Asked by: Steve Reed (Labour (Co-op) - Croydon North)
Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:
To ask the Minister of State, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, pursuant to the Answer of 18 March 2024 to Question 18175 on Nature Conservation: Finance, what estimate he has made of the total budget that is (a) unspent and (b) unallocated as of 12 April 2024.
Answered by David Rutley - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
Between financial years 2021/22 and 2022/23 the UK spent £763 million on climate change interventions that protect and restore nature and biodiversity leaving £2.2 billion to spend between 2023/24 and 2025/26. This figure will be updated when total spend for the financial year for 2023/24 is finalised later this year. There is currently over £3 billion allocated to nature programming between 2021/22 and 2025/26.
Asked by: Liam Byrne (Labour - Birmingham, Hodge Hill)
Question to the Department for Business and Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, how many export licence applications were escalated to the dispute resolution mechanism or complex cases mechanism in each year since 2010; and what the destination country was in each such case.
Answered by Alan Mak - Minister of State (Department for Business and Trade) (jointly with the Cabinet Office)
Export licence applications are assessed on a case-by-case basis against announced policies and the Strategic Export Licensing Criteria (SELC). Decisions are routinely taken by the Export Control Joint Unit (ECJU), on behalf of the Secretary of State for Business and Trade. These decisions are taken in consultation with officials from other government departments, principally the Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office and the Ministry of Defence but occasionally other Departments are also consulted depending on the nature of the case.
There is no single ‘dispute resolution mechanism’ which is regularly or consistently enacted. There have been various occasions since 2010 where different procedures have been set up to enable wider consultation and scrutiny of export licensing cases with Ministers across Government. These were in reaction to specific concerns or strategic priorities at the time. They can involve different attendees and terms of reference depending on the situation. We do not maintain data on how often this sort of procedure has been used over multiple years.
There is no specific ‘complex case mechanism’. ECJU receives a high volume of ‘complex cases’ and the vast majority are decided upon by consensus. However, if ECJU officials are unable to come to a consensus about a case they could refer it to MOD and FCDO Ministers, and ultimately to the Secretary of State for Business and Trade who has the responsibility for making the final decision. This happens extremely rarely in practice and therefore we do not maintain data on its occurrence over multiple years.
Asked by: Barry Sheerman (Labour (Co-op) - Huddersfield)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether his Department provides support to international game wardens to adapt to new techniques for tackling illegal wildlife activities.
Answered by Rebecca Pow - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The UK is committed to combatting the illegal wildlife trade (IWT), including by investing £30 million between 2022 and 2025 to support global efforts.
Our IWT Challenge Fund continues to support projects that benefit park rangers and drive innovative ways to tackle poaching. Projects have included expanding aerial surveillance to support ranger deployments in the Rungwa, Kizigo and Muhesi Game Reserves in central Tanzania, and enhanced use of innovative techniques to combat poaching and wildlife trafficking at the Ngulia rhino sanctuary in Kenya. More information on these projects and others is available here.
We have also funded the training of rangers (Op CORDED) in partnership with the British Army, helping wildlife parks work together to strengthen law enforcement and share information to disrupt smuggling and poaching across Africa.
Asked by: Barry Sheerman (Labour (Co-op) - Huddersfield)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps he is taking to support international game wardens in protecting vulnerable wildlife populations.
Answered by Rebecca Pow - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The UK is committed to combatting the illegal wildlife trade (IWT), including by investing £30 million between 2022 and 2025 to support global efforts.
Our IWT Challenge Fund continues to support projects that benefit park rangers and drive innovative ways to tackle poaching. Projects have included expanding aerial surveillance to support ranger deployments in the Rungwa, Kizigo and Muhesi Game Reserves in central Tanzania, and enhanced use of innovative techniques to combat poaching and wildlife trafficking at the Ngulia rhino sanctuary in Kenya. More information on these projects and others is available here.
We have also funded the training of rangers (Op CORDED) in partnership with the British Army, helping wildlife parks work together to strengthen law enforcement and share information to disrupt smuggling and poaching across Africa.
Asked by: Barry Sheerman (Labour (Co-op) - Huddersfield)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, if he will take steps to increase aid to organisations that employ game wardens.
Answered by Rebecca Pow - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The UK is committed to combatting the illegal wildlife trade (IWT), including by investing £30 million between 2022 and 2025 to support global efforts.
Our IWT Challenge Fund continues to support projects that benefit park rangers and drive innovative ways to tackle poaching. Projects have included expanding aerial surveillance to support ranger deployments in the Rungwa, Kizigo and Muhesi Game Reserves in central Tanzania, and enhanced use of innovative techniques to combat poaching and wildlife trafficking at the Ngulia rhino sanctuary in Kenya. More information on these projects and others is available here.
We have also funded the training of rangers (Op CORDED) in partnership with the British Army, helping wildlife parks work together to strengthen law enforcement and share information to disrupt smuggling and poaching across Africa.
Asked by: Andrew Rosindell (Conservative - Romford)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what information his Department holds on the number of threatening calls that were made to schools in (a) Romford constituency and (b) the UK in the last 12 months.
Answered by Damian Hinds - Minister of State (Education)
Schools in England do not have a legal requirement to report to the department threats that are received via phone calls. However, schools are expected to have policies and procedures in place to handle these situations. The procedures may include reporting threats to local authorities and the police, this depends on the nature and severity of the threat. Schools may also choose to inform the relevant authorities as a precautionary measure to ensure the safety and security of students and staff.
Asked by: Caroline Lucas (Green Party - Brighton, Pavilion)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether her Department is collating data from toxicology reports of non-fatal overdose incidents to assess the risk from synthetic opioids.
Answered by Andrea Leadsom - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Government is undertaking a number of actions to address the risk that synthetic opioids pose. The Department has a longstanding surveillance system in place to collect information on the nature and location of novel drug use, drug markets, and reports alerting us to drug harms experienced. We continue to monitor the threat posed by synthetic opioids, and are working to improve drug surveillance on synthetic opioids through the development of an early warning system. This will include, with the permission of coroners, toxicology results for fatal overdose cases from across England as soon as the information is available, enabling the Department to closely monitor the substances causing deaths.
We know that most overdoses take place when individuals are alone, or accompanied by others also using drugs. This means they are largely transitory and hidden events, with no opportunity for sampling. A key indicator, therefore, is those who do come into contact with first responders, who are administered the lifesaving opioid reversal drug naloxone, or who are admitted to hospital. Ambulance data represents an opportunity for rapidly identifying local spikes in overdoses and, for this purpose, we are establishing data feeds with ambulance trusts in England, on callouts where naloxone has been administered.
Asked by: Maria Eagle (Labour - Garston and Halewood)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what the average number of people employed to the Advanced Materials Programme at the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory was in each year since 2019.
Answered by James Cartlidge - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence)
Dstl works with industry, academia and Government to make sure the UK has the right defence science and technology capabilities, and to deliver work for our customers in the Ministry of Defence (MOD) and across Government. Dstl provides summary information on its Science and Technology Programmes on its website to inform the public of the nature of the work it is undertaking.
Dstl’s structure, and the wide range of expertise within the organisation, allows expertise to be brought in, as required, to support the dedicated programme technical teams deliver its S&T Programmes.
Whilst information relating to Dstl’s workforce is published annually in its Annual Report and Accounts, detailed FTE staffing details in respect of named Programmes cannot be provided in the interests of National Security.
Asked by: Maria Eagle (Labour - Garston and Halewood)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what the average number of people employed to the Air Systems Programme at the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory was in each year since 2019.
Answered by James Cartlidge - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence)
Dstl works with industry, academia and Government to make sure the UK has the right defence science and technology capabilities, and to deliver work for our customers in the Ministry of Defence (MOD) and across Government. Dstl provides summary information on its Science and Technology Programmes on its website to inform the public of the nature of the work it is undertaking.
Dstl’s structure, and the wide range of expertise within the organisation, allows expertise to be brought in, as required, to support the dedicated programme technical teams deliver its S&T Programmes.
Whilst information relating to Dstl’s workforce is published annually in its Annual Report and Accounts, detailed FTE staffing details in respect of named Programmes cannot be provided in the interests of National Security.
Asked by: Maria Eagle (Labour - Garston and Halewood)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what the average number of people employed to the Autonomy Programme at the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory was in each year since 2019.
Answered by James Cartlidge - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence)
Dstl works with industry, academia and Government to make sure the UK has the right defence science and technology capabilities, and to deliver work for our customers in the Ministry of Defence (MOD) and across Government. Dstl provides summary information on its Science and Technology Programmes on its website to inform the public of the nature of the work it is undertaking.
Dstl’s structure, and the wide range of expertise within the organisation, allows expertise to be brought in, as required, to support the dedicated programme technical teams deliver its S&T Programmes.
Whilst information relating to Dstl’s workforce is published annually in its Annual Report and Accounts, detailed FTE staffing details in respect of named Programmes cannot be provided in the interests of National Security.