Asked by: Robin Walker (Conservative - Worcester)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, how many people in (a) Worcester and (b) Worcestershire have taken up a Help to Buy ISA.
Answered by Harriett Baldwin
The Help to Buy: ISA is an expansion to the existing Help to Buy scheme. The Help to Buy: ISA scheme will be launched on 1 December 2015.
The existing Help to Buy schemes are the Mortgage Guarantee scheme and Equity Loan scheme. Over 110,000 housing completions have taken place with the support of the Help to Buy scheme, as of June 2015.
The Help to Buy: mortgage guarantee scheme has been running since October 2013. Figures are available only for completions to June 2015. There have been 110 completions in Worcester as of June 2015. Data for Worcestershire is not reported. The latest data is available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/help-to-buy-mortgage-guarantee-scheme-quarterly-statistics-october-2013-to-june-2015.
The Help to Buy: equity loan scheme has been running since April 2013. In Worcester, there have been 183 completions with the support of the Help to Buy: equity loan scheme, as of June 2015. Data for Worcestershire is not reported. Official statistics on completions for the Help to Buy: equity loan scheme, monthly, broken down by local authority for England, are available at: www.gov.uk/government/statistical-data-sets/help-to-buy-equity-loan-scheme-monthly-statistics
Asked by: Robin Walker (Conservative - Worcester)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, what funding his Department or its agencies have provided for facilities for (a) wheelchair basketball, (b) blind cricket, (c) deaf cricket, (d) wheelchair tennis, (e) wheelchair rugby and (f) wheelchair football since 2012.
Answered by Tracey Crouch
Government remains committed to supporting disabled people to realise their potential in sport. Since 2012 Sport England has made disability sport a key focus of its strategy and the National Governing Bodies of Sport have specific targets for increasing the number of people with disabilities who play their sport. Sport England is currently investing over £171 million to make sport a practical and attractive lifestyle choice for disabled people and to get more disabled people playing sport.
Table A: Investment in disability sport-specific facilities
Sport | Sport England investment in disability sport-specific facilities since 2012 |
Wheelchair basketball | £79,314* |
Blind cricket and deaf cricket | £241,540 |
Wheelchair tennis | £150,000 |
Wheelchair rugby | £228,968 |
Wheelchair football | £179,114 |
*Includes £30,000 award to GB Wheelchair Basketball Association (GBWBA) in 2013 for new wheelchairs
Please note that the figures in Table A only includes awards for projects which have a stated disability sport focus. Facilities like sports halls can be used for disability sports like the ones listed in Table A. Since 2012, Sport England has invested £39.8 million in 58 such sports hall projects.
As part of GBWBA’s Whole Sport Plan investment for 2013-17, Sport England invested £154,833 in the University of Worcester Disabled Athlete Accommodation project. Across Sport England’s National Centres for Sport, at least 20 per cent of accommodation provided has been designed specifically with disability access requirements in mind.
Sport England is also investing £26,000 in a research project in partnership with GBWBA to look at ways to increase the quality of surfaces used for wheelchair sports.
Asked by: Robin Walker (Conservative - Worcester)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what assessment his Department has made of the cost effectiveness of providing 24-hour mental health support to A&E departments.
Answered by Alistair Burt
In 2014, the Royal College of Psychiatrists made an assessment of the national provision of liaison psychiatry, the services that provide mental health support to Emergency Departments. This followed a commitment that the College made in the mental health Crisis Care Concordat.
The Government’s Mandate to NHS England states that access to crisis services, for an individual must be “at all times as accessible, responsive and as high quality as other health emergency services. This includes ensuring the provision of adequate liaison psychiatry services in emergency departments.”
NHS England has adopted these aims in Putting Patients First, its business plan for 2014/15 – 2016/17, and will take them forward as part of its Parity of Esteem programme. This year, £30 million investment is to be targeted on effective models of liaison psychiatry in a greater number of acute hospitals.
Achieving better access to mental health services by 2020 set the expectation that, by 2020, all acute trusts will have in place liaison mental health services for all ages appropriate to the size, acuity and specialty of the hospital.
Asked by: Robin Walker (Conservative - Worcester)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, which A&E departments in (a) Worcestershire and (b) the West Midlands have 24-hour mental health support.
Answered by Alistair Burt
The information requested is not collected centrally.
Asked by: Robin Walker (Conservative - Worcester)
Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, what the value of trade was between the UK and Paraguay in each of the last six years.
Answered by Lord Swire
For the six years to 2013 (most recent figures), trade between the United Kingdom and Paraguay was worth, £25m in 2008, £23m in 2009, £41m in 2010, £47m in 2011, £40m in 2012 and £53m in 2013.
Asked by: Robin Walker (Conservative - Worcester)
Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, what the value of trade was between the UK and Argentina in each of the last six years.
Answered by Lord Swire
For the six years to 2013 (most recent figures), trade both goods and services between the United Kingdom and Argentina was worth £1,190m in 2008, £1,250m in 2009, £1,430 in 2010, £1,420m in 2011, £1,460m in 2012 and £1,380 in 2013.
Asked by: Robin Walker (Conservative - Worcester)
Question
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, how many different employers took on apprentices in (a) Worcester, (b) Worcestershire and (c) the West Midlands in each of the last five years.
Answered by Nick Boles
Data is not centrally collected for the number of employers taking on apprentices. The Department publishes details of apprenticeship starts by region and Local Education Authority (LEA) (first link) and apprenticeship participation by region (second link) and LEA (third link) online:
The Department also publishes details of Workplaces Employing Apprentices by region and Parliamentary constituency; however, workplaces cannot be interpreted as different employers since employers can have apprentices at more than one workplace. This data is published online: https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/416511/apprenticeships-workplaces-by-region-and-constituency.xls
Asked by: Robin Walker (Conservative - Worcester)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what his policy is on screening all men for prostate cancer at the age of 50; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Jane Ellison
The UK National Screening Committee (UK NSC) advice on prostate cancer screening/prostate specific antigen (PSA) testing in men over the age of 50 is that a systematic population screening programme is not recommended. This recommendation is currently being reviewed as part of the UK NSC's regular review cycle and is due to be completed by November 2015. The UK NSC first reviewed the evidence for a national prostate screening programme in 1997 and again in 2010. The reviews did not show clear evidence that prostate cancer screening using the PSA test was more beneficial than harmful, and showed a risk of over-diagnosis.
The UK NSC says that PSA testing can be performed on request, and information is provided on the risks and benefits by the Prostate Cancer Risk Management Programme.
Asked by: Robin Walker (Conservative - Worcester)
Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, what steps his Department is taking to support exchanges and trade missions between the UK and China.
Answered by Lord Swire
This Government is committed to building upon our record levels of exports to, and inward investment from, China.
We are doubling the resources of UK Trade and Investment China to make it their biggest operation globally. This will enable more exchanges and trade missions like the recent Shanghai GREAT Festival of Creativity.
Asked by: Robin Walker (Conservative - Worcester)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, what information his Department holds on the number of properties repossessed in (a) Worcester, (b) Worcestershire and (c) England in each of the last 10 years.
Answered by Brandon Lewis
The Council of Mortgage Lenders collects data on the number of properties that have been repossessed, and provide this to the Ministry of Justice who publish the data and it can be found at:
https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/mortgage-and-landlord-possession-statistics
The data are for the United Kingdom as a whole. No further geographical breakdown is available. Data for 2005-14 is shown in the attached Table 1.
The Ministry of Justice collects and publishes mortgage and landlord possession statistics, which include mortgage and landlord possession claim actions in county courts in England and Wales. Data is available at county and local authority level and can be found at:
Data for Worcester, Worcestershire and England, 2005-14, is shown in the attached Table 2.
According to the Council of Mortgage Lenders, the number of mortgage possessions is at its lowest annual figure since 2007.
Moreover, Bank of England statistics published on 9 December 2014 state that the number of new mortgage arrears cases is at its lowest quarterly level since the statistical series began in 2007.
The action that this Government has taken to tackle the deficit left by the last Administration has kept interest rates down and helped reduce the number of repossessions.