Asked by: Damien Moore (Conservative - Southport)
Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:
To ask the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology, what steps her Department is taking to support research into the causes of motor neurone disease.
Answered by Andrew Griffith - Minister of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)
In November 2021, the Government committed to delivering at least £50 million to support motor neurone disease (MND) research over five years, as part of a package of £375 million for research into neurodegenerative diseases.
In June 2023, the government announced that more than £35 million of the £50 million pledged to cutting-edge MND research has now been allocated, just two years into a five year funding commitment. Work continues at pace to support MND researchers to submit high quality bids for open funding calls. (https://www.gov.uk/government/news/government-continues-delivering-on-50-million-funding-pledge-for-motor-neurone-disease-research)
Asked by: Damien Moore (Conservative - Southport)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what steps he is taking to encourage investment in the defence sector.
Answered by Laura Trott - Chief Secretary to the Treasury
The UK is committed to increasing investment in the defence sector to meet the challenges of an increasingly volatile and complex world. In the 2023 Integrated Review Refresh, the Government committed to an additional £5 billion to be provided to the Ministry of Defence over the next two years alongside the ambition to increase defence spending to 2.5% of GDP in the long term. The Government also works closely with the private equity and venture capital community to attract private investment in dual use technologies through the National Security Strategic Investment Fund (NSSIF) and nascent NATO Innovation Fund (NIF).
Asked by: Damien Moore (Conservative - Southport)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to help ensure that parents have access to the materials used to teach their children (a) relationships, sex and health education, (b) religious education and (c) other subjects in the curriculum.
Answered by Damian Hinds - Minister of State (Education)
All schools have a duty to share information concerning their curriculum with parents, including Relationships, Sex and Health Education (RSHE) and Religious Education (RE). The department has been very clear that schools should respond positively where parents request to see specific materials.
The Secretary of State wrote to schools again on Tuesday 24 October to clarify schools’ legal position and to make it clear that they can and should share RSHE curriculum materials with parents. Copyright restrictions under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act do not prevent schools from doing this. Schools can lawfully share copies of resources with parents and any contract clauses that seek to prevent schools from doing this are void and unenforceable. This is because they contradict the public policy interest in ensuring parents know what their children are being taught. The department is aware that some parents have particular concerns regarding materials used to teach RSHE.
As part of the review of the RSHE statutory guidance, the department will strengthen the guidance, in line with the Secretary of State’s letters, to help schools to share materials with parents.
It will remain important that schools take full responsibility for ensuring lessons and materials are age appropriate, suitable, and politically impartial, particularly when using materials produced by external organisations.
Schools may choose to use curriculum materials developed by Oak, an Arm’s Length Body, working independently of government and collaboratively with the education sector. Oak works with teachers across the country, providing them and their pupils with free, optional, and adaptable high quality digital curriculum resources. Their current resources are available at: https://www.thenational.academy/#teachers. Oak is now developing new resources for eight more subject areas including for RSHE and RE.
Schedule 4 Paragraph 7(a) of the School Information Regulations (England) 2008/3093 requires all maintained schools to publish their school curriculum on their website. The guidance for this is outlined online at: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/what-maintained-schools-must-publish-online. All academies must follow a similar process for their school curriculum. The guidance for this is outlined online at: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/what-academies-free-schools-and-colleges-should-publish-online.
If a parent feels that a maintained school is failing to comply with its legal requirements relating to the provision of the curriculum, or that a school is acting unreasonably in the way it complies with them, they can make a formal complaint to the governing body by following the school’s statutory complaints procedures.
Asked by: Damien Moore (Conservative - Southport)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many additional police officers Merseyside Police has recruited since the the Police Uplift Programme was announced in July 2019.
Answered by Chris Philp - Minister of State (Home Office)
During the Police Uplift Programme, the Home Office published data on the number of police officers in post and police officer recruits in England and Wales in the 'Police Officer Uplift’ statistical bulletin which can be accessed here: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/police-officer-uplift-statistics.
Table U2 of the data tables accompanying the final ‘Police Officer Uplift’ release, covering the position as at 31 March 2023, provides a breakdown of additional officers recruited through the Police Uplift Programme by month since October 2019. These data can be accessed here: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1171838/police-officer-uplift-final-position-as-at-march-2023-tables-260723.ods. Data are provided on a headcount basis and broken down by Police Force Area.
As at 31 March 2023, Merseyside Police have recruited 724 additional police officers attributable to the Police Uplift Programme. This is against an allocation to recruit 665 additional police officers for the three-year programme.
Asked by: Damien Moore (Conservative - Southport)
Question to the Department for Business and Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, what steps her Department is taking to ensure that age restrictions are appropriately enforced for people signing up to be delivery drivers.
Answered by Kevin Hollinrake - Minister of State (Department for Business and Trade)
The Government is clear that all businesses must fulfil their legal obligations in respect of employment law.
The Government is in regular conversation with businesses who utilise the service of delivery drivers. On 14th November Minister Jenrick hosted a roundtable with industry representatives. While onboarding processes are a matter for businesses themselves, this department continues to work closely with business to ensure that risks are minimised by ensuring business has robust onboarding systems and processes in place, to cover matters such as age verification.
Asked by: Damien Moore (Conservative - Southport)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what recent steps his Department has taken to help support economic growth in coastal communities.
Answered by Jacob Young - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities)
The Government is committed to promoting economic growth in all parts of the country including coastal communities.
We have supported coastal communities to level up through dedicated funding under the Coastal Communities Fund, the Coastal Revival Fund and additional funding under the Welcome Back Fund, while the Levelling Up Fund has provided around £1 billion to projects in coastal areas and over £400 million from the UK Shared Prosperity Fund is going to lead local authorities within or serving coastal areas in England, alongside major investment in the other nations of the UK.
But it is not just about funds. 11 out of 12 Freeports and 7 out of 20 Levelling Up Partnerships are in coastal areas, demonstrating our deep commitment to unlocking the economic potential of coastal communities.
In Southport we are investing £37.5 million through the Town Fund, which will be used to deliver the brand new 1200 seat ‘Marine Lake Events Centre’ with state of the art technical facilities, significant improvements to cycle and walking paths, upgraded road infrastructure, new public spaces and an business incubator for the Towns emerging creative/digital/tech sectors.
Asked by: Damien Moore (Conservative - Southport)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what assessment his Department has made of the potential contribution of the AUKUS defence partnership to R&D in the defence technology industry; and what steps he is taking to support innovation by UK companies.
Answered by James Cartlidge - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence)
In the two years following the AUKUS announcement, the UK continues to make good progress in working collaboratively with our UK defence industry to facilitate future opportunities attached to the AUKUS partnership including, but not exclusive, to: trade, R&D, and defence innovation.
Innovation continues to be a priority across Defence, with a well-established innovation system - supported through the Defence Innovation Fund - spanning various areas of the Department. Through AUKUS, the UK is also seeking to ensure that defence and technology trade and exports are as frictionless as possible between AUKUS partner nations. Export control reform is key to removing the layers of red tape impeding collaboration between our defence industry and governments.
Progress continues to be made to ensure that businesses can participate in investment opportunities attached to AUKUS. UK businesses are behind the design and manufacture of the world's most advanced submarines. As a decades-long programme, AUKUS will create thousands of jobs and wider opportunities across different sectors of the economy. In the short-term, this endeavour will almost double the size of the UK's (Raynesway) site, creating 1,170 high-skilled jobs in Derby, alongside thousands of job vacancies across the UK in the defence sector and the wider economy, supporting the Prime Minister's commitment to levelling up.
Asked by: Damien Moore (Conservative - Southport)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, whether he has made an assessment of the potential merits of the AUKUS defence agreement on other sectors of the economy.
Answered by James Cartlidge - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence)
In the two years following the AUKUS announcement, the UK continues to make good progress in working collaboratively with our UK defence industry to facilitate future opportunities attached to the AUKUS partnership including, but not exclusive, to: trade, R&D, and defence innovation.
Innovation continues to be a priority across Defence, with a well-established innovation system - supported through the Defence Innovation Fund - spanning various areas of the Department. Through AUKUS, the UK is also seeking to ensure that defence and technology trade and exports are as frictionless as possible between AUKUS partner nations. Export control reform is key to removing the layers of red tape impeding collaboration between our defence industry and governments.
Progress continues to be made to ensure that businesses can participate in investment opportunities attached to AUKUS. UK businesses are behind the design and manufacture of the world's most advanced submarines. As a decades-long programme, AUKUS will create thousands of jobs and wider opportunities across different sectors of the economy. In the short-term, this endeavour will almost double the size of the UK's (Raynesway) site, creating 1,170 high-skilled jobs in Derby, alongside thousands of job vacancies across the UK in the defence sector and the wider economy, supporting the Prime Minister's commitment to levelling up.
Asked by: Damien Moore (Conservative - Southport)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what steps his Department is taking to help support the defence industry to participate in trade arising from the AUKUS agreement.
Answered by James Cartlidge - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence)
In the two years following the AUKUS announcement, the UK continues to make good progress in working collaboratively with our UK defence industry to facilitate future opportunities attached to the AUKUS partnership including, but not exclusive, to: trade, R&D, and defence innovation.
Innovation continues to be a priority across Defence, with a well-established innovation system - supported through the Defence Innovation Fund - spanning various areas of the Department. Through AUKUS, the UK is also seeking to ensure that defence and technology trade and exports are as frictionless as possible between AUKUS partner nations. Export control reform is key to removing the layers of red tape impeding collaboration between our defence industry and governments.
Progress continues to be made to ensure that businesses can participate in investment opportunities attached to AUKUS. UK businesses are behind the design and manufacture of the world's most advanced submarines. As a decades-long programme, AUKUS will create thousands of jobs and wider opportunities across different sectors of the economy. In the short-term, this endeavour will almost double the size of the UK's (Raynesway) site, creating 1,170 high-skilled jobs in Derby, alongside thousands of job vacancies across the UK in the defence sector and the wider economy, supporting the Prime Minister's commitment to levelling up.
Asked by: Damien Moore (Conservative - Southport)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what assessment his Department has made of the potential impact of (a) collaborative projects and (b) joint ventures with (i) Australian and (ii) US defence companies on the (A) defence sector and (B) economy.
Answered by James Cartlidge - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence)
AUKUS provides a generational opportunity to enhance our collaborative relationship and collective national security, as well as better supporting how our industrial bases work together for the future. Progress continues to be made to ensure that businesses can participate in investment opportunities attached to AUKUS. To truly realise the benefits of the AUKUS partnership and the generational opportunity it presents, it is critical we break down existing and future barriers to collaboration. Modernising export controls will empower our government and industries to work together at the pace of relevance, accessing the best technologies and enhancing our mutual capabilities; ultimately to ensure our long-term collective security.