Asked by: Lord Field of Birkenhead (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many people have an offence of persistently soliciting under section 1 of the Vagrancy Act 1898 on their Disclosure and Barring Service record.
Answered by Victoria Atkins - Secretary of State for Health and Social Care
The Disclosure and Barring Service have not disclosed any offences under s1 of the Vagrancy Act 1898 since 29 May 2013 to 30 September 2018. The current rules governing the disclosure of offences came into force on 29 May 2013.
Asked by: Lord Field of Birkenhead (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many victims of modern slavery received a positive conclusive grounds decision but then did not receive discretionary leave to remain or a positive asylum claim in the most recent year for which data is available.
Answered by Caroline Nokes
The most recent information on the issue was set out in a letter of 17 February 2017 and relates to the year 2015. This was sent to the Rt Honourable member in his capacity as Chair of Work and Pensions Select Committee.
As set out in that letter, 1,043 people were confirmed as victims of modern slavery in 2015. Of these individuals, 379 had applied for asylum at the time the information was collected and 216 had been granted asylum. A further 123 of the individuals had been granted some other form of leave to remain.
Some of the individuals may have been granted asylum or leave to remain for another reason since the data was collected but that data is not available.
Asked by: Lord Field of Birkenhead (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what recent assessment he has made of the potential merits of enabling local authorities to include powers within their Special Cumulative Impact Policies to make the Reduce the Strength initiatives mandatory within a given area where the need for them is proven to exist.
Answered by Victoria Atkins - Secretary of State for Health and Social Care
Applying a standard licence condition to all premises in a cumulative impact zone would represent a significant departure from a key principle of the Licensing Act 2003, that conditions must be tailored to the individual type, location and characteristics of the premises concerned. In addition, there has been no large-scale evaluation of the effectiveness of the existing voluntary Reducing the Strength schemes. Their impact in reducing alcohol harms remains unproven.
Asked by: Lord Field of Birkenhead (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what recent assessment he has made of the potential merits of introducing a minimum price per unit of alcohol for beers and ciders.
Answered by Victoria Atkins - Secretary of State for Health and Social Care
In December 2016, Public Health England published an evidence review of the public health burden of alcohol and the cost-effectiveness of alcohol control policies. The review presents international evidence on the effectiveness of price-based interventions such as minimum unit pricing in reducing levels of consumption and the harms associated with alcohol.
The introduction of minimum unit pricing in England remains under review pending the impact of its implementation in Scotland.
Asked by: Lord Field of Birkenhead (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what the annual budget was in (a) cash and (b) real terms for the Merseyside Fire and Rescue Service in each year since 2010.
Answered by Nick Hurd
The Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) publishes local government finance annual settlements for all local authorities including fire and rescue authorities. These documents include table showing funding provided to all local authorities in England. These can be found by following the links below.
The number of firefighters employed by Merseyside Fire and Rescue service from 2010 to 2017 can be found in the link below.
The number of operational appliances recorded by Merseyside Fire and Rescue service for 2010 to 2017 can be found in the link below.
The average response time to primary fires in Merseyside in 2009/10 to 2016/17 can be found in the link below.
All local authorities hold a general reserve which provides contingency funding for any unexpected costs. As at March 2017, Merseyside Fire and Rescue Authority held £31.9 million in reserves (an increase of £14.1m), equivalent to 53.5% of their core spending power. This included £2m in the general reserve.
Spending Review 2015 provided a firm, four-year settlement to local authorities including fire and rescue authorities, giving greater certainty of funding until the end of 2019/20. Funding information can be found in the link below.
Single purpose fire and rescue authorities will receive a 0.3% increase in core spending power over the four years of this spending review. The 2019 Spending Review will set overall local government resourcing from 2020-21.
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Asked by: Lord Field of Birkenhead (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many (a) firefighters and (b) firefighting appliances were available to the Merseyside Fire and Rescue Service in each year since 2010.
Answered by Nick Hurd
The Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) publishes local government finance annual settlements for all local authorities including fire and rescue authorities. These documents include table showing funding provided to all local authorities in England. These can be found by following the links below.
The number of firefighters employed by Merseyside Fire and Rescue service from 2010 to 2017 can be found in the link below.
The number of operational appliances recorded by Merseyside Fire and Rescue service for 2010 to 2017 can be found in the link below.
The average response time to primary fires in Merseyside in 2009/10 to 2016/17 can be found in the link below.
All local authorities hold a general reserve which provides contingency funding for any unexpected costs. As at March 2017, Merseyside Fire and Rescue Authority held £31.9 million in reserves (an increase of £14.1m), equivalent to 53.5% of their core spending power. This included £2m in the general reserve.
Spending Review 2015 provided a firm, four-year settlement to local authorities including fire and rescue authorities, giving greater certainty of funding until the end of 2019/20. Funding information can be found in the link below.
Single purpose fire and rescue authorities will receive a 0.3% increase in core spending power over the four years of this spending review. The 2019 Spending Review will set overall local government resourcing from 2020-21.
Asked by: Lord Field of Birkenhead (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what the average response times to fire incidents were in each Merseyside borough in each year since 2010.
Answered by Nick Hurd
The Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) publishes local government finance annual settlements for all local authorities including fire and rescue authorities. These documents include table showing funding provided to all local authorities in England. These can be found by following the links below.
The number of firefighters employed by Merseyside Fire and Rescue service from 2010 to 2017 can be found in the link below.
The number of operational appliances recorded by Merseyside Fire and Rescue service for 2010 to 2017 can be found in the link below.
The average response time to primary fires in Merseyside in 2009/10 to 2016/17 can be found in the link below.
All local authorities hold a general reserve which provides contingency funding for any unexpected costs. As at March 2017, Merseyside Fire and Rescue Authority held £31.9 million in reserves (an increase of £14.1m), equivalent to 53.5% of their core spending power. This included £2m in the general reserve.
Spending Review 2015 provided a firm, four-year settlement to local authorities including fire and rescue authorities, giving greater certainty of funding until the end of 2019/20. Funding information can be found in the link below.
Single purpose fire and rescue authorities will receive a 0.3% increase in core spending power over the four years of this spending review. The 2019 Spending Review will set overall local government resourcing from 2020-21.
Asked by: Lord Field of Birkenhead (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how much funding his Department plans to allocate in (a) cash and (b) real terms to the Merseyside Fire and Rescue Service in each of the next five years.
Answered by Nick Hurd
The Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) publishes local government finance annual settlements for all local authorities including fire and rescue authorities. These documents include table showing funding provided to all local authorities in England. These can be found by following the links below.
The number of firefighters employed by Merseyside Fire and Rescue service from 2010 to 2017 can be found in the link below.
The number of operational appliances recorded by Merseyside Fire and Rescue service for 2010 to 2017 can be found in the link below.
The average response time to primary fires in Merseyside in 2009/10 to 2016/17 can be found in the link below.
All local authorities hold a general reserve which provides contingency funding for any unexpected costs. As at March 2017, Merseyside Fire and Rescue Authority held £31.9 million in reserves (an increase of £14.1m), equivalent to 53.5% of their core spending power. This included £2m in the general reserve.
Spending Review 2015 provided a firm, four-year settlement to local authorities including fire and rescue authorities, giving greater certainty of funding until the end of 2019/20. Funding information can be found in the link below.
Single purpose fire and rescue authorities will receive a 0.3% increase in core spending power over the four years of this spending review. The 2019 Spending Review will set overall local government resourcing from 2020-21.
Asked by: Lord Field of Birkenhead (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether the Government has any contingency funds which could be made available to the Merseyside Fire and Rescue Service.
Answered by Nick Hurd
The Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) publishes local government finance annual settlements for all local authorities including fire and rescue authorities. These documents include table showing funding provided to all local authorities in England. These can be found by following the links below.
The number of firefighters employed by Merseyside Fire and Rescue service from 2010 to 2017 can be found in the link below.
The number of operational appliances recorded by Merseyside Fire and Rescue service for 2010 to 2017 can be found in the link below.
The average response time to primary fires in Merseyside in 2009/10 to 2016/17 can be found in the link below.
All local authorities hold a general reserve which provides contingency funding for any unexpected costs. As at March 2017, Merseyside Fire and Rescue Authority held £31.9 million in reserves (an increase of £14.1m), equivalent to 53.5% of their core spending power. This included £2m in the general reserve.
Spending Review 2015 provided a firm, four-year settlement to local authorities including fire and rescue authorities, giving greater certainty of funding until the end of 2019/20. Funding information can be found in the link below.
Single purpose fire and rescue authorities will receive a 0.3% increase in core spending power over the four years of this spending review. The 2019 Spending Review will set overall local government resourcing from 2020-21.
Asked by: Lord Field of Birkenhead (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what progress has been made on the issuing of a licence to Billy Caldwell for medicinal cannabis.
Answered by Nick Hurd
As you will be aware on the weekend of 16 -17 June the Home Secretary issued an emergency licence to Billy Caldwell to access a schedule 1 controlled drug.
This particular licence was issued as a short-term solution based on the urgency of the case and currently remains valid. For the longer term, either the Home Office or the Department of Health in Northern Ireland will need to consider a full Schedule 1 application from a senior specialist clinician. This can only happen if this is the course of action recommended by Billy Caldwell’s medical team.
The expert panel that has been established to consider applications to prescribe cannabis and cannabis based medicinal products is now operational and in a position to start considering applications.