Asked by: Alistair Burt (Conservative - North East Bedfordshire)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, how many local authorities are without a five year housing land supply as a result of the decision to apply the new method of calculating housing need while awaiting the adoption of local plans.
Answered by Kit Malthouse
We are committed to a plan-led system that delivers the homes this country needs, while protecting our precious environment. Up-to-date plans provide a sound basis for assessing land supply, and it is only where plans have become out-of-date that our standard method for assessing housing need is used instead. What this means in practice will depend on the amount of land with permission in each area, the protections that apply and the stage an emerging plan has reached, and so there is no national estimate of the impact. The National Planning Policy Framework protects emerging plans in certain circumstances, even in the absence of a five-year land supply, where a development would significantly undermine the plan.
Asked by: Alistair Burt (Conservative - North East Bedfordshire)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what plans his Department has to allocate funding to IT connectivity for primary care optical practices to ensure safe and efficient referrals to hospital eye departments.
Answered by Seema Kennedy
The Department has no plans to allocate funding to enable IT connectivity between primary care optical practices and hospital eye departments. NHS England is continuing to work with the eye care sector and other key stakeholders on this area of work and will be considering priorities for IT investment later this year.
Asked by: Alistair Burt (Conservative - North East Bedfordshire)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what the level of reserves held by The Caxton Foundation were, prior to their winding up in 2018; and how those reserves were distributed.
Answered by Jackie Doyle-Price
For the cessation period which ended 16 August 2018, closing reserves were £203,657 which was returned to the Department, as the Founder, at close on 16 August 2018, in line with the requirements of the Trust Deed.
The Department has since directly financed the NHS Business Services Authority to administer the England Infected Blood Support Scheme to provide discretionary ex gratia financial assistance, to those individuals who have been shown to be infected or affected, by hepatitis C and HIV throughout the 1980s and 1990s. On 30 April 2019, the Department committed to increase the total amount of financial support for these individuals from £46 million to £75 million.
Asked by: Alistair Burt (Conservative - North East Bedfordshire)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what progress has been made with the Rural Connected Communities Project; and if he will make an assessment of the potential merits of using North East Bedfordshire as a pilot area for that initiative.
Answered by Margot James
The 5G Testbeds and Trials Programme is currently developing proposals for the Rural Connected Communities (RCC) project. This aims to build the business case for 5G, and rural mobile coverage by testing a range of technical solutions and commercial models, building and proving demand through new use cases.
When the application process for the RCC project is open, as a mainly rural area, North East Bedfordshire may wish to submit a bid, subject to the competition’s final eligibility requirements.
Asked by: Alistair Burt (Conservative - North East Bedfordshire)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what proportion of electricity used in England and Wales was generated in the UK in (a) 2017 and (b) 2018.
Answered by Claire Perry
In 2017, of 308.1 TWh electricity used in England and Wales, 293.3 TWh (95.2 per cent) was generated in the UK. This includes electricity used by generators, for pumped storage, losses, and final consumption.
Data for 2018 split by regions of the UK are not yet available. These will be published in December 2019.
Asked by: Alistair Burt (Conservative - North East Bedfordshire)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what proportion of electricity used in England and Wales was imported from Europe via interconnector in (a) 2017 and (b) 2018.
Answered by Kelly Tolhurst
In 2017, of 308.1 TWh electricity used in England and Wales, 14.8 TWh (4.8 per cent) was imported from Europe into the UK via interconnectors. This includes electricity used by generators, for pumped storage, losses, and final consumption.
Data for 2018 split by regions of the UK are not yet available. These will be published in December 2019.
Asked by: Alistair Burt (Conservative - North East Bedfordshire)
Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, when he plans to launch the Rural Gigabit Connectivity programme.
Answered by Margot James
At Budget 2018, £200 million was allocated from the National Productivity Investment Fund for the Rural Gigabit Connectivity programme. This is to start our "Outside-In" approach identified in the Future Telecoms Infrastructure Review, which seeks to ensure that around 10% of UK premises that are not likely to get commercial full fibre coverage by 2033 are addressed at the same pace as the rest of the country.
We will make further announcements on this policy shortly.
Asked by: Alistair Burt (Conservative - North East Bedfordshire)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, how many local authorities in England have 90 per cent of a deliverable five year housing land supply as required by the National Planning Policy Framework.
Answered by Lord Barwell
The National Planning Policy Framework requires local planning authorities to identify a supply of deliverable sites sufficient to provide five years' worth of housing against their housing requirements. We do not hold information centrally on how many authorities have a deliverable five-year housing land supply because the position changes frequently, as it is subject to market conditions.
The Housing White Paper includes a proposal to offer greater certainty to local planning authorities, developers and communities by enabling authorities to consult with key stakeholders and agree their housing land supply with the Planning Inspectorate. This would then be fixed for a one-year period.
Asked by: Alistair Burt (Conservative - North East Bedfordshire)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, how many local authorities in England have a deliverable five year housing land supply as required by the National Planning Policy Framework.
Answered by Lord Barwell
The National Planning Policy Framework requires local planning authorities to identify a supply of deliverable sites sufficient to provide five years' worth of housing against their housing requirements. We do not hold information centrally on how many authorities have a deliverable five-year housing land supply because the position changes frequently, as it is subject to market conditions.
The Housing White Paper includes a proposal to offer greater certainty to local planning authorities, developers and communities by enabling authorities to consult with key stakeholders and agree their housing land supply with the Planning Inspectorate. This would then be fixed for a one-year period.
Asked by: Alistair Burt (Conservative - North East Bedfordshire)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what plans he has to expand health services in North East Bedfordshire to meet growing demand as a result of additional houses being built.
Answered by David Mowat
This information is not held centrally. Decisions regarding the planning of services in a local area are the responsibility of individual clinical commissioning groups.