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16 Jun 2009 : Column 158W—continued

Energy and Climate Change

Renewable Energy: Pembrokeshire

Mr. Crabb: To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change what progress has been made on the Wave Dragon project off the coast of Milford Haven; and if he will make a statement. [279456]

Joan Ruddock: An application under section 36 of the Electricity Act 1989 to construct and operate a 7MW offshore wave device, known as ‘Wave Dragon’, was made by Wave Dragon Wales Ltd on 26 April 2007 which is currently under consideration, pending further information from the application. It is departmental policy not to comment on the merits of applications under consideration, and a decision will be taken on the application in due course.

Warm Front Scheme

Bob Spink: To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change how many (a) boilers and (b) full central heating systems have been installed through the Warm Front Scheme in each of the last three years. [279062]

Joan Ruddock: The following tables detail the number of (a) boilers and (b) full central heating systems installed by Warm Front in each of the last three scheme years and the current year to date.

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(a) Boilers
	2006-2007	2007-2008	2008-2009	2009-2010 (to end May 2009)
Boiler Replacements	53,436	75,600	80,458	15,072

(b) Central Heating
	2006-2007	2007-2008	2008-2009	2009-2010 (to end May 2009)
Central heating systems	30,549	28,779	23,466	5841

Work and Pensions

Cabinet: Glasgow

Mr. MacNeil: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions how much expenditure was incurred by her Department in respect of the Cabinet meeting in Glasgow on 16 April 2009. [273935]

Jonathan Shaw: For information relating to the Cabinet and public engagement event held in Glasgow on 16 April, I refer the hon. Member to the answer given by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister on 3 June 2009, Official Report, column 487W.

Carer’s Allowance: Greater Manchester

Andrew Gwynne: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions how many people are in receipt of carer's allowance in (a) Tameside and (b) Stockport. [279758]

Jonathan Shaw: The information is in the following table.

Carer's allowance—cases in payment caseloads by local authority of claimant: November 2008
Local authority	Number
Stockport	2,190
Tameside	2,030
Notes: 1. Caseload figures are rounded to the nearest 10. 2. Caseload totals show the number of people in receipt of an allowance and exclude people with entitlement but who do not actually receive carer's allowance, for example, because of the overlapping benefits rule. Source: DWP Information Directorate: Work and Pensions Longitudinal Study

Cold Weather Payments

Andrew Stunell: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions if she will assess the appropriateness of the threshold for cold weather payments in respect of those diagnosed with certain medical conditions or taking certain medications whose conditions may be exacerbated by cold weather conditions. [279126]

Jonathan Shaw: Cold weather payments help vulnerable groups on low incomes with the extra heating costs which result from periods of very cold weather that last, or are forecast to last, for seven days.

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They are paid to people awarded pension credit or income-related employment and support allowance that includes a work-related activity or support component when the temperature criteria is met for their area. Those awarded income support, income-based jobseeker’s allowance or income-related employment and support allowance in the assessment phase, and who have a pensioner or disability premium or have a child who is disabled or under the age of five are also eligible to receive payments.

There are no plans at the present time to change the qualifying criteria for cold weather payments.

Departmental Public Expenditure

Mrs. May: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what the budget under each budget sub-heading is of each of her Department’s employment programmes for (a) 2009-10 and (b) 2010-11. [276439]

Jim Knight [holding answer 19 May 2009]: The following table shows the budgets for the Department of Work and Pensions employment programmes, by sub-heading, for 2009-10 and 2010-11.

Budgets (to nearest £ million)
Programme	2009-10	2010-11
Support for long-term unemployed	845	1,214
Additional support at six months	145	216
Young persons guarantee and future jobs fund	250	838
Lone parents and families	34	63
Support for disabled people	533	567
Other employment programmes	184	202
Totals	1,991	3,100

Disability Living Allowance: Sight Impaired

Mr. Harper: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions how many people in (a) Forest of Dean constituency and (b) Gloucestershire who receive disability living allowance gave a visual impairment as the primary reason for claiming that allowance; and if she will make a statement. [277223]

Jonathan Shaw [holding answer 1 June 2009]: The available information is in the following table.

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Disability living allowance cases in payment where blindness is recorded as the main disabling condition: November 2008
	Number
Forest of Dean parliamentary constituency	80
Gloucestershire	510
Notes: 1. Figures are rounded to the nearest 10. 2. Totals show the number of people in receipt of an allowance, and exclude people with entitlement where the payment has been suspended, for example if they are in hospital. 3. A diagnosed medical condition does not mean that someone is automatically entitled to disability living allowance. Entitlement is dependent on an assessment of how much help someone needs with personal care and/or mobility because of their disability. These statistics are only collected for administrative purposes.
4. From October 2008 the way in which disabling condition is recorded on the live system changed. Disabling conditions are now recorded as primary and secondary, (previously recorded as disability care and mobility codes). For existing cases a mapping exercise was carried out which assigned disability care code to primary disabling condition and disability mobility code to secondary condition. Information Directorate has updated the methodology used to derive main disabling condition to reflect this change in the live system. The old category D08 (blindness) is now subdivided into a range of more specific condition codes. These are referred to by the over-arching title ‘Visual Disorder’. 5. The preferred data source for benefit statistics is 100 per cent. Work and Pensions Longitudinal Study. However, the 5 per cent. sample data are generally the preferred source for analysis on disabling condition as information is more complete for disabling condition on the 5 per cent. sample (Some recipients of disability living allowance who transferred from the attendance allowance system may not have been allocated a specific disabling condition code. This problem can be corrected on the sample data but not on the WPLS data. The number of cases affected is decreasing over time). In this case the WPLS data have been used as some of the caseload figures produced are very small and so would have a high level of statistical variation should the sample data have been used. Source: DWP Information Directorate: Work and Pensions Longitudinal Study

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Economic and Monetary Union

Mr. Hayes: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions what activities have been undertaken by her Department’s Euro Minister in that capacity. [277168]

Jonathan Shaw: Euro Ministers are responsible for euro preparations in their Department and attend Euro Ministers steering group meetings. Meetings are held only when necessary to discuss practical preparations to ensure a smooth changeover.

Employment

Paul Rowen: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions how many people in each age group have been placed in employment by Jobcentre Plus in the last six months. [278263]

Jim Knight [holding answer 8 June 2009]: The available information is in the following table:

Job seekers a llowance—off flows into work for the last six months—Great Britain
Aged:	November 2008	December 2008	January 2009	February 2009	March 2009	April 2009
under 17	15	25	10	25	30	40
17	185	145	60	135	140	165
18	4,775	3,585	1,480	2,825	2,880	3,315
19	4,865	3,765	1,725	3,550	3,830	4,295
20-24	23,295	17,825	8,865	19,580	19,760	21,535
25-29	14,310	10,970	6,225	15,220	14,790	15,815
30-34	9,900	7,390	4,560	11,165	10,615	10,975
35-39	9,385	7,350	4,675	10,870	10,375	10,845
40-44	9,395	7,285	4,875	11,235	10,675	11,245
45-49	9,015	6,915	4,575	10,435	9,820	10,425
50-54	7,485	5,685	3,755	8,370	8,065	8,390
55-59	5,675	4,450	3,035	6,365	5,890	6,340
60 and over	1,155	970	635	1,490	1,450	1,530
Column total	99,440	76,380	44,470	101,255	98,310	104,920
Notes: 1. The number of off-flows moving into employment include claimants who increased their employment hours beyond 16 per week. 2. This information is published on the Nomis website at: www.nomisweb.co.uk 3. The percentage of people leaving with an unknown destination recorded has increased over the last 10 years. This is because the completion levels of the JSA40 (forms filled in by people leaving JSA) have decreased over this period. This should be taken into account when interpreting these statistics, as many of these ‘unknown’ leavers will have moved into employment or other benefits. The data are not seasonally adjusted. Source: 100 per cent. count of claimants of unemployment-related benefits, Jobcentre Plus Computer Systems.

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