Asked by: Danny Kinahan (Ulster Unionist Party - South Antrim)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how contribution in lieu of council tax is calculated for service personnel stationed in Northern Ireland.
Answered by Lord Lancaster of Kimbolton
Service Families Accommodation and Single Living Accommodation for Service personnel in England, Scotland and Wales is formally exempt from the Council Tax regime and the Ministry of Defence (MOD) instead pays a Contribution in Lieu of Council Tax (CILOCT) to local authorities, broadly equivalent to the amount of Council Tax that would otherwise be due. The average contribution, determined by the type of property occupied, is then recovered from Service occupants with their accommodation charge. The levels of CILOCT charge applied to personnel living in Northern Ireland ensure consistency of charging with the same type of accommodation within the United Kingdom. The MOD pays the applicable rates in Northern Ireland.
Information on the amount of CILOCT that Service personnel living in Northern Ireland have paid in each year since 2011 is not held centrally and could be provided only at disproportionate cost.
Asked by: Danny Kinahan (Ulster Unionist Party - South Antrim)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how much service personnel in Northern Ireland have paid as a contribution in lieu of council tax in each year since 2011.
Answered by Lord Lancaster of Kimbolton
Service Families Accommodation and Single Living Accommodation for Service personnel in England, Scotland and Wales is formally exempt from the Council Tax regime and the Ministry of Defence (MOD) instead pays a Contribution in Lieu of Council Tax (CILOCT) to local authorities, broadly equivalent to the amount of Council Tax that would otherwise be due. The average contribution, determined by the type of property occupied, is then recovered from Service occupants with their accommodation charge. The levels of CILOCT charge applied to personnel living in Northern Ireland ensure consistency of charging with the same type of accommodation within the United Kingdom. The MOD pays the applicable rates in Northern Ireland.
Information on the amount of CILOCT that Service personnel living in Northern Ireland have paid in each year since 2011 is not held centrally and could be provided only at disproportionate cost.
Asked by: Danny Kinahan (Ulster Unionist Party - South Antrim)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, if she will make it her policy to introduce the bottle deposit return system proposed by Surfers Against Sewage.
Answered by Thérèse Coffey
There are currently no plans to introduce a deposit return system. We will continue to review new evidence regarding such schemes.
Asked by: Danny Kinahan (Ulster Unionist Party - South Antrim)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how much funding the Capita-led consortium receives from the public purse to manage the defence estate annually.
Answered by Lord Lancaster of Kimbolton
The Capita-led consortium (known as the Strategic Business Partner (SBP)) is responsible for leading and managing the Defence Infrastructure Organisation (DIO), the business unit within the Ministry of Defence that manages the majority of the defence estate.
As set out in the NAO Report "Delivering the defence estate" dated 15 November 2016, fees payable to the SBP for the period June 2014 to July 2016 totalled £90.2 million as follows:
2014-15 £33.3 million
2015-16 £55.2 million
2016-17 £1.7 million
Total £90.2 million
In the period to 30 September 2016 further fees of £7.3 million have become payable. The majority of the fees payable to the SBP are based on them delivering savings to the MOD that can be reinvested in Defence.
As the SBP is incentivised to achieve savings in the delivery of DIO's outputs and the fee payable in future years is, therefore, dependent on the level of savings delivered.
Asked by: Danny Kinahan (Ulster Unionist Party - South Antrim)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of the effectiveness of the presumption against closure of rural schools in England contained in the Education and Inspections Act 2006; and what assessment she has made of the effect of that provision on rural communities.
Answered by Nick Gibb
The Government recognises the importance of rural schools and the need to maintain access to a local school in rural areas. Often these schools are at the heart of their community. This is why the Government is supportive of the presumption against closing rural maintained schools. The Government is also introducing a new ‘double lock’ to provide additional protection against the closure of rural academies, to ensure that both local authorities and the Department for Education have a role in such closures.
The Government has committed £7 billion to create new school places between 2015 and 2021, in addition to our investment in 500 new free schools, to support LAs in meeting this duty.
Asked by: Danny Kinahan (Ulster Unionist Party - South Antrim)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, if she will ensure that her Department includes an extension to Northern Ireland of a pardon for gay and bisexual men convicted under now abolished offences and seeks a Legislative Consent Motion on this matter from the Northern Ireland Assembly.
Answered by Phillip Lee
I am proud that the Government is delivering its manifesto commitment to posthumously pardon gay and bisexual men convicted of now abolished sex offences. We are also going further and pardoning living individuals who have had their historical convictions deleted through the Home Office disregard process.
Lord Sharkey’s amendments to the Policing and Crime Bill on this issue extend to England and Wales only.
It is an established principle that the UK Parliament only legislates on devolved matters in Northern Ireland with the consent of the Northern Ireland Assembly. My officials are in preliminary discussions with the Northern Ireland Department of Justice regarding this.
Asked by: Danny Kinahan (Ulster Unionist Party - South Antrim)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps she is taking to ensure that social media activity by terrorist groups both within the UK and abroad is effectively monitored.
Answered by Ben Wallace
This Government takes extremely seriously the threat from those that post online terrorist and extremist material.
In the UK, our dedicated police Counter Terrorism Internet Referral Unit (CTIRU) proactively identifies and refers online terrorist and extremist content to communication service providers for removal. Since its inception in February 2010, CTIRU has secured the removal of more than 220,000 pieces of terrorist-related content. Its work has a global impact as content is removed by industry from their social media platforms world-wide.
Internationally, the UK assisted in the establishment of the European Internet Referrals Unit (EUIRU) which replicates the UK model at European level and services all Member States. The Unit went live on 1 July 2015 and has focused on a broad range of non-English language content, including Arabic, French and German. Since its creation, the EUIRU has secured the removal of over 12,000 pieces of terrorist-related content.
Asked by: Danny Kinahan (Ulster Unionist Party - South Antrim)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what steps he has taken to monitor (a) staffing levels and (b) training of Royal Naval Reservists.
Answered by Lord Lancaster of Kimbolton
Commander Maritime Reserves continually plans and monitors current manning levels as detailed in Future Reserves 2020.
Royal Naval Reserves training is delivered by both Regular and Reserves personnel across a variety of locations around the UK and overseas. Training quality and consistency is achieved through audits and inspections conducted by internal and external organisations. In addition, training is subject to an internal feedback system from students and training documentation is reviewed on a three yearly cycle. Instructors are also assessed annually to ensure currency of training.
Asked by: Danny Kinahan (Ulster Unionist Party - South Antrim)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what estimate he has made of Royal Navy staffing levels.
Answered by Lord Lancaster of Kimbolton
The 2015 Strategic Defence and Security Review made clear that the Royal Navy (RN) and Royal Marines (RM) will increase in numbers with a 2020 target strength of 30,450. With regard to current staffing levels, the RN and RM Monthly Personnel Situation Report provides information on the number of RN and RM personnel joining and leaving the Regular Service. These can be found at:
www.gov.uk/government/statistics/royal-navy-and-royal-marines-monthly-personnel-statistics-2016
Asked by: Danny Kinahan (Ulster Unionist Party - South Antrim)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will take steps to guarantee to match any EU funding lost to universities and colleges.
Answered by Lord Johnson of Marylebone
University researchers can continue to bid for competitive EU research funding while we remain a member of the EU. We will work with the Commission to ensure payment when funds are awarded. HM Treasury will underwrite the payment of such awards, even when specific projects continue beyond the UK’s departure from the EU. Further details about Government safeguarding funding can be found in the statement Jo Johnson made on 13 August: https://www.gov.uk/government/news/safeguarding-funding-for-research-and-innovation