Asked by: Grant Shapps (Conservative - Welwyn Hatfield)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, if he will make an assessment of the safety implications of failing to renew the UK’s current exemption from Standard European Rules of Air on vertical separation from cloud in Class D airspace for aircraft operating under Visual Flight Rules.
Answered by Michael Ellis
The current exemption was issued by the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) to allow a safe and orderly transition to the requirements of the SERA with effect from 12 September 2019. The CAA is taking the necessary measures to meet the aims of the exemption. The SERA requirement gives effect to the international standard set out in Annex 2 to the Convention on International Civil Aviation and is already safely applied throughout most of the world.
We are aware that the airspace structure in the UK may give rise to some operational complications in respect of complying with the SERA requirement. The Department is working with the CAA to fully understand any safety implications arising from the application of the requirement in the UK, including whether any safeguarding measures are necessary.
Asked by: Grant Shapps (Conservative - Welwyn Hatfield)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what estimate he has made of the number of people working in the public sector that are subject to the 2019 loan charge; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Jesse Norman - Shadow Leader of the House of Commons
Disguised Remuneration (DR) schemes are contrived arrangements that pay loans in place of ordinary remuneration, with the sole purpose of avoiding income tax and National Insurance contributions. The loans are provided on terms that mean they are not repaid in practice, so they are no different to normal income and are, and always have been, taxable.
The Government estimates that around 50,000 individuals could be affected by the 2019 loan charge. Further information on who the charge affects can be found at page 17 of HM Treasury’s report on time limits and the charge on disguised remuneration loans:
This shows, for example, that 65% of the DR user population worked in business services, and only 3% worked in medical or education services.
Asked by: Grant Shapps (Conservative - Welwyn Hatfield)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what steps he is taking to ensure that single mothers receive adequate support and advice in the family courts division.
Answered by Paul Maynard
Access to justice is a fundamental right. We spent £1.6bn last year on legal aid for the most vulnerable – of which £545m was in family law.
Legal aid is also part of a bigger picture and so we are now making changes to enhance the breadth of legal support available for everyone in society.
The Legal Support Action Plan, published on 7 February, announced that we would be changing the legal aid eligibility criteria to provide non-means tested legal aid for parents, or those with parental responsibility, who wish to oppose applications for placement orders or adoption orders in public family law. In addition, we announced that we will doubling the department’s funding to the Litigants in Person Support Strategy to £3m for the next two years.
Asked by: Grant Shapps (Conservative - Welwyn Hatfield)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to the NHS Long Term Plan, what funding his Department plans to allocate to end of life care.
Answered by Caroline Dinenage
As with the vast majority of NHS services, the funding and commissioning of palliative and end of life care is a local matter, over which individual National Health Service commissioners have responsibility. Local commissioners are best placed to understand the needs of local populations and commission services to meet those needs accordingly.
The NHS Long Term Plan, sets out significant investment and activity to improve the quality of patient care and health outcomes, including for end of life care. This includes £4.5 billion of new investment to fund expanded community multidisciplinary teams aligned with new primary care networks. Based on individual needs and choices, people identified as having the greatest risks and needs will be offered targeted support for both their physical and mental health needs, helping them to maintain independence and avoid unnecessary hospital admissions. This includes patients approaching the end of life.
Asked by: Grant Shapps (Conservative - Welwyn Hatfield)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether the Government has plans to improve animal rights after the UK leaves the EU.
Answered by David Rutley
We will maintain and enhance our high animal welfare standards as we leave the EU.
We recently laid legislation to ban travelling circuses from using wild animals and to tackle puppy farming by ending third party sales. We have made CCTV mandatory in slaughterhouses and are introducing one of the world’s toughest bans on ivory sales to protect elephants from poaching. Each of these measures goes further than EU rules require.
Asked by: Grant Shapps (Conservative - Welwyn Hatfield)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what steps his Department is taking to encourage more young people to become magistrates.
Answered by Paul Maynard
We are taking a number of steps to encourage younger people to join the magistracy, including through the use of social media to advertise recruitment campaigns and collaborative work with Universities and employers, providing talks and information to raise the profile of the role amongst a younger audience.
Asked by: Grant Shapps (Conservative - Welwyn Hatfield)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what assessment he has made of the effect on the availability of business premises of permitted development rules allowing offices to be converted into housing.
Answered by Kit Malthouse
The permitted development right for the change of use from office to residential is making an important contribution to the delivery of new homes across the country. In the three years to March 2018, over 42,000 homes to buy or to rent have been delivered under the right.
Where it is felt that it is necessary to protect the local amenity or wellbeing of an area, the local planning authority can consult the local community on removing a permitted development right by making an Article 4 direction. This requires that a planning application must be submitted which the local planning authority can determine in accordance with its local plan.
Asked by: Grant Shapps (Conservative - Welwyn Hatfield)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what steps he is taking to increase the number of women members of the judiciary.
Answered by Edward Argar - Shadow Secretary of State for Health and Social Care
The proportion of female court judges has increased by 5 percentage points since 2014, to 29% as at 1 April 2018, and for tribunal judges it has increased by 3 percentage points to 46%, over the same period.
We recognise that more progress is required and the Ministry of Justice has jointly developed and is funding the pre-application judicial education programme (PAJE), which launched on 24 April 2019. This will support and encourage lawyers interested in a judicial career and targets underrepresented groups including women, to help them prepare for a judicial career.
The MoJ continues to work closely with the Lord Chief Justice, Chair of the Judicial Appointments Commission and other members of the Judicial Diversity Forum, including the three legal professions, to implement its multi stranded plan to increase judicial diversity.
Asked by: Grant Shapps (Conservative - Welwyn Hatfield)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many members of the judicial bench in the family division are women.
Answered by Edward Argar - Shadow Secretary of State for Health and Social Care
As of 1 April 2018, 58 judges appointed to the family division were women. This amounts to 48% of the total number of judges in the family division.
Asked by: Grant Shapps (Conservative - Welwyn Hatfield)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what guidance his Department provides to aerodromes on the implementation of GPS approaches.
Answered by Jesse Norman - Shadow Leader of the House of Commons
Global Navigation Satellite System approaches need to be approved by the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA). The CAA will provide guidance to aerodromes that are considering the implementation of such approaches. In particular the CAA has produced a framework for the safety cases which need to be produced as part of the approval process.