Asked by: Andrew Gwynne (Labour - Denton and Reddish)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to her Department's policy paper entitled People at the Heart of Care: adult social care reform white paper, published on 1 December 2021, whether the target for 80% of CQC registered social care providers to have a digital social care record in place by March 2024 was met.
Answered by Helen Whately - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
We have increased the adoption of digital social care records (DSCRs) by Care Quality Commission (CQC) registered providers from 40% in December 2021, to at least 63% in February 2024. In January 2024, the Department updated this target to ensure that 80% of CQC registered providers and 80% of people who receive care will have a DSCR in place by March 2025. By extending timeframes, we can ensure that care providers who are yet to digitise have the time and support needed to successfully adopt DSCRs, and to reduce the risk of regional disparities in DSCR uptake. We’ve allocated a further £25 million this financial year, to ensure as many people as possible can benefit from a DSCR.
Asked by: Andrew Gwynne (Labour - Denton and Reddish)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what re-appraisal of costs he has made for the successful Levelling-Up Fund bid entitled Destination Denton which was provisionally awarded in November 2023.
Answered by Guy Opperman - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
I am pleased to confirm that, following a validation process of the Destination Denton scheme, the Department is supporting Tameside Metropolitan Borough Council to progress the scheme to delivery.
Asked by: Andrew Gwynne (Labour - Denton and Reddish)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, with reference to his Department’s press release entitled New tech partnership to stop the boats, published on 6 August 2023, when the Online Capability Centre became operational.
Answered by Michael Tomlinson - Minister of State (Minister for Illegal Migration)
Following the announcement by the Prime Minister of the new tech partnership to stop the boats on 6 August 2023, the Home Office and National Crime Agency (NCA) have strengthened the voluntary partnership with social media companies, Meta, YouTube, X/Twitter, to accelerate action to tackle people smuggling content online. We continue to explore further options, such as a ‘hackathon’ model to develop our innovative approach to break the business model of people smugglers advertising their services online.
To date we have successfully removed 98% of content flagged to social media companies, with over 9000 posts, pages and accounts removed since November 2021.
The Online Communications Centre (previously known as the Online Capability Centre) has been operational since October 2023 and with expertise in policy, investigations and intelligence and with access to a range of niche capabilities in tackling the online threat. We cannot comment on individual numbers of officers in classified roles.
Asked by: Andrew Gwynne (Labour - Denton and Reddish)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, with reference to his Department’s press release entitled New tech partnership to stop the boats, published on 6 August 2023, how many (a) posts, (b) pages and (c) accounts have been (i) removed and (ii) suspended as a result of the partnership with social media companies.
Answered by Michael Tomlinson - Minister of State (Minister for Illegal Migration)
Following the announcement by the Prime Minister of the new tech partnership to stop the boats on 6 August 2023, the Home Office and National Crime Agency (NCA) have strengthened the voluntary partnership with social media companies, Meta, YouTube, X/Twitter, to accelerate action to tackle people smuggling content online. We continue to explore further options, such as a ‘hackathon’ model to develop our innovative approach to break the business model of people smugglers advertising their services online.
To date we have successfully removed 98% of content flagged to social media companies, with over 9000 posts, pages and accounts removed since November 2021.
The Online Communications Centre (previously known as the Online Capability Centre) has been operational since October 2023 and with expertise in policy, investigations and intelligence and with access to a range of niche capabilities in tackling the online threat. We cannot comment on individual numbers of officers in classified roles.
Asked by: Andrew Gwynne (Labour - Denton and Reddish)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, with reference to his Department’s press release entitled New tech partnership to stop the boats, published on 6 August 2023, when the hackathon event took place.
Answered by Michael Tomlinson - Minister of State (Minister for Illegal Migration)
Following the announcement by the Prime Minister of the new tech partnership to stop the boats on 6 August 2023, the Home Office and National Crime Agency (NCA) have strengthened the voluntary partnership with social media companies, Meta, YouTube, X/Twitter, to accelerate action to tackle people smuggling content online. We continue to explore further options, such as a ‘hackathon’ model to develop our innovative approach to break the business model of people smugglers advertising their services online.
To date we have successfully removed 98% of content flagged to social media companies, with over 9000 posts, pages and accounts removed since November 2021.
The Online Communications Centre (previously known as the Online Capability Centre) has been operational since October 2023 and with expertise in policy, investigations and intelligence and with access to a range of niche capabilities in tackling the online threat. We cannot comment on individual numbers of officers in classified roles.
Asked by: Andrew Gwynne (Labour - Denton and Reddish)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, with reference to his Department’s press release entitled New tech partnership to stop the boats, published on 6 August 2023, with which social media companies his Department is in partnership.
Answered by Michael Tomlinson - Minister of State (Minister for Illegal Migration)
Following the announcement by the Prime Minister of the new tech partnership to stop the boats on 6 August 2023, the Home Office and National Crime Agency (NCA) have strengthened the voluntary partnership with social media companies, Meta, YouTube, X/Twitter, to accelerate action to tackle people smuggling content online. We continue to explore further options, such as a ‘hackathon’ model to develop our innovative approach to break the business model of people smugglers advertising their services online.
To date we have successfully removed 98% of content flagged to social media companies, with over 9000 posts, pages and accounts removed since November 2021.
The Online Communications Centre (previously known as the Online Capability Centre) has been operational since October 2023 and with expertise in policy, investigations and intelligence and with access to a range of niche capabilities in tackling the online threat. We cannot comment on individual numbers of officers in classified roles.
Asked by: Andrew Gwynne (Labour - Denton and Reddish)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many staff are currently employed at the Online Capability Centre.
Answered by Michael Tomlinson - Minister of State (Minister for Illegal Migration)
Following the announcement by the Prime Minister of the new tech partnership to stop the boats on 6 August 2023, the Home Office and National Crime Agency (NCA) have strengthened the voluntary partnership with social media companies, Meta, YouTube, X/Twitter, to accelerate action to tackle people smuggling content online. We continue to explore further options, such as a ‘hackathon’ model to develop our innovative approach to break the business model of people smugglers advertising their services online.
To date we have successfully removed 98% of content flagged to social media companies, with over 9000 posts, pages and accounts removed since November 2021.
The Online Communications Centre (previously known as the Online Capability Centre) has been operational since October 2023 and with expertise in policy, investigations and intelligence and with access to a range of niche capabilities in tackling the online threat. We cannot comment on individual numbers of officers in classified roles.
Asked by: Andrew Gwynne (Labour - Denton and Reddish)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, pursuant to the Answer of 13 March 2024 to Questions 15600 and 15601 on Children in Care and Foster Care, if she will publish the number of children looked after who were cared for in a (a) relative and (b) friend foster placement by (i) age, (ii) gender, (iii) ethnicity and (iv) local authority level as of 31 March 2023.
Answered by David Johnston - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Education)
The latest figures on children looked after who were cared for in a relative or friend foster placement by age, gender and ethnicity and at local authority level are shown in the attached tables. The department does not hold the data broken down separately into relative foster placements and friend foster placements. Therefore, the combined totals have been provided. Data has been provided for children looked after on 31 March 2023.
Asked by: Andrew Gwynne (Labour - Denton and Reddish)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether he has made an assessment of the adequacy of the time taken for care providers to receive Certificates of Sponsorship for (a) overseas and (b) senior care workers.
Answered by Tom Pursglove - Minister of State (Minister for Legal Migration and Delivery)
The Defined Certificate of Sponsorship process for carers and senior carers from overseas is the same and frequently requires an assessment to establish whether or not the sponsor is able to offer a genuine vacancy. This usually requires the sponsor to submit additional documentation, while the timeframes involved are adequate for the purposes of preventing the exploitation of proposed migrant workers.
Asked by: Andrew Gwynne (Labour - Denton and Reddish)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent assessment she has made of the potential impact of the removal of (a) overseas and (b) senior care workers’ rights to bring dependants on main applicant flows for the health and social care visa.
Answered by Helen Whately - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
We expect social care visa volumes will remain resilient to removing the eligibility for new care and senior care workers to bring dependants. This is in the context of a strong global labour supply, possible changes in migrant behaviour in response, and that a proportion of recruits are estimated to already come without dependants. The Home Office has published estimates of the impact these changes might have on the number of people applying to work in the sector from outside the United Kingdom, which are available at the following link:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/legal-migration-statement-estimated-immigration-impacts