Asked by: Laura Farris (Conservative - Newbury)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what steps his Department is taking to ensure the adequacy of scrutiny of the lending practices of Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme lenders.
Answered by Paul Scully
The Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme (CBILS) operates as a delegated scheme, so all lending decisions are at the discretion of the lender. However, lenders are required to agree to and adhere to the Scheme’s Legal agreement.
Furthermore, all CBILS accredited lenders must undergo thorough due diligence as part of the British Business Bank’s accreditation process. Thereafter, lenders undergo periodic audits (including an audit prior to moving from a probationary to a full lender under the Scheme) to check that scheme eligibility rules and processes have been followed. The British Business Bank can suspend a lender from new lending or remove its accreditation if it is not following the correct lending practices.
Asked by: Laura Farris (Conservative - Newbury)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps his Department is taking to support private candidates who were due to sit exams in the 2020-21 academic year as external candidates.
Answered by Nick Gibb
In light of the ongoing COVID-19 outbreak, the Government considers that examinations cannot be held in a way which is fair. The Department has announced that GCSE, AS and A level examinations will not go ahead this summer as planned.
My right hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Education has asked the Chief Regulator at Ofqual to find a clear and accessible route for private candidates, and those not in school this year, to be assessed and receive a grade. The Department and Ofqual have launched a two week consultation on how to fairly award all pupils a grade that supports them to progress to the next stage of their lives, including consulting specifically on four different approaches for private candidates to receive a grade.
The consultation can be accessed from the Ofqual website and will be open until 29 January 2021. The Department and Ofqual strongly encourage all our stakeholders, including private candidates and their parents, to respond. We will continue to engage with a range of relevant stakeholders when developing plans for our policy on GCSE, AS and A level assessments in 2021, as will the examinations regulator Ofqual.
Asked by: Laura Farris (Conservative - Newbury)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, when he plans to publish additional details on the £100 million leisure centre fund which he announced on 22 October 2020.
Answered by Nigel Huddleston - Financial Secretary (HM Treasury)
Government has provided unprecedented support to businesses through tax reliefs, cash grants and employee wage support, which many sport clubs have benefited from. On 22 October, the Government announced a £100m support fund for local authority leisure centres. We will be releasing further information on the scheme and how local authorities with outsourced leisure centre provision can apply in the coming weeks.
Asked by: Laura Farris (Conservative - Newbury)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps he is taking to ensure that there are adequate washing and toilet facilities at overflow lorry parks in Kent.
Answered by Rachel Maclean
The Department for Transport is working with the Kent Resilience Forum to prepare for the end of the transition period. Our plans for the lorry holding areas in Kent at Sevington and Manston include facilities for HGV drivers, including toilet and washing provision. The delivery plans will be carried out in accordance with the latest covid-19 guidance.
Asked by: Laura Farris (Conservative - Newbury)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what steps his Department is taking to prepare the events industry to hold large scale events again, once covid-19 testing at scale becomes available.
Answered by Nigel Huddleston - Financial Secretary (HM Treasury)
We are aware that many in the sector seek clarity on when the events industry will be able to hold larger scale events.
From 2 December, we will return to a regional, tiered approach to COVID-19 restrictions. In tiers 1 and 2, spectator sport and business events can now resume inside and outside with tight capacity limits and social distancing, providing more consistency with indoor performances in theatres and concert halls.
In tier 3, there should be no public attendance at spectator sport or indoor performances and large business events should not be taking place.
The Government will also introduce spectator capacity limits for sports stadia, business events and live performances in tiers where these are permitted. These limits will vary depending on whether the event is held indoors or out. At tier 1 these will be 50% capacity or 4,000 outdoors and 1,000 indoors, whichever is lower and at tier 2 these will be 50% capacity or 2,000 outdoors and 1,000 indoors, whichever is lower.
We continue to engage with stakeholders - including through the Tourism Industry Council and the Events Industry Senior Leaders Panel - to assess how we can best support the sector’s safe reopening.
The business events pilots we carried out in September will ensure that the correct advice and guidance is put in place to help larger events reopen when it is safe to do so.
Asked by: Laura Farris (Conservative - Newbury)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to reduce waiting times for Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services in West Berkshire.
Answered by Nadine Dorries
Expanding access to children’s mental health services nationally is a priority for this Government, and it is a core part of the NHS Long Term Plan. The National Health Service has set an ambitious goal of an extra 345,000 children and young people aged 0-25 receiving support via NHS-funded mental health services and schools-based mental health support teams (MHSTs) by 2023/24.
MHSTs are a proposal of our Green Paper on improving children and young people’s mental health provision. We are trialling the proposals in trailblazer areas. The first 25 areas, announced in December 2018, are running the first wave of 59 MHSTs. West Berkshire is one of those 25 areas.
Twelve of the first trailblazer areas have also been chosen to pilot a four-week waiting time.
West Berkshire, Reading and Wokingham co-operate at local leadership level to support a shared children’s mental health Local Transformation Plan, which promotes resilience, and good mental health and wellbeing. It can be found at the following link:
www.berkshirewestccg.nhs.uk/about-us/how-we-work-with-others/the-local-transformation-plan
Asked by: Laura Farris (Conservative - Newbury)
Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, what steps his Department is taking to support humanitarian action in (a) refugee camps and (b) elsewhere in Syria; and what steps he is taking with his international counterparts to help bring an end to the conflict within that country.
Answered by James Cleverly - Home Secretary
The UK has committed over £3.3 billion to support the humanitarian response in Syria and neighbouring countries hosting its refugees, such as Turkey, Jordan and Lebanon. This includes a pledge of at least £300 million at the 2020 Brussels IV 'Supporting the Future of Syria and the Region' donor conference.
Our aid provides life-saving support such as healthcare, food and water in camps for displaced Syrians, and in communities across the country. Our aid also supports education and job creation initiatives for Syrian refugees in the region.
The UK works to bring an end to the conflict through supporting the UN-facilitated political process to reach a lasting political settlement to the conflict which protects the rights of all Syrians. The UK uses its position at the UN Security Council to call on all parties to respect agreed ceasefires and to focus the international community on the conflict's impact on the civilian population.
Asked by: Laura Farris (Conservative - Newbury)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps the Government is taking to communicate the importance of a healthy and balanced diet to the general public.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Government supports behaviour change through the Eatwell guide, catering guidance, its social marketing campaigns, the reduction and reformulation programme and providing advice to the consumer through the National Health Service website to promote making the healthier choice, the easiest choice.
We published ‘Tackling obesity: empowering adults and children to live healthier lives’ on 27 July. This strategy demonstrates an overarching campaign to reduce obesity, takes forward actions from previous chapters of the childhood obesity plan and sets our measures to get the nation fit and healthy, protect against COVID-19 and protect the NHS. The strategy is available at the following link:
Public Health England also launched Better Health, a campaign which helps people to make healthier choices by providing the most up to date evidence based healthy eating and physical activity advice including calorie intakes, portions of fruit and vegetables and recommended physical activity levels. As well as teaching skills to prevent weight gain and providing helpful tools like balanced recipes and the Food Scanner app which helps shoppers make healthier product choices, Better Health also supports people who wish to lose weight.
Asked by: Laura Farris (Conservative - Newbury)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps he is taking review his Department's guidance that advises against residential school trips, in light of the financial difficulty faced by (a) Rhos-Y-Gwaliau and (b) other outdoor activity centres and where those centres are able to accommodate school bubbles.
Answered by Nick Gibb
The guidance for full school opening continues to advise against UK overnight educational residential visits. This guidance is available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/actions-for-schools-during-the-coronavirus-outbreak/guidance-for-full-opening-schools.
This advice will remain under review and will be updated in line with guidance from Public Health England, the Cabinet Office and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office.
Asked by: Laura Farris (Conservative - Newbury)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, whether businesses supplying technical and musical kit to live music events and concert venues can access the Culture Recovery Fund.
Answered by Caroline Dinenage
DCMS appreciates the important role that the live music sector plays in the UK’s cultural economy, and that the Covid-19 pandemic presents a significant challenge to many businesses operating in these sectors.
The Secretary of State provided a major £1.57 billion support package for key cultural organisations to help them through the coronavirus pandemic. This funding will provide targeted support to organisations across a range of cultural and creative sectors. Businesses supplying technical and musical equipment are not eligible to apply for this funding, however this support package will benefit these businesses by providing support to music venues and many other organisations in the Creative Industries that host live events, to stay open and continue operating.
From 15th August, venues and organisations have been able to put on live indoor performances in front of a socially-distanced audience. This is in addition to the earlier announcement that from 11 July we can all enjoy performances outdoors with social distancing. This follows the government’s five-stage roadmap outlining how DCMS will get audiences back into performing arts venues. We are now at Stage Four of the roadmap.
We are committed to continuing to work with the live events sector to understand the difficulties they face and help them access support through these challenging times and through recovery.