Asked by: Nick Timothy (Conservative - West Suffolk)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether he plans to publish new guidance on the exemption process for indirect sales of non-household waste under the Extended Producer Responsibility scheme before fees are calculated for the year starting in April 2025.
Answered by Mary Creagh - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Since Autumn 2024, the Government has been working with stakeholders to consider potential future amendments to the definition of household packaging, which includes the exemption process for indirect sales of non-household waste under the pEPR scheme. The Government will provide an update on progress made and next steps shortly.
Asked by: Nick Timothy (Conservative - West Suffolk)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment he has made of the potential impact of the Extended Producer Responsibility fees being (a) illustrative and (b) not intended for business planning purposes on the ability of business to plan for these costs.
Answered by Mary Creagh - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The four UK administrations have published three sets of illustrative base fees to help businesses prepare for the implementation of extended producer responsibility scheme for packaging. Thanks to regular engagement and input with a wide range of businesses for the first time we published the third set of illustrative fees showed point estimates as opposed to ranges, providing further certainty.
Large producers are required to submit the next round of 2024 data by 1 April 2025 to ensure the fees are based on accurate data, following this and pending satisfactory regulatory checks, we intend to use these data to publish pEPR base fees by June 2025.
PackUK will continue to monitor the expected base fees as more packaging data is submitted for 2024, and will release a new set of illustrative base fees before June if there are significant changes.
Asked by: Nick Timothy (Conservative - West Suffolk)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether he has taken steps to promote material substitution, in the context of (a) recent trends in the level of Extended Producer Responsibility Fees and (b) the introduction of a deposit return scheme for other drink materials from 2027.
Answered by Mary Creagh - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The Government is committed to transitioning to a circular economy. The packaging reforms increase producers’ roles in supporting this transition. Packaging EPR will make producers, rather than taxpayers, responsible for the costs of managing their packaging, reducing the amount of packaging used by producers and incentivising recyclable and reusable alternatives.
In line with previous consultations, and the regulations, Packaging EPR base fees in year 1 are designed to reflect the cost of managing packaging waste. From year 2 fees will include modulation to incentivise more environmentally sustainable packaging, initially focussing on recyclability. I
DRS in England, Northern Ireland and Scotland will include single-use drinks containers from 150ml to 3 litres. Materials included are polyethylene terephthalate (PET) plastic, steel, and aluminium drink containers. A DRS will create a separate cleaner, closed-loop waste stream which will mean plastic and metal drinks containers can be turned back into new drinks containers, reducing the reliance on virgin materials. The scheme has not been designed to encourage material switching.
Asked by: Nick Timothy (Conservative - West Suffolk)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, with reference to the report packaging data system for extended producer responsibility, what assessment his Department has made of the reasons for which there has been a decline in glass volumes in the first six months of 2024.
Answered by Mary Creagh - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The 2024 pEPR impact assessment assessed the impact of introducing the pEPR scheme on packaging producers as a whole. The illustrative base fees use packaging tonnage data submitted to date by producers on the Report Packaging Data (RPD) online portal for the first six months of 2024. We continue to monitor all data submitted by producers on the RPD portal and will publish an update to the illustrative base fees if the estimates significantly change. We do not have enough of a time series to identify reasons for, or impact on the policy on Placed On Market tonnages. We aim to calculate final fees in June, following regulator checks of the data.
Asked by: Nick Timothy (Conservative - West Suffolk)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many domestically trained applicants were rejected for residency positions with NHS providers in each year since 2020.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The decision to remove the Resident Labour Market Test for doctors in 2020 has meant that more international medical graduates have also been able to apply for speciality training places, increasing the number of candidates for roles.
Residencies, or speciality training positions, are advertised nationally, and the process is administered by a lead deanery on behalf of the four nations of the United Kingdom. There is no obligation on National Health Service providers to advertise residency positions for British nationals before foreign nationals, or to hire British residents before overseas residents. The rules and criteria for recruitment into higher specialty training are agreed by the Medical and Dental Recruitment and Selection committees on behalf of the four statutory education bodies of the UK and must meet standards required by the General Medical Council. Working with NHS England, we continue to keep the selection process for all applicants to medical speciality training under review.
Data provided by NHS England shows that in 2024, 14,620 graduates from UK medical schools applied for medical specialty training posts. Of these 1,299 were unsuccessful or unappointable in any of their applications as individuals can make multiple applications. A further 1,476 UK graduates were deemed appointable at interview but did not receive any offers due to post availability.
Information on medical specialty recruitment in 2021, 2022 and 2023 is published by NHS England. This includes information for each individual medical specialty programme on the number of applications made, the number of appointable applicants, the number of offers made and the number of accepted roles. The information is available by nationality group and country of qualification. The published data does not present this information across all specialties together as presented for the 2024 round. The information is available at the following link:
Asked by: Nick Timothy (Conservative - West Suffolk)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether NHS providers are obligated to (a) advertise residency positions for British nationals before foreign nationals and (b) hire British residents before overseas residents.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The decision to remove the Resident Labour Market Test for doctors in 2020 has meant that more international medical graduates have also been able to apply for speciality training places, increasing the number of candidates for roles.
Residencies, or speciality training positions, are advertised nationally, and the process is administered by a lead deanery on behalf of the four nations of the United Kingdom. There is no obligation on National Health Service providers to advertise residency positions for British nationals before foreign nationals, or to hire British residents before overseas residents. The rules and criteria for recruitment into higher specialty training are agreed by the Medical and Dental Recruitment and Selection committees on behalf of the four statutory education bodies of the UK and must meet standards required by the General Medical Council. Working with NHS England, we continue to keep the selection process for all applicants to medical speciality training under review.
Data provided by NHS England shows that in 2024, 14,620 graduates from UK medical schools applied for medical specialty training posts. Of these 1,299 were unsuccessful or unappointable in any of their applications as individuals can make multiple applications. A further 1,476 UK graduates were deemed appointable at interview but did not receive any offers due to post availability.
Information on medical specialty recruitment in 2021, 2022 and 2023 is published by NHS England. This includes information for each individual medical specialty programme on the number of applications made, the number of appointable applicants, the number of offers made and the number of accepted roles. The information is available by nationality group and country of qualification. The published data does not present this information across all specialties together as presented for the 2024 round. The information is available at the following link:
Asked by: Nick Timothy (Conservative - West Suffolk)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how the career experience of British nationals and foreign nationals are compared when NHS providers are considering residency applications.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The decision to remove the Resident Labour Market Test for doctors in 2020 has meant that more international medical graduates have also been able to apply for speciality training places, increasing the number of candidates for roles.
Residencies, or speciality training positions, are advertised nationally, and the process is administered by a lead deanery on behalf of the four nations of the United Kingdom. There is no obligation on National Health Service providers to advertise residency positions for British nationals before foreign nationals, or to hire British residents before overseas residents. The rules and criteria for recruitment into higher specialty training are agreed by the Medical and Dental Recruitment and Selection committees on behalf of the four statutory education bodies of the UK and must meet standards required by the General Medical Council. Working with NHS England, we continue to keep the selection process for all applicants to medical speciality training under review.
Data provided by NHS England shows that in 2024, 14,620 graduates from UK medical schools applied for medical specialty training posts. Of these 1,299 were unsuccessful or unappointable in any of their applications as individuals can make multiple applications. A further 1,476 UK graduates were deemed appointable at interview but did not receive any offers due to post availability.
Information on medical specialty recruitment in 2021, 2022 and 2023 is published by NHS England. This includes information for each individual medical specialty programme on the number of applications made, the number of appointable applicants, the number of offers made and the number of accepted roles. The information is available by nationality group and country of qualification. The published data does not present this information across all specialties together as presented for the 2024 round. The information is available at the following link:
Asked by: Nick Timothy (Conservative - West Suffolk)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will list (a) ambulance substations and (b) the number of ambulances permanently located in the East of England in (i) January 2025 and (ii) February 2025.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The information requested is not held centrally. The location of ambulance stations is held locally by ambulance services. The East of England Ambulance Service NHS Trust publishes a list of ambulance stations on its website, which is available at the following link:
https://www.eastamb.nhs.uk/join-the-team/working-for-us/EEAST-station-list
The East of England Ambulance Service NHS Trust has reported that it provides services through 577 ambulances.
Asked by: Nick Timothy (Conservative - West Suffolk)
Question to the Department for Energy Security & Net Zero:
To ask the Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero, what assessment his Department has made of the potential impact of reduced energy imports from Norway on energy prices in the UK.
Answered by Miatta Fahnbulleh - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Energy Security and Net Zero)
Great Britain has a secure and diverse energy system, which has delivered reliable energy supplies this winter and over recent years, despite challenging global conditions. This includes the UK’s homegrown energy from renewables and nuclear.
The UK imports gas through pipelines with Norway and mainland Europe and from the global market via Liquefied Natural Gas ports, and have ten operational electricity interconnectors with Europe. Our mission to make Britain a clean energy superpower provide energy security in the long term and help protect billpayers from global markets.
Asked by: Nick Timothy (Conservative - West Suffolk)
Question to the Department for Energy Security & Net Zero:
To ask the Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero, what discussions (a) Ministers, (b) advisors and (c) officials in his Department have had with the Office for Nuclear Regulation on Small Modular Reactors.
Answered by Michael Shanks - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Energy Security and Net Zero)
Details of Ministers' and Permanent Secretaries' meetings with external individuals and organisations are published quarterly in arrears on GOV.UK.