Asked by: Deidre Brock (Scottish National Party - Edinburgh North and Leith)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how long the vanguard-class submarines have been on patrol at sea on average in each of the last 10 years.
Answered by Leo Docherty - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence) (Minister for the Armed Forces)
The Royal Navy has successfully maintained Operation RELENTLESS, the Continuous At Sea Deterrent, for an unbroken 55 years. We do not disclose details of the Operation, including the duration of time spent at sea, as such information could be used to undermine the security and capability of the mission and our personnel.
Asked by: Deidre Brock (Scottish National Party - Edinburgh North and Leith)
Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:
To ask the Minister of State, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, if he will make the latest Joint Analysis of Conflict and Stability assessment for Ethiopia available to Parliament.
Answered by Andrew Mitchell - Minister of State (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office) (Minister for Development)
The Joint Analysis of Conflict and Stability (JACS) report is an internal document and not intended for publication.
Asked by: Deidre Brock (Scottish National Party - Edinburgh North and Leith)
Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:
To ask the Minister of State, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, what steps his Department is taking to help tackle famine in Tigray.
Answered by Andrew Mitchell - Minister of State (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office) (Minister for Development)
Across Tigray and other parts of northern Ethiopia, El Nino has caused drought that is affecting 4 million people. According to assessments from the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, nearly 1.4 million people in Tigray will need immediate emergency food assistance because of drought. I witnessed firsthand the effects of this during my visit in February 2024. In response, I announced an additional £100 million to fund our Ending Preventable Deaths Programme, which will target three million people across Ethiopia including those who are most at risk in the northern regions. The UK also co-hosted a donor conference in Geneva on 16 April and successfully raised £610 million to meet humanitarian needs in Ethiopia.
Asked by: Deidre Brock (Scottish National Party - Edinburgh North and Leith)
Question to the Ministry of Defence:
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, how many nuclear site events there were at (a) Coulport and (b) Faslane in the last 12 months.
Answered by James Cartlidge - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence)
The table below provides the number of Nuclear Site Event Reports (NSERs) at Coulport and Faslane recorded between January 2023 to April 2024. These are shown according to their categorisation using criteria agreed locally in 2015.
Nuclear Site Events- 2023 | Category A | Category B | Category C | Category D | Below Scale |
Coulport | 0 | 0 | 4 | 17 | 6 |
Faslane | 1 | 4 | 12 | 37 | 77 |
Nuclear Site Events- 2024 | Category A | Category B | Category C | Category D | Below Scale |
Coulport | 0 | 0 | 5 | 7 | 0 |
Faslane | 0 | 1 | 2 | 5 | 2 |
In line with Industry Good Practice and in common with other defence and civil nuclear sites, His Majesty’s Naval Base Clyde has a well-established system for raising NSERs.
NSERs are raised to foster a robust safety culture that learns from experience, whether that is equipment failures, human error, procedural failings, documentation shortcoming or near-misses.
The safety significance of all reported events remains low and are below Level 1, the lowest of the seven-point Internal Nuclear and Radiological Event Scale (INES).
None of the events caused harm to the health of any member of staff on the Naval Base or to any member of the public or have resulted in any radiological impact to the environment.
Asked by: Deidre Brock (Scottish National Party - Edinburgh North and Leith)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what assessment he has made of the strength of the Union.
Answered by Felicity Buchan - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities)
The Union is strong. The United Kingdom is one of the world’s most successful political and economic unions. When we work together as one United Kingdom, we are safer, stronger and more prosperous.
Asked by: Deidre Brock (Scottish National Party - Edinburgh North and Leith)
Question
To ask the Minister for Women and Equalities, if she will have discussions with the Secretary of State for the Home Department on the potential impact of the increased Minimum Income Requirement on (a) women and (b) people belonging to specific ethnicities.
Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)
The Minister for Women and Equalities wrote to all Government departments in December last year reminding them of their statutory duty to comply with the Public Sector Equality Duty when shaping policy and delivering services. The duty requires public authorities to ensure that equality issues are actively considered in order to remove or minimise disadvantage. As part of the Equality Act 2010, the Public Sector Equality Duty includes the protected characteristics of sex and race.
To assist departments' compliance with the duty, the Minister for Women and Equalities provided updated Public Sector Equality Duty guidance.
Asked by: Deidre Brock (Scottish National Party - Edinburgh North and Leith)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, with reference to the Migration Advisory Committee’s Rapid review of the Immigration Salary List, published on 23 February 2024, for what reason his Department has not implemented the recommendation on the use of the Immigration Salary List beyond the skilled worker route for asylum seekers.
Answered by Tom Pursglove - Minister of State (Minister for Legal Migration and Delivery)
Replacing the Shortage Occupation List with the new Immigration Salary List will maintain the important principles that underpin our approach to permission to work and is in line with wider changes to the Immigration Rules.
Unrestricted access to employment could act as an incentive for more migrants to choose to come here illegally, with many making dangerous journeys across the Channel and supporting the business model of evil people smugglers, rather than claim asylum in the first safe country they reach.
The Government considers it important to distinguish between those who need protection and those seeking to work here who can apply for a work visa under the Immigration Rules. Aligning asylum seekers’ permission to work with the Skilled Worker route could undermine the legal routes for those seeking to work in the UK.
Asked by: Deidre Brock (Scottish National Party - Edinburgh North and Leith)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, if he will make an assessment of the potential impact of replacing the Shortage Occupation List with the Immigration Salary List on employment opportunities for asylum seekers who are eligible to work.
Answered by Tom Pursglove - Minister of State (Minister for Legal Migration and Delivery)
The Home Secretary commissioned the independent Migration Advisory Committee (MAC) to carry out a rapid review of the new Immigration Salary List (ISL) ahead of the Spring Immigration Rules. Appendix Immigration Salary List can be found in the Statement of Changes to the Immigration Rules: HC 590, published on 14 March 2024. We will keep the list under review and the MAC will carry out a fuller review later in the year.
Replacing the new ISL will maintain the important principles that underpin our approach to permission to work by an individual’s asylum claim still being outstanding for 12 months or more, through no fault of their own. This includes the need to avoid creating perverse incentives for people to make dangerous journeys to the UK and to not undercut the resident labour market.
Asked by: Deidre Brock (Scottish National Party - Edinburgh North and Leith)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, with reference to his Oral Statement of 4 December 2023 on Legal Migration, Official Report, column 41, and the report by the Migration Observatory entitled Family fortunes: The UK’s new income requirement for partner visas, published on 1 February 2024, whether he has had discussions with Cabinet colleagues on the potential impact of the increased Minimum Income Requirement on (a) women and (b) people belonging to specific ethnicities.
Answered by Tom Pursglove - Minister of State (Minister for Legal Migration and Delivery)
Any discussions that take place between Cabinet Ministers are confidential.
A full regulatory Impact Assessment will be developed, and the Government will publish an Equality Impact Assessment on this change, and both will be published in due course. We will continue to monitor the policy throughout its implementation.
Asked by: Deidre Brock (Scottish National Party - Edinburgh North and Leith)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, with reference to his Oral Statement of 4 December 2023 on Legal Migration, Official Report, column 41, whether he has made an assessment of the potential impact of the increase to the minimum income requirement on (a) equality of opportunity and (b) reducing negative disparities.
Answered by Tom Pursglove - Minister of State (Minister for Legal Migration and Delivery)
Any discussions that take place between Cabinet Ministers are confidential.
A full regulatory Impact Assessment will be developed, and the Government will publish an Equality Impact Assessment on this change, and both will be published in due course. We will continue to monitor the policy throughout its implementation.