Asked by: Pat McFadden (Labour - Wolverhampton South East)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, with reference to the policy paper entitled Transforming for a digital future: 2022 to 2025 roadmap for digital and data, updated on 29 February 2024, what steps his Department has taken to mitigate the risks of red-rated legacy IT systems.
Answered by Alex Burghart - Parliamentary Secretary (Cabinet Office)
The Central Digital and Data Office (CDDO), in the Cabinet Office, has established a programme to support departments managing legacy IT. CDDO has agreed a framework to identify ‘red-rated’ systems, indicating high levels of risk surrounding certain assets within the IT estate. Departments have committed to have remediation plans in place for these systems by next year (2025).
It is not appropriate to release sensitive information held about specific red-rated systems, more detailed plans for remediation within departmental IT estates, or information that could indicate which systems are at risk as it may highlight potential security vulnerabilities.
Asked by: Emily Thornberry (Labour - Islington South and Finsbury)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, pursuant to the Answers of 15 April 2024 to Questions 20230 and 20234 on Cabinet Office: Visits Abroad, whether the share of the total flight costs attributable to the Deputy Prime Minister was £14,784.46; and whether the non-flight costs incurred by the Deputy Prime Minister on his visit to New York were £13,915.54.
Answered by Alex Burghart - Parliamentary Secretary (Cabinet Office)
Costs for the trip were outlined in the ministerial travel data entitled Cabinet Office ministerial overseas travel, July to September 2023, published on 21 March 2024.
As outlined in that publication, the flight was also used to support regular movement of military personnel between the UK and the USA. These were not included in the number of officials nor in the cost calculations for the trip in order to maintain operational security.
Asked by: Patrick Grady (Scottish National Party - Glasgow North)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, pursuant to the Answer of 20 March 2024 to Question 18492 on European Court of Human Rights, whether the Prime Minister considers the Permanent Court of Arbitration to be a foreign court.
Answered by Alex Burghart - Parliamentary Secretary (Cabinet Office)
I refer the Hon. Member to the reply to the answer of 18 April 2024, Official Report, PQ 20335.
A clear distinction can be made between the domestic courts of the United Kingdom applying our law on one hand, and international (foreign) courts on the other, which hear cases within their often limited jurisdiction, in which at least one party is likely to be a nation state, and which are composed of international panels of judges or arbitrators applying international law, and whose rulings or opinions are often but not always final and binding.
Asked by: Patrick Grady (Scottish National Party - Glasgow North)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, pursuant to the Answer of 20 March 2024 to Question 18492 on European Court of Human Rights, what assessment the Prime Minister has made of the potential impact of the location of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) on how its jurisdiction applies to (a) the country in which it is based and (b) other countries; and if he will make a comparative assessment of how the jurisdiction of the ECHR applies in (i) France and (ii) the UK.
Answered by Alex Burghart - Parliamentary Secretary (Cabinet Office)
I refer the Hon. Member to the reply to the answer of 18 April 2024, Official Report, PQ 20335.
A clear distinction can be made between the domestic courts of the United Kingdom applying our law on one hand, and international (foreign) courts on the other, which hear cases within their often limited jurisdiction, in which at least one party is likely to be a nation state, and which are composed of international panels of judges or arbitrators applying international law, and whose rulings or opinions are often but not always final and binding.
Asked by: Patrick Grady (Scottish National Party - Glasgow North)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, pursuant to the Answer of 20 March 2024 to Question 18492 on European Court of Human Rights, whether the Prime Minister considers the Tribunals of the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes to be foreign tribunals when they meet in (a) Washington DC and (b) London.
Answered by Alex Burghart - Parliamentary Secretary (Cabinet Office)
I refer the Hon. Member to the reply to the answer of 18 April 2024, Official Report, PQ 20335.
A clear distinction can be made between the domestic courts of the United Kingdom applying our law on one hand, and international (foreign) courts on the other, which hear cases within their often limited jurisdiction, in which at least one party is likely to be a nation state, and which are composed of international panels of judges or arbitrators applying international law, and whose rulings or opinions are often but not always final and binding.
Asked by: Patrick Grady (Scottish National Party - Glasgow North)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, pursuant to the Answer of 20 March 2024 to Question 18492 on European Court of Human Rights, whether the Prime Minister considers the International Tribunal on the Law of the Sea to be a foreign tribunal.
Answered by Alex Burghart - Parliamentary Secretary (Cabinet Office)
I refer the Hon. Member to the reply to the answer of 18 April 2024, Official Report, PQ 20335.
A clear distinction can be made between the domestic courts of the United Kingdom applying our law on one hand, and international (foreign) courts on the other, which hear cases within their often limited jurisdiction, in which at least one party is likely to be a nation state, and which are composed of international panels of judges or arbitrators applying international law, and whose rulings or opinions are often but not always final and binding.
Asked by: Patrick Grady (Scottish National Party - Glasgow North)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, pursuant to the Answer of 20 March 2024 to Question 18492 on European Court of Human Rights, whether the Prime Minister considers the International Court of Justice to be a foreign court.
Answered by Alex Burghart - Parliamentary Secretary (Cabinet Office)
I refer the Hon. Member to the reply to the answer of 18 April 2024, Official Report, PQ 20335.
A clear distinction can be made between the domestic courts of the United Kingdom applying our law on one hand, and international (foreign) courts on the other, which hear cases within their often limited jurisdiction, in which at least one party is likely to be a nation state, and which are composed of international panels of judges or arbitrators applying international law, and whose rulings or opinions are often but not always final and binding.
Asked by: Emily Thornberry (Labour - Islington South and Finsbury)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, with reference to his Department's Evaluation Task Force Output and Outcome Indicators March 2024, if he will publish the (a) Evaluation Accelerator Fund projects rated red and (b) Evaluation Task Force priority projects without robust evaluation plans.
Answered by John Glen - Paymaster General and Minister for the Cabinet Office
The Evaluation Task Force (ETF) committed to publicly report on a series of output and outcome indicators in response to recommendations featured in the ‘Evaluating Government Spending’ NAO report in 2022 and the Public Accounts Committee’s recommendation for the ETF to establish quantifiable metrics on the scale and quality of evaluation across government. These indicators of progress can be viewed in the ETF evaluation strategy published in 2022 here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/the-evaluation-task-force-strategy-2022-2025
The indicators are not wholly controlled or ‘owned’ by the ETF. Driving progress towards the targets outlined in the ETF strategy are dependent on cross-government partners working together to build an improved evaluation ecosystem which creates more and higher quality evaluation in government.
The PQ references two indicators:
1.4 Proportion of Evaluation Accelerator Fund projects on track (RAG rated 'Green')
1.6 Proportion of ETF priority projects with robust evaluation plans (cumulative)
The ETF Output and Outcome Indicators (March 2024) report has also published its Technical Annex alongside the main report. This details the number of projects rated Red, Amber and Green across these portfolios and provides a detailed explanation of how these ratings were assessed. This is summarised in the background section below.
Departments and What Works Centres who lead either EAF or priority projects understand they are part of the ETF’s broader portfolio of work and that although regular indicators of evaluation progress in government are published, there have been no plans to publish the details of specific projects as part of the reporting.
The ETF has established good working relationships with departments who (particularly within the context of EAF and priority projects) are delivering complex evaluations in high profile policy areas. The departments openly share their work with the ETF and this transparency has enabled the ETF to provide high quality advice and support to teams. Using the information provided to the ETF to specifically publicly name projects, separately from other projects, risks damaging this important working relationship.
The ETF instead has been working to ensure transparency on a larger more sustainable scale, for all projects not just ETF priority areas. The Cabinet Office and the ETF will soon be publicly launching the Government Evaluation Registry. The Registry will bring together all planned, live and completed evaluations from Government Departments in a single accessible location, providing an invaluable tool for understanding “what works” in Government. Due to the importance of transparency and improving evaluation across Departments, the Government has decided to make use of the Registry mandatory. As such, Departments and What Works Centres responsible for EAF funded and priority projects will publish plans and findings on the Registry in due course. This will then be available to the public, along with the plans and reports for the rest of the department’s portfolio.
Asked by: Jessica Morden (Labour - Newport East)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, what steps he has taken since receiving Sir Robert Francis KC's infected blood compensation framework study, published on 7 June 2022.
Answered by John Glen - Paymaster General and Minister for the Cabinet Office
Following the publication of Sir Robert’s study, and the Inquiry’s subsequent first interim report in July 2022, the Government made interim payments of £100,000 available to chronic infected beneficiaries and bereaved partners registered with existing support schemes from October 2022. These payments continue to be made to eligible beneficiaries upon being accepted onto the schemes. The Government accepted the moral case for compensation in December 2022, and is committed to responding to the Inquiry’s final report as quickly as possible following on from its publication.
Asked by: Karl McCartney (Conservative - Lincoln)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, what his planned timetable is for announcing full compensation payments relating to the Infected Blood Inquiry.
Answered by John Glen - Paymaster General and Minister for the Cabinet Office
The Government will respond in full to Sir Brian Langstaff’s recommendations on compensation following the publication of the Inquiry’s final report on 20th May, and we will provide an update to Parliament on next steps within 25 sitting days following this date. Additionally, we will bring forward amendments at Report Stage of the Victims and Prisoners Bill in the Other Place with the intention of speeding up the implementation of the Government’s response to the Infected Blood Inquiry.