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12 Jun 2009 : Column 1075W—continued
Northern Ireland
Departmental Data Protection
James Brokenshire: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how many officials in (a) his Department and (b) its agencies have been (i) disciplined and (ii) dismissed for (A) breaches of data protection requirements and (B) inappropriate use of personal or sensitive data in the last 12 months. [278722]
Paul Goggins: There have been no such cases.
The Northern Ireland Office has clear policies and processes in place to ensure that staff understand the importance of data security and data confidentiality and to ensure that any cases of potential data loss can be properly dealt with.
Departmental Official Hospitality
Bob Spink: To ask the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland how much his Department has spent on (a) conference services and (b) banqueting services in each of the last five years. [274500]
Mr. Woodward: The Northern Ireland Office (NIO) records expenditure for conferences and banquets under the description of hospitality or catering. Due to the high volume of transactions within these expenditure areas it would be possible to extract the costs requested only at disproportionate cost.
Energy and Climate Change
Environment Protection: Transport
Nadine Dorries: To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change how much funding his Department has allocated to encourage take up of environmentally-friendly means of transportation in (a) Mid Bedfordshire constituency and (b) the East of England since it was established; and if he will make a statement. [278843]
Mr. Khan: I have been asked to reply.
Funding provided by the Department for Transport (DfT) to local transport authorities is not generally ring-fenced and local authorities have discretion to spend their allocations in line with their priorities. Figures are not available at constituency level.
The Department provides integrated transport block and highways maintenance funding to local transport authorities to support capital investment in transport, which may be used for a range of purposes as the authorities see fit. Allocations provided to Bedfordshire county council and the eastern region, since 1997, are shown in the following table.
| (£ millions) | ||
| Bedfordshire | Eastern Region | |
| Note: Since 2000 the allocations comprise integrated transport block grant and highways maintenance. Prior to 2000 the allocations are in the form of gross approved spending. | ||
Revenue expenditure on transport is generally supported through the Department for Communities and Local Government's Formula Grant.
In addition to this funding, DfT has made some funding available specifically to support cycling. In 2007-08 and 2008-09, DfT provided £6,720 and £32,000 respectively to Bedfordshire county council to fund cycling training. In 2009-10, following the local authority boundary changes, Bedford borough are due to receive £28,000, and central Bedfordshire £35,240 to fund 700 and 881 training places respectively.
Works and Pensions
Letter from Mel Groves:
The Secretary of State has asked me to reply to your question asking, with reference to the Answer of 26 November 2008, Official Report, column 1980W, on Jobcentre Plus: manpower, for a description of each job in Jobcentre Plus in each pay grade. This is something that falls within the responsibilities delegated to me as Acting Chief Executive of Jobcentre Plus.
Whilst certain roles within many operational posts in Jobcentre Plus are standard, the mix of roles within each job can vary.
By way of example, there are approximately 50 individual Job Role descriptors for a Jobcentre, which all Jobcentres would cover. Many Jobcentres therefore will have less than 50 employees and instead will establish posts (or jobs) that cover a range of these roles and responsibilities in a variety of permutations. Each manager will in turn set an individual set of objectives for each job holder. Similarly, non operational jobholders within functions such as Projects, Finance and Planning cover roles that are also not standard. Many of these jobholders will necessarily have individual descriptions. This variety and volume of jobs means that a description of every job in every grade is not available.
Instead, we have established over 200 Job Role descriptors covering operational roles, broken down by grade. I have listed these in Annex 1. The descriptors will be placed in the Library.
I hope this information is helpful.
Letter from Ruth Owen:
The Secretary of State has asked me to reply to your question asking pursuant to the answer to the hon. Member for Cardiff of 10 March 2009 on Jobseeker’s Allowance, what quantitative and qualitative evaluation has been undertaken of the extent to which signposting takes place and the outcome it achieves. This is something that falls within the responsibilities delegated to Mel Groves as Acting Chief Executive of Jobcentre Plus. Mel Groves is currently on Annual Leave and I am replying in his absence.
Signposting customers to appropriate agencies, for advice and support including debt and financial management, is an integral part of the service offered by Jobcentre Plus staff. Jobcentre Plus interacts with over 100,000 members of the public every working
day. Where such referrals arise from a work focused interview with a Personal Adviser. It would quite naturally be followed up at subsequent interviews.
Jobcentre Plus does not carry out the specific types of evaluation asked for in your question. However it does signpost customers, and there is a Quality Assurance Framework, which is used by managers to assess the performance of our advisers.
Individual Personal Advisers are assessed using a Quality Assurance Framework. This helps to make sure our advisory services are effective, efficient and of consistently high quality. It is a framework for regularly reviewing adviser functions that allows us to reward and recognise good performance as well as identify where performance can be improved and making improvements where necessary. One of the criteria we look for is an understanding of the range and detail of support available through external partners. We expect our Personal Advisers to act as the customer’s advocate through a range of contracted/non-contracted provision and services.
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