Asked by: Andy Sawford (Labour (Co-op) - Corby)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what steps he is taking to ensure that obese and overweight patients receive expert advice on weight loss and weight management as early as possible.
Answered by Jane Ellison
The Government remains committed to providing overweight and obese individuals with expert advice, through supporting local public health teams and health professionals with the evidence based tools they need to deliver early support and advice in adopting healthier behaviours and reducing excess weight. We are giving local authorities £8.2 billion ring fenced public health funding over 3 years.
Local authorities, NHS England and clinical commissioning groups are responsible for the commissioning of the obesity care pathway, providing services based on expert guidance from the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE).
Public Health England (PHE) provides tools and support to local authorities to provide evidence based and effective pathways and interventions for overweight and obese individuals to lose weight.
The National Child Measurement Programme and NHS Health Check are national mandatory public health functions which are the responsibility of local authorities. These services enable identification of the overweight and obese; in school aged children at reception and year 6 and for adults aged 40-74 years; and provide access to services.
Asked by: Andy Sawford (Labour (Co-op) - Corby)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, if his Department will take steps to ensure that healthcare practitioners routinely check obese patients for signs of osteoarthritis.
Answered by Jane Ellison
The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence clinical guideline ‘Obesity: Guidance on the prevention, identification, assessment and management of overweight and obesity in adults and children’ published in 2006, makes recommendations on the treatment of obese patients. The guideline outlines that patients who are overweight or obese should be assessed for a number of conditions, including osteoarthritis.
Asked by: Andy Sawford (Labour (Co-op) - Corby)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, if he will take steps to ensure that the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence Guideline Development Group working on the draft partial update to Clinical Guidance 43 on the prevention, identification, assessment and management of overweight and obesity is taking fully into account all published studies in relation to the use of very low calorie diets for weight loss to ensure that in the interests of patient care and NHS expenditure all practical alternatives to bariatric surgery are considered prior to such surgery being offered.
Answered by Jane Ellison
Ministers have had no such discussions.
The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) is an independent body and as such it would be inappropriate for Ministers to intervene. NICE is responsible for the methods used to develop and update its guidance and reviews its published clinical guidelines in order to take account of the latest available evidence.
NICE consulted on its draft updated clinical guideline on the prevention, identification, assessment and management of overweight and obese adults and children in July and August. NICE will take the stakeholder comments from the consultation into account in developing the final guideline, which is currently planned for publication in November.
Asked by: Andy Sawford (Labour (Co-op) - Corby)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what discussions he has had with representatives of the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence on the Guideline Development Group working on the draft partial update to Clinical Guidance 43 on the prevention, identification, assessment and management of overweight and obesity.
Answered by Jane Ellison
Ministers have had no such discussions.
The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) is an independent body and as such it would be inappropriate for Ministers to intervene. NICE is responsible for the methods used to develop and update its guidance and reviews its published clinical guidelines in order to take account of the latest available evidence.
NICE consulted on its draft updated clinical guideline on the prevention, identification, assessment and management of overweight and obese adults and children in July and August. NICE will take the stakeholder comments from the consultation into account in developing the final guideline, which is currently planned for publication in November.
Asked by: Andy Sawford (Labour (Co-op) - Corby)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, what discussions (a) Ministers and (b) officials in his Department have had with counterparts in the Department for Education on his Department's Information Sharing Guidelines and child protection.
Answered by Kris Hopkins
The Government is committed to improving information sharing, for the benefit of vulnerable children and adults, and all members of society. The statutory guidance, Working Together to Safeguarding Children requires all organisations to have arrangements in place which enable the effective sharing of information. Government Departments have been working to review procedures to identify children and adults at risk of abuse and the outcome of this review was published on 29 July and can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/news/working-together-to-safeguard-children-multi-agency-safeguarding-hubs. The Government is reviewing the guidance for practitioners and managers to dispel mistaken beliefs which prevent information being shared appropriately and effectively.
Asked by: Andy Sawford (Labour (Co-op) - Corby)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, when he will update his Department's Information Sharing Guidance.
Answered by Kris Hopkins
The Government is committed to improving information sharing, for the benefit of vulnerable children and adults, and all members of society. The statutory guidance, Working Together to Safeguarding Children requires all organisations to have arrangements in place which enable the effective sharing of information. Government Departments have been working to review procedures to identify children and adults at risk of abuse and the outcome of this review was published on 29 July and can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/news/working-together-to-safeguard-children-multi-agency-safeguarding-hubs. The Government is reviewing the guidance for practitioners and managers to dispel mistaken beliefs which prevent information being shared appropriately and effectively.
Asked by: Andy Sawford (Labour (Co-op) - Corby)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, what assessment he has made of the effectiveness of his Department's Information Sharing Guidelines on providing professionals with information about sharing data in the interests of child protection; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Kris Hopkins
The Government is committed to improving information sharing, for the benefit of vulnerable children and adults, and all members of society. The statutory guidance, Working Together to Safeguarding Children requires all organisations to have arrangements in place which enable the effective sharing of information. Government Departments have been working to review procedures to identify children and adults at risk of abuse and the outcome of this review was published on 29 July and can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/news/working-together-to-safeguard-children-multi-agency-safeguarding-hubs. The Government is reviewing the guidance for practitioners and managers to dispel mistaken beliefs which prevent information being shared appropriately and effectively.
Asked by: Andy Sawford (Labour (Co-op) - Corby)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what proportion of detainees who have escaped from detention or from escort in each of the last four years have been returned to detention.
Answered by James Brokenshire
The proportion of detainees who have escaped from detention or from escort in each of the last four years who have been returned to detention is 37% (7) of 19 detainees. One detainee was not returned to detention but located overseas. Major changes to the estate since 2010 have included the closure of the lower security site at Oakington Reception Centre in November 2010 and increased capacity at the higher security centre at Harmondsworth in July 2010. The management information above has been reached by the examination of individual records. It does not form part of published statistics and is not subject to the detailed checks that apply for National Statistics publications. It is provisional and subject to change.
Asked by: Andy Sawford (Labour (Co-op) - Corby)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many times the Gold Suite has been opened at each Immigration Removal Centre in England and Wales in the last year; and what the nature was of each incident that caused it to be opened.
Answered by Karen Bradley
The Home Office command suite structure for the management of serious
incidents is based on the model operated by the Prison Service. Silver Command
Suites are opened in the establishment where the incident occurred.
A Gold Command Suite is opened in Prison Service Headquarters for incidents
where the Home Office requests mutual assistance from the Prison Service and is
attended by a Home Office senior manager.
Any other serious incident, which does not require mutual assistance but
requires ongoing management, is dealt with by opening a Gold Command Suite at
Detention Operations headquarters.
The number of times Silver Suites have been opened in the past year in
immigration removal centres is detailed in the table below for January 2013
to March 2014 and is provided in line with the data periods for published statistics.
Asked by: Andy Sawford (Labour (Co-op) - Corby)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, how many Immigration Removal Centre detainees have (a) escaped from detention, (b) escaped whilst being escorted and (c) attempted to escape each IRC in the last four years; and how many such people are still at large.
Answered by Karen Bradley
Escapes from immigration removal centres and while under escort are a subset of
published statistics. The following table shows absconds for the financial
years 2010/11-2013/14.
Information on attempted escapes is not held centrally and could only be
provided by examination of individual records at disproportionate cost.
Eleven of those individuals recorded as escaped 2010/11-2013/14 have not been
located.
The police are informed immediately when a detainee has escaped and the
individual's details are recorded on the Police National Computer should the
individual be apprehended at a later date.
People leaving detention by place of last detention, absconded 2010/11-2013/14 (financial year) (1)(2).
Year | Absconded |
2010/2011 | |
Absconded from centre | 5 |
Absconded from escorts | 3 |
Total | 8 |
2011/2012 | |
Absconded from centre | 3 |
Absconded from escorts | 3 |
Total | 6 |
2012/2013 | |
Absconded from centre | 4 |
Absconded from escorts | 1 |
Total | 5 |
2013/2014 | |
Absconded from centre | 0 |
Absconded from escorts | 0 |
Total | 0 |
(1) Data from 2011/12 onwards are provisional.
(2) Total detainees are those detained in the United Kingdom solely under Immigration Act powers and exclude those in police cells, Prison Service establishments, short term holding rooms at ports and airports (for less than 24 hours), and those recorded as detained under both criminal and immigration powers and their dependants.