Asked by: Tom Brake (Liberal Democrat - Carshalton and Wallington)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what recent steps his Department has taken through the immigration system to ensure that the UK can attract and retain scientific talent at all career stages.
Answered by Caroline Nokes
On 24 June 2019, the Government asked the independent Migration Advisory Committee (MAC) to consider the operation of salary thresholds in the future immigration system, including the impact of exemptions from minimum salary thresholds. The MAC is due to report by January 2020.
We recognise the vital contribution that scientists make to the UK. In his spring statement, my Rt Hon Friend, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, confirmed that PhD level occupations would be exempt from the Tier 2 cap. Additionally, researchers applying for settlement are exempt from the rule which states that, there should be no absence from the UK for 180 days if the absence from the UK is for the purpose carrying out research. A number of research roles also appear on the Shortage Occupation List which also exempts them from the settlement salary threshold
The Tier 1 (Exceptional Talent) route is also available for internationally recognised leaders and promising future leaders, including in the science and research sector.
Asked by: Tom Brake (Liberal Democrat - Carshalton and Wallington)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what recent steps he has taken to ensure that the UK’s visa charges remain competitive with those of other countries.
Answered by Caroline Nokes
The Home Office keeps all visa fees under regular review. A constituent part of this analysis includes a review of fees charged in comparison with other countries.
Asked by: Tom Brake (Liberal Democrat - Carshalton and Wallington)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what preparations his Department is making for the UK leaving the EU without an agreement; and how much funding has been allocated to those preparations.
Answered by Caroline Nokes
The UK Government remains focussed on ensuring a smooth and orderly withdrawal from the EU with a deal as soon as possible
However, as a responsible government, we’ve been preparing to minimise any disruption in the event of no deal for nearly three years. The Home Office has been planning and preparing for a no deal scenario ensuring we have contingency plans in place across areas including law enforcement, passport operations and the border.
We have taken extensive steps to provide businesses and citizens with advice on helping them mitigate the potential impacts of a no deal exit. When necessary we will continue to update our advice on gov.uk/euexit on how people should prepare
During the extension period, to underpin our ability to respond in a no deal scenario, we are working closely with operational partners to develop our response to a range of theoretical scenarios
The Treasury has allocated over £4.2 billion of additional funding to departments and Devolved Administrations for EU exit preparations so far. This breaks down as £412m over the spending review period for the Department for Exiting the European Union, Department for International Trade and the Foreign & Commonwealth Office (Autumn Statement 2016); £286m of additional funding for 2017/18 (a full breakdown of which can be found in Supplementary Estimates 2017/18); over £1.5 billion for 2018/19 (Supplementary Estimates 2018/19); and over £2 billion for 2019/20 (Main Estimates 2019/20). This funding is to cover all exit scenarios and is in addition to departmental efforts to reprioritise from business as usual toward preparations for the UK’s departure from the EU. Work on no-deal exit preparations cannot be readily separated from other EU exit work, given the significant overlap in plans in many cases.
Asked by: Tom Brake (Liberal Democrat - Carshalton and Wallington)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many staff in his Department who were transferred or seconded to work (a) in other departments or (b) on other departmental briefs on preparations for the UK to leave the EU, have since returned to his Department.
Answered by Victoria Atkins - Secretary of State for Health and Social Care
The Home Office workforce management information records only show members of staff who are currently transferred or Seconded out of the Home Office. No rolling records are maintained for staff transferred or seconded who have since returned to the Home Office. In addition, these records do not identify the specific work streams an individual has been working on.
Manual record checks would involve a disproportionate cost and would be unlikely to be able to provide the information being sought.
Asked by: Tom Brake (Liberal Democrat - Carshalton and Wallington)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many and what proportion of officials in his Department took sick leave for reasons relating to stress in the last 12 months; what proportion that leave was of total sick leave taken in his Department; and what the cost was to his Department of officials taking sick leave over that period.
Answered by Victoria Atkins - Secretary of State for Health and Social Care
The number of staff in the Home Office who took sickness absence due to mental health issues in the 12 months to 30 April 2019; the proportion of the total sick absence that this comprises; and the cost to the Department of sick absence due to mental ill health during that period is set out in the accompanying table. These absences include those relating to stress, as well as other mental health issues such as anxiety and depression. These conditions can be triggered by various factors.
We are committed to breaking down barriers and reducing stigma for employees living with mental health conditions. We aim to equip managers to recognise and address stress in the workplace and encourage employees to talk to their managers about mental health issues so that they can access help and support at the earliest stage.
Asked by: Tom Brake (Liberal Democrat - Carshalton and Wallington)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether he has estimated the cost to the public purse of paying survivor pensions to all police widows and widowers regardless of remarriage or cohabitation; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Nick Hurd
We have estimated with the Government’s Actuary’s Department, by using historical actuarial data, that the total cost of retaining benefits for all police survivors would increase the police scheme liabilities by around £144m. It is also estimated that retaining benefits for all police survivors, including reinstatement of pensions already surrendered, would increase the police scheme liabilities to around £198m.
Asked by: Tom Brake (Liberal Democrat - Carshalton and Wallington)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether it is his Department’s policy not to release the location of the immigration removal centre where a person has been detained to the direct family of the detainee.
Answered by Caroline Nokes
The Home Office has no specific policy precluding the release of information relating to an individual’s location within the immigration detention estate. Data protection legislation however may prevent the release of such personal information should there be no legal basis to share it.
Asked by: Tom Brake (Liberal Democrat - Carshalton and Wallington)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what recent estimate he has made of the cost to his Department of preparations for the UK leaving the EU without a deal.
Answered by Victoria Atkins - Secretary of State for Health and Social Care
HM Treasury has allocated over £4.2 billion of additional funding to departments and the Devolved Administrations for EU exit preparations so far. This breaks down as:
• £412m of additional funding over the spending review period for the Depart-ment for Exiting the European Union, Department for International Trade and the Foreign & Commonwealth Office at Autumn Statement 2016
• £286m of additional funding for 17/18 (a full breakdown of which can be found in Supplementary Estimates 17/18). https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/679738/PU2137_Supplementary_estimates_web.pdf
• Over £1.5bn of additional funding for 18/19. A full breakdown of the allocations can be found in the Chief Secretary’s Written Ministerial Statement, HCWS540, laid on the 13th March 2018. https://www.parliament.uk/business/publications/written-questions-answers-statements/written-statement/Commons/2018-03-13/HCWS540/
• Over £2bn of additional funding for 19/20. A full breakdown of the allocations can be found in the Chief Secretary’s Written Ministerial Statement, HCWS1205, laid on the 18th December 2018. https://www.parliament.uk/business/publications/written-questions-answers-statements/written-statement/Commons/2018-12-18/HCWS1205/
This funding is to cover all exit scenarios, and is in addition to departmental efforts to reprioritise from business as usual toward preparations for the UK’s departure from the EU.
Work on no-deal exit preparations cannot be readily separated from other EU exit work. The Department is preparing for all eventualities and the resources available to support preparations are kept under constant review.
The Department also received £5.45m of additional funding in 2018/19, for no-deal civil contingency planning.
Asked by: Tom Brake (Liberal Democrat - Carshalton and Wallington)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, pursuant to the Answer of 24 April to Written Question 179072 on Home Office: Contracts, for what purpose gagging clauses have been included in contracts drawn up between his Department and (a) charities, (b) voluntary sector organisations, (c) social enterprises and (d) companies.
Answered by Victoria Atkins - Secretary of State for Health and Social Care
There are no gagging clauses within Home Office contracts or Grant agreements.
Asked by: Tom Brake (Liberal Democrat - Carshalton and Wallington)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what recent estimate he has made of the number of EU citizens in the UK who are eligible to apply for Settled Status under the EU Settlement Scheme.
Answered by Caroline Nokes
Over 400,000 EU Citizens have applied to the Scheme so far.
An estimated 3.4m EEA nationals currently resident in the UK are eligible for the EU Settlement Scheme (based on Home Office internal analysis of ONS Annual Population Survey (APS) data for year October 2017 to September 2018).
The Impact Assessment for the EU Settlement Scheme was published in July 2018
(http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukia/2018/116/pdfs/ukia_20180116_en.pdf )
and an updated version was published in March 2019
(http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukia/2019/74/pdfs/ukia_20190074_en.pdf).
The Home Office has estimated that the total number of EEA citizens and their family members eligible to apply for the EU Settlement Scheme by the end of the planned implementation period on 31 December 2020 is likely to be between 3.5 million and 4.1 million. This estimate is based on a number of assumptions as to how the size of the eligible EEA population will change over the period. The range should be considered indicative as future migration flows can be affected by many factors and are difficult to predict.
Two reports on the private testing phases have already been published (https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/eu-settlement-scheme-private-beta-1 and https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/eu-settlement-scheme-private-beta-2/eu-settlement-scheme-private-beta-testing-phase-2-report)