2016-02-19.

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what estimate his Department has made of the proportion of railway stations that will be unstaffed in (a) 2020 and (b) 2025.

Claire Perry

Station staffing levels are a matter for operators. Whilst we regulate Ticket Office opening times through the Ticketing and Settlement Agreement station staffing levels are a matter for operators as we believe that railway operators themselves are best placed to determine how to meet the needs of their passengers.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Teresa Pearce on 2016-02-19.

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what assessment his Department has made of the effect of staffing of railway stations on (a) passenger safety, (b) passenger assurance, (c) safety of women passengers, (d) disabled passengers, (e) revenue protection and (f) passenger assistance.

Claire Perry

Whilst we regulate Ticket Office opening times through the Ticketing and Settlement Agreement station staffing levels are a matter for operators as we believe that railway operators themselves are best placed to determine how to meet the needs of their passengers. However, it is important that those who need assistance to travel can rely on railway staff to provide this. Each operator is required to participate in the Passenger Assist system which allows disabled passengers to book staff assistance when they require it.

We recognise that passengers can feel very strongly about station staffing hours and we expect all operators to take on board the views of stakeholders before taking any proposal to change such hours forward.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Teresa Pearce on 2015-11-25.

To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, when the ministerial working group on preventing and tackling homelessness will next meet; and what the membership of that group is.

Mr Marcus Jones

The Ministerial Working Group on Homelessness will meet in the New Year. The group consists of Ministers from ten Departments – Ministry of Justice, Department for Education, Department of Health, Department for Work and Pensions, Cabinet Office, Ministry of Defence, Home Office, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, Government Equalities Office, and Department for Communities and Local Government.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Teresa Pearce on 2016-02-22.

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what steps he has taken in response to the findings set out in the 2014-15 Annual Report of the Independent Monitoring Board at HM Prison Belmarsh on the prison’s online and telephone booking system.

Andrew Selous

We had already recognised the issues highlighted in the 2014-15 Annual Report of the Independent Monitoring Board at HM Prison Belmarsh. I am pleased to inform the hon. Member for Erith and Thamesmead that we will be increasing the number of social visit slots that are available per session and we have added an additional booking telephone line. There are also plans to introduce an automated system to increase our capacity to manage visit calls.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Teresa Pearce on 2016-01-13.

To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, what his policy is on public sector and charitable provision of consumer debt advice services.

Damian Hinds

The Money Advice Service (MAS) is responsible for the coordination of publicly funded free to client debt advice. MAS is financed by a levy on the financial services industry. MAS is currently consulting on its business plan; it has proposed levying for a constant budget for debt advice for 2016/17 providing around £45 million to its third sector partners for the provision of debt advice.

More broadly the Government is currently reviewing how the public provision of free-to-client, impartial financial guidance, including consumer debt advice services, should be structured to give consumers the information they need to make financial decisions. The Public Financial Guidance consultation closed in December 2015 and the Government will report back by budget.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Teresa Pearce on 2016-02-22.

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many times (a) family and (b) legal visits to prisoners in HM Prison Belmarsh have been cancelled in each of the last 12 months; and for what reason each such visit was cancelled.

Andrew Selous

Family and legal visits have been cancelled on two occasions in the last 12 months at HM Prison Belmarsh. These were;

8 October 2015 – Due to a full lock down search of the prison

9 December 2015 – To enable a Trade Union meeting