Asked by: Nadia Whittome (Labour - Nottingham East)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether her Department is taking steps to ensure that security officers and door staff have the right to wear protective clothing including stab vests.
Answered by Damian Hinds - Minister of State (Education)
The Security Industry Authority (SIA) protect the public through the regulation of the private security industry, which includes working with partners to raise standards across the industry as a whole.
However, it is for employers and venues to conduct risk assessments to ensure that staff and personnel working for them are provided with the appropriate equipment to fulfil their role safely and securely. Any assessment and mitigation of risk should include the need for appropriate personal protection equipment.
The SIA signposts to advice produced by the Health and Safety Executive on conducting risk assessments. Particularly in light of Covid, the Government has also published a number of additional guides for those working in a variety of environments. Stipulation of particular Personal Protection Equipment will be assignment-specific, and the responsibility of the employer or venue to be satisfied on.
Asked by: Nadia Whittome (Labour - Nottingham East)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, whether her Department has made an assessment of the potential merits of implementing a fee waiver for Security Industry Authority licences for security officers on a low income.
Answered by Damian Hinds - Minister of State (Education)
The Security Industry Authority’s licence application fee is fixed in accordance with Schedule 1, section 15(1) of the Private Security Industry Act 2001, which states that the SIA should set its application fees at a level suitable to enable full recovery of costs incurred in delivering its activities, without seeking to make profits.
Any variation to waive or vary fees for one cohort would essentially require the SIA to recoup these costs from other applicants or would result in a loss that the taxpayer would subsidise. Some employers and security businesses operate schemes to either pay for the licence fee and/or support their employees to spread repayment of the costs over a longer period of time.
Asked by: Nadia Whittome (Labour - Nottingham East)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps her Department is taking to end the use of prisons for the purpose of immigration detention.
Answered by Tom Pursglove - Minister of State (Minister for Legal Migration and Delivery)
There are no plans to end the limited use of prisons for the purpose of immigration detention.
The Government is committed to a fair and humane immigration policy that welcomes those here legally, but tackles abuse and protects the public. Any foreign national who is convicted of a crime and given a prison sentence is considered for deportation at the earliest opportunity, and since January 2019 we have removed 8,441 foreign national offenders.
Asked by: Nadia Whittome (Labour - Nottingham East)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps her Department is taking to (a) collect data on the increase in pet theft during the covid-19 lockdown and (b) help tackle the increase in that crime.
Answered by Kit Malthouse
The Government is working with the police and others and will consider the evidence and what more could be done to prevent pet theft.
Asked by: Nadia Whittome (Labour - Nottingham East)
Question to the Home Office:
What assessment she has made of the effect on people of the No Recourse to Public Funds condition applied to immigration status.
Answered by Chris Philp - Minister of State (Home Office)
Migrants coming to the UK are expected to maintain and support themselves and their families without posing a burden on the welfare system.
The Home Office has published its policy equality statement on the impact of the No Recourse to Public Funds policy on migrants on the human rights route.
Migrants with leave under certain routes can apply to lift their NRPF condition.