Asked by: Lord Trefgarne (Conservative - Excepted Hereditary)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask Her Majesty's Government, further to the reply by Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon on 12 January (HL Deb, col 1083), whether they have anything further to add about whether one of the UK's Trident submarines is always on patrol.
Answered by Baroness Goldie
Since April 1969, there has always been at least one Royal Navy nuclear-armed submarine at sea keeping us safe from the most extreme threats to our national security and way of life. We will maintain four deterrent submarines to ensure at least one will always be on a Continuous At Sea Deterrence patrol.
Asked by: Lord Trefgarne (Conservative - Excepted Hereditary)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they are satisfied with the law which authorises statutory authorities to obstruct the highway for the purposes of repair and maintenance.
Answered by Baroness Vere of Norbiton - Parliamentary Secretary (HM Treasury)
Utility street works and highway authority road works, are carried out within the framework of legislation set by New Roads and Street Works Act 1991 and the Traffic Management Act 2004. The overall framework balances the need to ensure the essential repair and maintenance of roads, whilst reducing the disruption that such works can cause.
We have, in recent years, continued to improve the framework of secondary legislation and we have approved lane rental schemes, which allow local authorities to charge for works on the busiest roads at the busiest times to reduce congestion. We have also introduced the Street Manager digital service, which is now used by all local highway authorities and utility companies in England to plan and manage works, providing real time, open data on live and planned works.
Asked by: Lord Trefgarne (Conservative - Excepted Hereditary)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask Her Majesty's Government when they expect Hammersmith Bridge to be re-opened to vehicular traffic.
Answered by Baroness Vere of Norbiton - Parliamentary Secretary (HM Treasury)
Hammersmith Bridge is owned by the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham (LBHF) and therefore responsibility for maintaining the bridge, and making decisions on its repair, lies with the borough.
The Government has set out a clear commitment to support LBHF in finding a long-term solution for the bridge. As agreed in the Transport for London Extraordinary Funding and Finance agreement of 1 June 2021, the Government will contribute up to 1/3 of the total costs, but no more.
The next step to permanent reopening to motor vehicles lies with LBHF, which must submit a satisfactory business case to the Department for Transport. The submission of such a case is a condition for the release of any Government contribution to the cost of repairing the bridge. As the asset owner, it is up to LBHF to take the decision on its preferred engineering solution. The timeline of the project is dependent on the solutions chosen by LBHF.
Asked by: Lord Trefgarne (Conservative - Excepted Hereditary)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask Her Majesty's Government how many fixed penalty notices have been issued under powers granted by orders made under the Coronavirus Act 2020.
Answered by Baroness Williams of Trafford - Captain of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms (HM Household) (Chief Whip, House of Lords)
Data on the number of fixed penalty notices (FPNs) issued under the new emergency COVID-19 health regulations, are published by the NPCC on a fortnightly basis and can be found on the National Police Chiefs' Council website.
The NPCC release provides information about FPNs issued by police forces in England and Wales, the British Transport Police and the Ministry of Defence Police.
Policing is a devolved matter and FPNs issued by Police Scotland and Police Service Northern Ireland are reported separately by the respective forces.
Asked by: Lord Trefgarne (Conservative - Excepted Hereditary)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what estimate they have made of the cost of a single standard class rail ticket from London to Birmingham when HS2 opens.
Answered by Baroness Vere of Norbiton - Parliamentary Secretary (HM Treasury)
A decision has not been taken on how fares will be set for High Speed 2 (HS2) at this stage. The business case for HS2 is based on the assumption that fares will be the same as the average for comparable services on the existing network.
Asked by: Lord Trefgarne (Conservative - Excepted Hereditary)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what plans they have to propose amendments to the provision of the Civil Partnership, Marriages and Deaths (Registration etc) Act 2019 as they relate to the issue of marriage certificates by churches immediately following the ceremony in question.
Answered by Baroness Williams of Trafford - Captain of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms (HM Household) (Chief Whip, House of Lords)
The General Register Office (GRO) is currently working on the secondary legislation, IT systems and administrative processes that are required to implement the marriage schedule system, which includes the issue of certificates following a ceremony.
GRO continues to engage interested stakeholders on these matters, including the Church of England and Church in Wales.
Asked by: Lord Trefgarne (Conservative - Excepted Hereditary)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what plans they have, if any, for the now-closed hospital at Broadmoor; and where the former patients are now held.
Answered by Baroness Blackwood of North Oxford
Broadmoor Hospital is owned by West London NHS Trust. In December 2019, the Broadmoor Hospital moved from the predominantly Victorian buildings, which were no longer compatible with modern clinical standards, into a state-of-the-art facility. This provides purpose built accommodation to ensure a safe, therapeutic environment for the care, treatment and rehabilitation of patients who need high-secure psychiatric care. All the former patients have been moved this new facility on the same site.
The Department encourages the National Health Service to sell land when it is not in use and the NHS locally deem it no longer needed for clinical purposes. Broadmoor Hospital was declared surplus in April 2012 and is recorded in the NHS Surplus Land annual collection. The surplus land area is 16.86 hectares containing listed buildings and is expected to be disposed of in April 2022.
The Trust is looking to dispose the former hospital in a sensitive way that accounts for the complex planning and environmental aspects of the site, in line with official NHS guidance.
Asked by: Lord Trefgarne (Conservative - Excepted Hereditary)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what estimate they have made of the number of homeless people sleeping rough in the Greater London area during the recent Christmas period; and of those, how many they estimate to be ex-service personnel.
Answered by Viscount Younger of Leckie - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Government does not collect this information centrally. The annual rough sleeping snapshot for 2019 will be released on 27 February 2020. In addition, the Greater London Authority will release their CHAIN data on 31 January 2020, which will provide details on people seen sleeping rough in Greater London in September - December 2019, including details on ex-service personnel.
The Government has allocated over £1.2 billion through to 2020 to tackle all forms of homelessness. In London this includes:
Asked by: Lord Trefgarne (Conservative - Excepted Hereditary)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask Her Majesty's Government when they expect the first of the new Dreadnought-class submarines to go to sea; and when they expect it to go into service.
Answered by Baroness Goldie
The first Dreadnought Class ballistic missile submarine will enter service in the early 2030s, as set out most recently in the eighth Annual Update to Parliament on the United Kingdom's Future Nuclear Deterrent, published on 20 December 2019.
Asked by: Lord Trefgarne (Conservative - Excepted Hereditary)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what consideration they have given to re-employing recently retired police officers as part of their plans to increase the number of such officers by 20,000.
Answered by Baroness Williams of Trafford - Captain of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms (HM Household) (Chief Whip, House of Lords)
The Home Office is working with the National Police Chiefs’ Council and the College of Policing to support successful recruitment in all forces, to meet the Government’s commitment to increase the number of police officers by an additional 20,000 over the next three years. This work includes attracting former officers who may wish to re-join following resignation or retirement, as well as maximising opportunities to retain those who have important skills and policing experience.