Asked by: Chris Ruane (Labour - Vale of Clwyd)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office, what estimate he has made of the (a) number of excess winter deaths in each (i) nation and (ii) region of the UK and (b) proportion of those excess winter deaths that have been directly attributed to fuel poverty in each of the last 10 years.
Answered by Chloe Smith
The information requested falls under the remit of the UK Statistics Authority. I have therefore asked the Authority to respond.
Asked by: Chris Ruane (Labour - Vale of Clwyd)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office, pursuant to the Answer of 21 October 2019 to Question 904, what the campaigns and initiatives referred to in the Answer were; and how many staff took part in each of them.
Answered by Simon Hart - Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasury (Chief Whip)
As referenced in the Answer of 21 October 2019 to Question 904, Cabinet Office has run a number of campaigns and initiatives in the past year to improve the personal wellbeing of staff relating to physical, mental and social wellbeing. The department receives consistently strong engagement rates in activities relating to these campaign events. Whilst we cannot give exact numbers, we estimate that around 2000 members of staff taking part in events and initiatives in the first ten months of 2019, either physically or remotely through the use of video technology.
A breakdown of events can be seen below:
Month | Type of initiative | Staff Engagement |
January | Wellbeing Month - we organised 29 events and training sessions throughout the month, including resilience workshops, park runs, mindfulness sessions and a visit by ‘wellbeing dogs’ | Over 400 people attended workshops, 30 colleagues joined sessions remotely (via google hangout), and hundreds of colleagues visited the wellbeing dogs. |
February | Time to Talk Day events | Circa 50 attended events |
May | Mental Health Awareness Week – 5 talks organised and ‘This is me’ campaign where Cabinet Office staff shared their own personal stories with mental health | Raised £219 by selling green ribbons to staff Circa 500 members of staff took part in this campaign either through buying a ribbon or attending one of the talks |
June | Civil Service Active Wellbeing Week, led by Civil Service Sports Council. To support the week, colleagues across Cabinet Office volunteered their own time to run a series of events, such as bike rides, pilates sessions and wellbeing walks. | As these were organised by volunteers, we do not have an estimated number of staff who attended these events, however they were very popular amongst colleagues. |
September | National Suicide Prevention Day – guest speaker | Circa 50 members of staff attended the talk on the day, and a further 150 watched the talk remotely through the use of video technology. |
September | Know Your Numbers Week. A national campaign led by Blood Pressure UK to encourage staff to know their vital health statistics, such as blood pressure, heart rate, hydration and body mass index. As part of this event, we arranged for health check kiosks to be made available for staff in our London and Newcastle offices | A total of 683 people using these kiosks. In addition, 30 people took part in the smoothie bike challenge which formed part of the event |
October | Cabinet Office encouraged staff to stop smoking for 28 days as part of the Stoptober campaign. We promoted this campaign via the intranet and set up stalls manned by specialist stop smoking advisors | Circa 30 people visited stalls |
October | World Mental Health Day. This included a tea & talk session, a panel discussion and a mental wellbeing workshop. | Around 300 people took part in these events, with a further 200 people buying green ribbons to support the day |
Asked by: Chris Ruane (Labour - Vale of Clwyd)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office, whether his Department is taking steps to incorporate mindfulness and wellbeing into support for veterans provided by the Office for Veterans' Affairs.
Answered by Oliver Dowden - Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster
The Government already provides significant support to veterans through mental health and wellbeing services, including through an additional £10m to support Veterans’ Mental Health and Wellbeing needs announced in autumn 2018. The NHS in England has developed two bespoke services, the Veterans’ Mental Health Transition, Intervention and Liaison Service and the Veterans’ Mental Health Complex Treatment Services.
The Office for Veterans' Affairs will be working to join up such services across government and collaborating closely with service charities to ensure that veterans can access the mental health and well-being support they need.
Health and wellbeing is also one of the key areas set out in the Strategy for our Veterans, on which we worked closely with the Devolved Administrations. One of the Office’s first tasks will be to produce a detailed work programme informed by the responses to the consultation on this Strategy.
Asked by: Chris Ruane (Labour - Vale of Clwyd)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office, whether his Department uses Office for National Statistics estimates of personal wellbeing in formulating policy; and what policies his Department has introduced to improve personal wellbeing in the last 12 months.
Answered by Simon Hart - Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasury (Chief Whip)
The Cabinet Office measures personal wellbeing through the annual Civil Service People Survey using the same national statistics that the Office for National Statistics (ONS) use for the UK population as a whole. Responses to this informed the Health and Wellbeing Strategy which was signed off by the Cabinet Office People Committee in September 2018
In the past year Cabinet Office has run over a dozen campaigns and initiatives to improve personal wellbeing with over 2000 staff taking part.
Asked by: Chris Ruane (Labour - Vale of Clwyd)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office, what plans his Department has to consult (a) the electoral commission, (b) the electoral reform society, (c) Bite the Ballot, (d) Operation Black Vote and (e) other third sector organisations on the Government's proposed bill on electoral integrity.
Answered by Kevin Foster
Throughout the development of our work on electoral integrity we have consulted with a broad range of representative groups, charities and civil society organisations. We will continue consultation with all of these organisations, keeping Public Sector Equality Duty compliance at the core of our planning for the roll out of voter ID in Great Britain.
We have successfully conducted 15 local authority pilots, and will continue to work closely with the Electoral Commission and other organisations expert in the delivery of elections. We will continue to welcome the views of all stakeholders with an interest in voter ID as we take forward measures to improve the integrity and accessibility of our elections.
Asked by: Chris Ruane (Labour - Vale of Clwyd)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office, with reference to the Government's no deal planning preparations, how many Government Departments have (a) reviewed their reliance on personal data flows from the EU and (b) developed contingency plans to mitigate risks to public sector service provision of that reliance.
Answered by Kevin Foster
All government departments have reviewed their reliance on personal data flows from the EU and developed suitable contingency plans to mitigate risks to the public sector service provision of that reliance. Chapter three of the No Deal Readiness Report provides further information.
Asked by: Chris Ruane (Labour - Vale of Clwyd)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, and Minister for the Cabinet Office, what estimate he has made of the number and proportion of rough sleepers who have died in each of the last seven years who previously served in the armed forces.
Answered by Kevin Foster
The information requested falls under the remit of the UK Statistics Authority. I have asked the Authority to respond.
Asked by: Chris Ruane (Labour - Vale of Clwyd)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office, how many non-disclosure agreements in relation to preparations for the UK leaving the EU without a deal his Department has signed with (a) private organisations and (b) public organisations from (i) 23 June 2016 to 22 August 2019 and (ii) since 22 August 2019.
Answered by Kevin Foster
This information is not held centrally. However, following investigation, we have not found records of the Cabinet Office signing any non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) with private organisations or public organisations between 23 June 2016 and 22 August 2019, and since 22 August 2019, in relation to preparations for leaving the EU without a deal.
The new Government has changed the approach to NDAs. As announced on August 22 organisations working with government on Brexit will no longer be routinely required to sign NDAs.
Asked by: Chris Ruane (Labour - Vale of Clwyd)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office, with reference to the Electoral Commission's report entitled Accuracy and completeness of the electoral registers in Great Britain, what assessment his Department has made of the merits of additional ring-fenced funding for the purpose of increasing electoral register completeness for 18-34 year olds.
Answered by Kevin Foster
Since 2013/14, the Government has provided more than £27m to fund diverse activities by EROs, civil society groups and others to promote electoral registration and democratic engagement, including with younger people.
The Government does not support ring-fenced funding for the registration of 18-34 year-olds. Under a long-standing protocol, the majority of funding provided to local authorities is not ring-fenced. Democratically elected local authorities are best placed to determine the allocation of funds within their area.
Younger people are keen users of the Government’s online register to vote service. Ahead of the General Election in June 2017 young people aged under 25 submitted over 1 million applications to register to vote - more than 35 percent of all applications received in the pre-election period.
Asked by: Chris Ruane (Labour - Vale of Clwyd)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office, with reference to the Electoral Commission's report Accuracy and completeness of the electoral registers in Great Britain, what steps his Department is taking to reduce the disparity between electoral register completeness of voters from white ethnic backgrounds and those from other ethnic backgrounds.
Answered by Kevin Foster
The Government is committed to protecting, promoting and respecting our democracy. We want to build upon recent record levels of electors registering to vote and participating in elections. Since 2013/14, the Government has provided more than £27m to fund diverse activities by EROs, civil society groups and others to promote electoral registration and democratic engagement.
The Cabinet Office has recently published the findings of a project investigating the barriers to registration for under-registered groups, including some minority ethnic backgrounds.
This evidence is available along with other resources on GOV.UK to assist Electoral Registration Officers and others to better understand why some ethnic minorities are less likely to be registered and to target them more effectively.
The Government is also taking action to reform the annual canvass of all residential properties in Great Britain. These reforms will significantly improve the overall efficiency of the canvass process and allow Electoral Registration Officers to focus their efforts on activities including the targeting of under-registered groups.