Asked by: John Nicolson (Scottish National Party - Ochil and South Perthshire)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, if he will publish his Department's independent analysis of ECOPEL faux fur that found that it did not meet necessary requirements to replace bear fur for use in Queen's Guards caps.
Answered by Jeremy Quin
The Ministry of Defence (MOD) has not conducted analysis of Ecopel faux fur. A man-made fabric manufactured by Ecopel was passed to an independent testing house by PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals), and those results were shared with the MOD. The analysis showed that the material does not meet the necessary requirements. For further detail on the test analysis, I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave on 24 May 2022 to Question 4694 to the hon. Member for Newport West (Ruth Jones).
Asked by: John Nicolson (Scottish National Party - Ochil and South Perthshire)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, how many fines were issued on toll roads that (a) operate toll plazas and (b) require the driver to pay (i) in advance and (ii) after travelling in 2021-22.
Answered by Trudy Harrison
All current tolled roads, bridges and tunnels in England are locally or privately operated, and the Department does not hold data on fines issued by those undertakings. The only road operated by National Highways where a road user charge is applied is the A282 Dartford Crossing; drivers must pay this charge beforehand or by midnight the day after crossing. In 2021-22, 2,154,092 penalty charge notices were issued for non-payment of the Dart Charge.
Asked by: John Nicolson (Scottish National Party - Ochil and South Perthshire)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what steps her Department took to ensure that people who were not able to claim their deferred pension as a one-off lump sum, those who reached pension age after 6th April 2016, were aware of this change.
Answered by Guy Opperman - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
The Department for Work and Pensions carried out a comprehensive communications campaign on State Pension reforms, beginning in 2014 for the reforms which were introduced in April 2016. The campaign included advertisements in newspapers, online and on radio stations across the country as well as working through stakeholders to raise public awareness of the changes.
The awareness-raising campaign directed people to a significant package of online information about the State Pension at www.gov.uk. Specific information about deferral rules can be found at www.gov.uk/deferring-state-pension/
Letters inviting people to claim their State Pension also provided details of the changes to the deferral rules.
Asked by: John Nicolson (Scottish National Party - Ochil and South Perthshire)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment she has made of the impact of not uprating benefits in line with inflation on levels of child poverty in Ochil and South Perthshire.
Answered by David Rutley - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
No such assessment has been made. The Government is up-rating benefits in line with inflation. The Secretary of State undertakes an annual review of benefits and pensions with reference to the Consumer Prices Index (CPI). All benefit up-rating since April 1987 has been based on the increase in the relevant price inflation index in the 12 months to the previous September. The relevant benefits are increasing by 3.1% from April.
The latest statistics on the number and proportion of children who are in low income families by local area, covering the six years, 2014/15 to 2019/20, can be found in the annual publication: Children in low income families: local area statistics 2014 to 2020 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)(opens in a new tab).
This Government is committed to reducing poverty and supporting low-income families, and believes work is the best route out of poverty. Our approach is based on clear evidence about the importance of parental employment – particularly where it is full-time – in substantially reducing the risks of child poverty and in improving long-term outcomes for families and children.
Asked by: John Nicolson (Scottish National Party - Ochil and South Perthshire)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, with reference to the recommendation of the Joint Committee scrutinising the Online Safety Bill that the exemption for news publisher content should be amended to cover consumer and business magazines, what steps her Department has taken to engage with industry bodies to create a definition of news-related material that encompasses IPSO-regulated specialist publishers.
Answered by Chris Philp - Minister of State (Home Office)
Online Safety legislation has been designed to safeguard access to journalistic content. News publishers’ content will be exempted from platforms’ new online safety duties. The criteria against which an organisation qualifies as a publisher is set in the draft Online Safety Bill. If an organisation meets these criteria, then its content will be exempt. The criteria is clear that it captures news publishers' whose principal purpose is the publication of news-related material.
The Bill will also impose a duty on the biggest and riskiest companies, Category 1 companies, to safeguard all journalistic content shared on their platform. Through this duty, these platforms will need to have systems in place to ensure they take into account the importance of the free expression of journalistic content when operating their services. These protections will cover specialist publishers such as consumer and business magazines, where they are engaged in journalism.
Asked by: John Nicolson (Scottish National Party - Ochil and South Perthshire)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what assessment she has made of the potential merits of amending the definition of news-related material in the Online Safety Bill to ensure that content produced by all IPSO regulated publications, including specialist magazine titles, is exempted from platforms’ new online safety duties.
Answered by Chris Philp - Minister of State (Home Office)
Online Safety legislation has been designed to safeguard access to journalistic content. News publishers’ content will be exempted from platforms’ new online safety duties. The criteria against which an organisation qualifies as a publisher is set in the draft Online Safety Bill. If an organisation meets these criteria, then its content will be exempt. The criteria is clear that it captures news publishers' whose principal purpose is the publication of news-related material.
The Bill will also impose a duty on the biggest and riskiest companies, Category 1 companies, to safeguard all journalistic content shared on their platform. Through this duty, these platforms will need to have systems in place to ensure they take into account the importance of the free expression of journalistic content when operating their services. These protections will cover specialist publishers such as consumer and business magazines, where they are engaged in journalism.
Asked by: John Nicolson (Scottish National Party - Ochil and South Perthshire)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what his planned timetable is for passing on the remaining £31 million allocated to the Scottish Government as a consequential of the £300 million Culture Recovery Fund uplift in the Budget of March 2021.
Answered by Simon Clarke
The Barnett formula applies to changes in departmental DEL budgets, not when departments make spending or policy announcements.
The UK government has provided the Scottish Government with an additional £6.5 billion of Barnett-based funding this year. It is for the Scottish Government to decide how to allocate this funding across its devolved responsibilities, including how to provide support to the culture sector.
If the Treasury provides additional funding to departments in areas that are devolved in Scotland then the Scottish Government will receive additional funding through the Barnett formula. Final funding allocations will be confirmed at Supplementary Estimates.
Asked by: John Nicolson (Scottish National Party - Ochil and South Perthshire)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what steps her Department is taking to prevent children accessing adult applications on tablets and phones.
Answered by Chris Philp - Minister of State (Home Office)
The strongest protections within the draft Online Safety Bill are for children. Services which are likely to be accessed by or attract a significant number of children will be required to conduct a child safety risk assessment and provide safety measures for child users. This includes services which are not targeted at children, but which they are accessing.
Ofcom will set out the steps companies can take to protect children from harm on their service. Companies will have to ensure that only users who are old enough are able to access services which have age restrictions or risk causing them harm. We expect companies to use age verification technologies to prevent children from accessing services which pose the highest risk of harm to children, such as online pornography or dating sites.
Asked by: John Nicolson (Scottish National Party - Ochil and South Perthshire)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what steps she will take to evaluate the adequacy of social media companies’ risk assessments of the likelihood of children using their adult services.
Answered by Chris Philp - Minister of State (Home Office)
The strongest protections in the draft Online Safety Bill are for children. The Bill will require social media companies to assess whether their service is likely to be accessed by or appeal to a significant number of children and, if so, deliver additional protections for them.
Ofcom will be required to produce and publish guidance for services on how to undertake this risk assessment. Companies which assess that they are not likely to be accessed by children will need to provide robust evidence to the regulator and keep this assessment under review. The requirement to undertake, and keep up to date, an accurate assessment with regard to child access is an enforceable requirement. Ofcom may take enforcement action where providers do not carry out an adequate assessment and keep it up to date.
Asked by: John Nicolson (Scottish National Party - Ochil and South Perthshire)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what steps her Department will take to protect investment in the creative sector in Scotland in the event that Channel 4 is privatised.
Answered by Julia Lopez - Minister of State (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology)
We value Channel 4’s contribution to the creative sector across the UK and, if we decide to sell Channel 4, we would want to see it demonstrate a continued commitment to its impact outside of London.
Channel 4’s regional footprint is an issue we have specifically consulted on, and we are in the process of examining all of the evidence we have received before any decision is made.