Became Member: 9th September 2020
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These initiatives were driven by Lord Moylan, and are more likely to reflect personal policy preferences.
A Bill to require the Secretary of State to publish an annual report on complications from abortions in England; and for connected purposes.
A Bill to make provision for a Foetal Sentience Committee to review current understanding of the sentience of the human foetus and to inform policy-making; and for connected purposes.
Lord Moylan has not co-sponsored any Bills in the current parliamentary sitting
The Government is committed to extending mandatory pay gap reporting to ethnicity and disability pay gaps for employers with at least 250 employees. It is also committed to ensuring the Public Sector Equality Duty covers all parties exercising public functions.
The information requested falls under the remit of the UK Statistics Authority.
Please see the letter attached from the Director General for Office for Statistics Regulation.
Ed Humpherson, Director General for Office for Statistics Regulation
The Lord Moylan
House of Lords
London
SW1A 0PW
19 December 2024
Dear Lord Moylan,
As Director General for Office for Statistics Regulation, I am responding to your Parliamentary Question asking when His Majesty's Government plan to update the assessment of abortion statistics by the UK Statistics Authority in order to comply with the Code of Practice for Statistics (HL3549).
The Office for Statistics Regulation (OSR) was established in 2016 and is the regulatory arm of the UK Statistics Authority (the Authority). OSR provides independent regulation of all official statistics produced in the UK. Before 2016, the Authority's Monitoring and Assessment team handled regulatory functions.
Accredited Official Statistics are official statistics that have been independently assessed by OSR to comply with the standards of trustworthiness, quality and value in the Code of Practice for Statistics. Accredited Official Statistics are called National Statistics in the Statistics and Registration Service Act 2007.
Abortions Statistics for England and Wales produced by the Office for Health Improvement & Disparities (OHID, was previously Department of Health) were assessed as complying with the Code of Practice for Statistics in February 2012, and National Statistics designation was awarded[1].
It is a requirement of the Statistics and Registration Service Act 2007 that the Code of Practice must continue to be complied with by the statistics producer in relation to the statistics. OSR regularly engages with the Head of Profession for Statistics for the Department of Health and Social Care to obtain general assurance on the Department’s compliance with the Code of Practice, but the OSR team has not discussed the abortion statistics specifically in these conversations.
Once a set of statistics has been assessed, OSR can re-assess them at any time. Reassessments can be initiated as a result of concerns raised with us by users, including citizens, academic experts and policy stakeholders. While we do not currently have any plans to re-assess the abortion statistics in this financial year, we are always open to hearing the concerns of people with an interest in the topic area.
To that end, if you have any concerns regarding the trustworthiness, quality and value of these abortion statistics not complying with the Code of Practice for Statistics, please do contact me through our general contact email regulation@statistics.gov.uk.
Yours sincerely
Ed Humpherson
Director General for OSR
[1]Statistics on Abortion: Letter of Confirmation as National Statistics, https://uksa.statisticsauthority.gov.uk/publication/statistics-on-abortion-letter-of-confirmation-as-national-statistics/
The Charity Commission’s role as the independent regulator of charities in England and Wales is to ensure that charity trustees comply with their duties as set out in charity law. The Charity Commission has published guidance for trustees on the use of social media and managing the risks for charities.
The Charity Commission notes the Tribunal’s judgment in this recent case, and is considering what lessons can be applied to future casework.
In the last five years, the Charity Commission has disqualified six individuals in cases that relate to the usage of social media. An individual’s use of social media was the sole basis for disqualification in three cases, while in the other three it was one of several grounds.
The Commission’s decisions to disqualify are subject to robust oversight and can be appealed through review by an independent member of Commission staff, and subsequently to the First Tier Tribunal.
The Charity Commission is independent from the Government in its regulatory decision making.
Departmental settlements have been set following the Budget announcement on October 30. Individual programmes will now be assessed during the departmental Business Planning process.
The Department keeps all of its policies under review, to ensure they are aligned to the Government’s priorities and delivering the best possible outcomes for the public.
It is standard practice for any new administration to review the policies of its predecessors.
Where appropriate, we publish details of our reviews on gov.uk. This includes information on the independent reviews, public consultations and taskforces that have been launched, completed and published between 5 July 2024 and 5 January 2025.
The Remedial Agreement letter has been published on the .gov website. Redactions have been made using the exemptions permitted under both section 40(2) (personal information) and 43(2) (commercially prejudicial information) of the Freedom of Information Act. A public interest test was conducted as part of the consideration process. The Remedial Agreement runs until March 2025.
The current Remedial Agreement with XC Trains Limited that was agreed in August 2024 runs until March 2025. The Department is considering what further actions might be appropriate, if any.
All operators are required to meet their contractual obligations as set out in their National Rail Contract, including contractual performance indicators. Failure to comply with those contractual obligations, once Force Majeure claims have been taken into account, leaves operators open to enforcement action.
The Department is currently assessing if XC Trains Limited exceeded the default threshold, for any of the relevant indicators in these periods, once Force Majeure claims have been taken into account.
The current Remedial Agreement with XC Trains Limited that was agreed in August 2024 runs until March 2025. There has been no amendment to the existing Remedial Agreement.
All operators are required to meet their contractual obligations as set out in their National Rail Contract. Failure to comply with those contractual obligations leaves operators open to enforcement action.
It is public knowledge that CrossCountry is both reinstating services on some routes and amending the times of some services from May 2025. The Department has not agreed any alterations to the CrossCountry May 2025 timetable.
The Secretary of State announced on 4 December that, under the Passenger Railway Services (Public Ownership) Act 2024, South Western Railway’s services will transfer into public ownership on 25 May 2025, followed by c2c’s on 20 July 2025 and Greater Anglia’s in autumn 2025.
Transport in London is devolved to the Mayor and TfL. Thanks to constructive dialogue between TfL and the unions the strikes planned by both RMT and ASLEF for early November have now been called off.
The Government is currently reviewing the position it has inherited on rail infrastructure and will consider how to address capacity needs and support economic growth in and between the North and the Midlands, whilst maintaining fiscal discipline.
We will set out next steps in due course.
In accordance with the Abortion Act 1967, all abortions in England must be notified to the Chief Medical Officer within 14 days of the procedure. This information is used by the Department to monitor compliance with the act. The Department also publishes this data in line with the Code of Practice for Statistics, to ensure it is available to commissioners and providers of abortion services and others with an interest in abortion in England and Wales. There is no legal duty placed on the Department to publish data collected through abortion notification forms.
The Department regularly consults the Office for Statistics Regulation, which is the independent regulatory arm of the UK Statistics Authority, and provides independent regulation of all official statistics produced in the United Kingdom.
Following reports of extremely rare adverse events of concurrent thrombosis and thrombocytopenia following vaccination with the first dose of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine, the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) advised that adults aged under 30 years old and without underlying health conditions should be offered an alternative vaccine, if available. This advice was published on 7 April 2021. In parallel, the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency updated its information for healthcare professionals on the COVID-19 AstraZeneca vaccine. On 7 May 2021, the JCVI published updated advice which extended the group who should be offered an alternative to include all unvaccinated adults aged 30 to 39 years old who were not in a clinical priority group at higher risk of severe COVID-19 disease. This advice is published online, and is available in an online only format.
Following reports of extremely rare adverse events of concurrent thrombosis and thrombocytopenia following vaccination with the first dose of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine, the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) advised that adults aged under 30 years old and without underlying health conditions should be offered an alternative vaccine, if available. This advice was published on 7 April 2021. In parallel, the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency updated its information for healthcare professionals on the COVID-19 AstraZeneca vaccine. On 7 May 2021, the JCVI published updated advice which extended the group who should be offered an alternative to include all unvaccinated adults aged 30 to 39 years old who were not in a clinical priority group at higher risk of severe COVID-19 disease. This advice is published online, and is available in an online only format.
The information is not held in the format requested. However, the following table shows a count of the Finished Admission Episodes (FAEs) where the primary diagnosis was Guillain-Barré syndrome, for the period 2014/15 to 2023/24 in England:
Year | FAEs |
2014/15 | 1,403 |
2015/16 | 1,354 |
2016/17 | 1,412 |
2017/18 | 1,342 |
2018/19 | 1,337 |
2019/20 | 1,354 |
2020/21 | 921 |
2021/22 | 1,243 |
2022/23 | 1,374 |
2023/24 | 1,367 |
Source: data is from the Hospital Episode Statistics, by NHS England.
Notes:
All claims to the Vaccine Damage Payment Scheme (VDPS) are assessed on a case-by-case basis by experienced independent medical assessors, General Medical Council registered doctors with a licence to practise, who have undertaken specialised training in vaccine damage and disability assessment.
When making medical assessment through the VDPS, independent medical assessors consider not just the claimant’s full medical records once they are gathered, but also the claim form and a range of credible resources to support their assessment, as per NHS Business Services Authority’s published VDPS Principles of Medical Assessment. This includes, but is not limited to, the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency’s data, including Yellow Card information on suspected safety concerns involving a healthcare product, vaccine product information and updates, the UK Health Security Agency's Green Book, and the World Health Organization’s Causality assessment of an adverse event following immunization. Medical assessors will also consider academic research, epidemiological evidence, and the current consensus of expert medical opinion.
As of 30 September 2024, the Vaccine Damage Payment Scheme (VDPS) has processed 3,825 claims relating to the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine. A further 207 claims relating to the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine are undergoing medical assessment. As of 30 September 2024, there were 7,335 live VDPS claims, of which 1,024 have been awaiting resolution for longer than 12 months, and 316 claims for longer than 18 months.
The UK-funded Bangladesh Collaborative, Accountable and Peaceful Politics programme works to protect and promote freedom of religion or belief. A local peace building organisation The Hunger Project has organised a range of initiatives to foster inter-ethnic and religious peace. This has included peace events, consultation meetings with local authorities and quarterly meetings with local conflict mediation. As a result, local peace forum groups have been created to take steps to protect Hindus and other minority communities during their religious festivals. The UN Human Rights Office have now published their report; this provides credible independent data on events last year.
While the UK Government condemns all violence, including kidnaps, across Nigeria we do not routinely engage on instances of non-UK citizens being kidnapped as this is a matter for the Nigerian authorities. Kidnapping for ransom is sadly a widespread practice in Nigeria, particularly in the North-West where banditry is prevalent. Kidnappings often have financial rather than religious motives and communities of all religions and beliefs are vulnerable. With assistance from the UK National Crime Agency, a Multi-Agency Kidnap Fusion Cell (MAKFC) has been established to support cooperation between Nigeria's security and justice agencies. This will both reduce the harm to victims and hold those responsible to account.
The UK has a long-standing commitment to the promotion and protection of human rights, including Freedom of Religion or Belief (FoRB). In November 2024, The Minister for the Indo-Pacific visited Bangladesh and discussed the importance of the protection of religious minorities with Chief Adviser Yunus who has been vocal about support for minorities. We are providing up to £27 million under the Bangladesh Collaborative, Accountable and Peaceful Politics programme for protecting civic and political space, fostering collaboration, reducing corruption, and mitigating tensions that lead to any violence. We are supporting the United Nations Resident Coordinator's Office, who are working with Bangladesh's Interim Government to produce credible independent data on incidents of religious violence.
The environment for freedom of religion or belief in China is restrictive, which includes the persecution of Christians. This government stands firm on human rights, including the right to freedom of religion or belief. We raise our concerns at the highest levels: the Prime Minister and Foreign Secretary both raised human rights recently with their counterparts, President Xi and Foreign Minister Wang respectively. More broadly, this government champions freedom of religion or belief for all abroad. We work to uphold the right to freedom of religion or belief through our position at the UN, G7 and other multilateral fora, and through bilateral engagement.
The UK champions freedom of religion or belief around the world. We closely monitor human rights, including freedom of religion or belief, in Belarus and condemn the sentencing of Father Henrykh Akalatovich in a closed-door trial. We work with likeminded partners to raise the human rights situation with the Belarusian authorities and demand the release of political prisoners. Our Embassy in Minsk demonstrates UK solidarity with political prisoners using social media campaigns to highlight ongoing human rights violations, including discrimination based on religion or belief.
By the end of January 2024, over 11.5m tax returns had been submitted for the 2022/23 financial year. Around 97 percent of returns received were online and the majority were processed automatically.
HMRC carries out additional processing work on a small percentage of tax returns. This includes checks, addressing amends made by customers and manually working through returns which are made on paper. This year HMRC is on track to meet targets for processing paper Self Assessment returns which is consistent with previous years.
To ensure taxpayers get support to meet their obligations for filing 23/24 returns, HMRC has recently recruited and trained additional customer service advisors.
Tobacco duty aims to raise revenue and reduce harm to public health by discouraging smoking and raised £10bn in 2022/23. High duty rates, making tobacco less affordable, have helped reduce smoking prevalence with the percentage of adult smokers in the UK reducing from 26% in 2000 to 12% in 2023.
Strong enforcement is essential in tackling the illicit tobacco market and minimising the tax gap. HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) and Border Force published a new illicit tobacco strategy in January 2024, ‘Stubbing Out the Problem)’. This set out the Government’s continued commitment to reduce the trade in illicit tobacco with a focus on reducing demand, and the disruption of organised crime groups behind the illicit tobacco trade.
The strategy is supported by £100 million of new ‘smokefree’ funding over the next 5 years which will boost existing HMRC and Border Force enforcement capability.
HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) publish official statistics relating to measuring tax gaps, which include the estimated annual tax revenue loss from Illicit and non-duty paid tobacco.
The statistics are published annually and the latest figures are set out in Measuring tax gaps 2024 edition: tax gap estimates for 2022 to 2023.
The duty gap for tobacco is estimated at 14.5% of the theoretical tobacco duty liability, or £2.2 billion (£1.7 billion in Excise Duty and £0.5 billion in VAT), in tax year 2022 to 2023.
Under the assumptions used in tobacco costings certified by the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) at Spring Budget 2024, increasing overall tobacco duty rates increases tobacco duty receipts.
Under the assumptions used in tobacco costings certified by the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) at Spring Budget 2024, increasing overall tobacco duty rates increases tobacco duty receipts.
In August 2023 the previous Government introduced reforms to alcohol duty so that products are taxed in proportion to their alcoholic strength, not volume. The reforms aimed to modernise and simplify the system, to prioritise public health and incentivise consumption of lower strength products.
To help the wine industry adapt to the new duty system, the current, temporary duty easement was introduced as a transitional measure, which was intended to allow time for wine producers to adapt to calculating duty based on alcohol by volume.
By the planned end-date of 1 February 2025, the wine industry will have had over two years to adapt to the new strength-based system.
The Financial Conduct Authority and the Prudential Regulation Authority are non-governmental bodies which are independent from the Treasury. The government does not make assessments of their consultations.
The Treasury engages closely and regularly with the regulators on a wide range of issues, including ensuring that effective, proportionate regulation is supporting the government’s mission to drive the growth and international competitiveness of the UK’s financial services sector.
The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) and Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA) are non-governmental bodies which are independent from the Treasury and have broad powers to make rules in order to advance their statutory objectives. The regulators are required by legislation to carry out their general functions, which include rule-making, in a way that advances their competitiveness and growth objectives.
In line with statutory requirements, the FCA and PRA have included in their consultations an explanation of the compatibility of the proposed rules with their duties, including consideration of the competitiveness and growth objectives.
The Government wants to encourage as many people as possible to complete their self assessments online. HMRC therefore asks taxpayers who do not initially opt to complete their return online to call HMRC. This approach allows HMRC to speak to taxpayers to encourage them to file online, or to find out if they need additional support and guidance to do so, before sending them a paper form if needed. The SA100 form is available for download on gov.uk.
The Government’s number one priority is to keep the UK safe. By closing the current gap in advance permissions, the ETA scheme will, for the first time, give us a comprehensive understanding of those intending to travel to the UK and the ability to prevent the travel of those who pose a threat, including those in transit. A blanket exemption to the ETA requirement for passengers transiting UK airside would risk creating a permission-free route of travel into the UK, which we believe could be open to abuse in future. We will however keep this and other aspects of the scheme under review, including looking at other ways these risks might be mitigated.
People who have a vignette or stamp in their passport that shows they have indefinite leave to remain in the UK can also access an eVisa. They do this by making a No Time Limit application which helps us to re-establish their identity so that they can create a UKVI account to access digital evidence of their status. All No Time Limit applicants whose applications are decided before the end of this month will get a BRP which they can use to create a UKVI account and access their eVisa. If their applications are decided after the end of this month, they will not receive a BRP. Instead, applicants will either have an account created for them automatically, or will be advised on steps they need to take to create their UKVI account. Further information on the new process will be available at www.gov.uk/evisa.
Whilst we encourage people who have a vignette or stamp in their passport to transition to an eVisa, they will still be able to prove their rights as they do today, using their physical documents where these are permitted. That will not change at the end of 2024.
However, making the switch to an eVisa and creating a UKVI account will bring a range of benefits. This includes the fact that an eVisa cannot be lost or damaged, like a vignette, and there is no need for a potentially costly replacement.
HMCTS has worked with the judiciary since the disorder in the summer to bring the rioters to justice. As of 3 October, a total of 819 defendants have been received by the courts in connection with public disorder, 493 have had a final outcome, of which 388 received an immediate custodial sentence. Data relating to the cases started in connection with public disorder comes from a bespoke data feed which does not include information on defendant home address and location of the offence. To obtain this information would involve a disproportionate cost as it would involve checking individual case files.
The Ministry of Justice’s response to the Regulation 28 Prevention of Future Deaths report issued on 12 April by the Senior Coroner for Milton Keynes was sent by the Director General of Operations for HM Prison and Probation Service on 15 May 2024.
Section 2 of the Crime (Sentences) Act 1997 (the 1997 Act) introduced a mandatory life sentence for a second serious offence, meaning judges had to impose a life sentence on anyone convicted of a second specified serious offence, unless there were exceptional circumstances.
Although the ‘two-strike’ life sentence and the IPP sentence can be imposed for similar specified offences, unlike the IPP sentence, the ‘two-strike’ life sentence is a life sentence, and offenders will therefore be subject to licence conditions for life if they are released by the Parole Board. The recent changes to the IPP licence, which can be terminated pursuant to section 31A of the 1997 Act, would therefore not align with this life licence.
We will be launching a review of the sentencing framework. The details of this review will be announced in due course.