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26 Oct 2009 : Column 60W—continued
Veterinary Medicine: Nurses
Mr. Drew: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs how many registered veterinary nurses there are. [294842]
Jim Fitzpatrick: The Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons maintains a list of veterinary nurses who are allowed by the Veterinary Services Act 1966 to undertake certain veterinary procedures. There are currently 8,795 qualified veterinary nurses on this list. Of these, 6,758 have voluntarily applied to join a non statutory register of veterinary nurses, and are therefore known as registered veterinary nurses.
Waste Disposal: Fixed Penalties
John Battle: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs how many fixed penalty notices were served in respect of household waste disposal offences in Leeds City in each year since 2001. [295360]
Dan Norris: The Clean Neighbourhoods and Environment Act 2005 enabled local authorities to issue fixed penalty notices for waste receptacle offences for the first time in April 2006. In the period 2006-07, Leeds city council issued and received payment on 41 fixed penalty notices.
DEFRA has commissioned returns from English local authorities on fixed penalty notices issued for 2007-08 and 2008-09 for a range of environmental offences, including those relating to waste receptacles. Returns are still outstanding from many local authorities and these are being pursued. Results will be published on the DEFRA website in December.
Zero Waste Places
Mrs. Spelman: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs if he will place in the Library a copy of each bid made for Towards Zero Waste Place funding. [294464]
Dan Norris: Copies of the bids made for Towards Zero Waste Place funding will be made available in the House Library.
Mrs. Spelman: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what schemes have received funding from his Department under the Zero Waste Places scheme since the scheme's inception; and what projects or policies have since been adopted as a result. [294555]
Dan Norris: In October 2008 the Government announced England's first six Zero Waste Places, which received total funding of £70,258. The places fulfilled a pathfinder role in identifying the barriers and illustrating solutions to enable other local authorities to adopt good sustainable waste management practices. These were:
A Waste Free Tuesday Market Place-Borough Council of King's Lynn and West Norfolk;
Peterborough City Centre-Peterborough Environment City Trust;
Green Zones Community Development Project-London Borough of Brent;
Shenley Church End Zero Waste Place Project-Milton Keynes Council;
A Zero Waste Region-West Midlands (WM) Region;
London Borough of Lewisham-Lewisham Zero Waste Eco Street.
The initiative ran from October 2008 until May 2009. All projects were considered successful and all have continued in some form after the funding ended. Details of the six projects can be found on the Local Government Association website.
We have also announced six new Zero Waste Places in parts of Shropshire, Dorchester, Brixton, Newham, Hoxton and Suffolk. We plan to support these places, which are moving towards zero waste through seed corn funding totalling approximately £50,000. The evidence generated by the projects will be used as guidance for other areas working towards a zero waste ambition.
Scotland
Departmental Training
John Mason: To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland pursuant to the answer of 14 October 2009, Official Report, column 886W, on what subjects the learning and development activities were undertaken by his Department's staff. [295442]
Ann McKechin: A variety of external learning and development activities were undertaken by staff in the Scotland Office in the last 12 months, including health and safety training for senior executives, first aid training and various professional development activities.
International Development
Departmental Visits Abroad
David Simpson: To ask the Secretary of State for International Development how much his Department spent on overnight accommodation for (a) Ministers and (b) officials while overseas in each of the last three years. [294689]
Mr. Michael Foster: It is not possible to disaggregate costs in respect of overnight accommodation without incurring a disproportionate cost.
Developing Countries: Females
Mr. Dai Davies: To ask the Secretary of State for International Development what steps he has taken to help increase standards of (a) female literacy and (b) medical care for women and girls in the world's 10 poorest countries. [293954]
Mr. Michael Foster: The information is as follows:
(a) The Department for International Development (DFID) is committed to achieving the education millennium development goals of universal primary education and gender parity in education by 2015 and is spending at least £8.5 billion over the period 2006-15 in support of education in poor and developing countries. DFID regards supporting girls' education as a priority. DFID's Strategy, Girls' Education: Towards a Better Future for All (2005) sets out our approach to overcoming the barriers girls face in getting an education-it is available at:
(b) In June 2008, the UK Government made a commitment to spend £6 billion on strengthening health systems and services over seven years to 2015 (plus £1 billion to the Global Fund for AIDS, TB and Malaria (GFATM). The United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) event on 23 September highlighted the importance of providing health services free at the point of delivery. The UK-initiated Global Consensus on Maternal, Newborn and Child Health was also widely endorsed. It seeks to make health systems and investments work better for women and children, thus driving up standards. Leaders from Nepal, Malawi, Ghana, Liberia, Burundi and Sierra Leone announced historic shifts towards free health care. Removing the financial barriers to health services and providing services free at the point of use
for women and children will ensure that the poorest people, especially women and girls, can access a trained health worker in the right place at the right time with the right infrastructure, equipment and drugs.
India: Tuberculosis
Dr. Naysmith: To ask the Secretary of State for International Development what recent assessment he has made of the effectiveness of his Department's support for the national tuberculosis programme in India in reducing the incidence of tuberculosis in that country. [294276]
Mr. Michael Foster: The Department for International Development's (DFID) support to India's National Tuberculosis Control Programme has been highly effective. The programme has averted an estimated 180,000 deaths a year since 2005. That is around 500 lives saved in India every day. DFID's support has helped put 1.5 million TB patients on treatment every year in India.
Our support has ensured that India has faced no drug shortage, despite having the most rapidly expanding TB programme in the world. By March 2006, the programme had been scaled up to cover the entire country. Since 1997, the success rate for TB treatment has tripled from 25 per cent. to 86 per cent. and TB deaths rates have been cut seven-fold from 29 per cent. to 4 per cent.
Women and Equality
Equality and Human Rights Commission: Vacancies
John McDonnell: To ask the Minister for Women and Equality how many full-time equivalent posts are currently vacant in the Equality and Human Rights Commission. [294052]
Training: Sight Impaired
Lynne Featherstone: To ask the Minister for Women and Equality how much the Government have spent to support Braille literacy courses in each of the last four years; and if she will make a statement. [293053]
Michael Jabez Foster: My Department, the Government Equalities Office, was established in October 2007. It has not spent any money on Braille literacy courses since then.
Foreign and Commonwealth Office
Anguilla: Energy
Andrew Rosindell: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs how much funding the Government have contributed to the establishment of the Anguilla Renewable Energy Office. [293464]
Chris Bryant:
The Anguilla Renewable Energy Office is being established by the Anguilla National Trust in conjunction with the government of Anguilla, as part of a project entitled "Implementation of the Anguilla Energy Policy 2008-20. Phase One: Building a Broad Community Movement". The Foreign and Commonwealth Office and Department for International Development
funded Overseas Territories Environment Programme (OTEP) has committed £100,000 over two years in support of the overall project. OTEP has to date contributed £3,805 to the establishment of the Anguilla Renewable Energy Office.
British Council: Manpower
Mr. Fallon: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs how many British Council posts in the UK are being outsourced; what the cost-savings involved are; and if he will make a statement. [295187]
Chris Bryant: The British Council is undertaking an investment and transformation programme across its network to increase the scale and impact of its global activities.
This includes a proposal to consolidate the organisation's finance functions from five global centres into one overseas centre and one in the UK. As a result, the total number of UK finance posts would reduce from 98 to approximately 40. Around 40 posts would transfer to the overseas finance centre. Consultation on the proposals is ongoing and no final decision has yet been made. Proposed changes to the finance function do not include any plans to outsource to other companies.
The overall savings from this reduction in staffing will be approximately £12 million per year.
British Council: Redundancy
Mr. Fallon: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs for what reasons the terms of the redundancy agreement for British Council employees are being changed for existing staff; and if he will make a statement. [295186]
Chris Bryant: The British Council's Redundancy Procedures Agreement was agreed and signed by the organisation and its local trade union on 12 June 2008. The agreement is based on relevant UK legislation and employment relations best practice. No changes to its terms are planned.
British Overseas Territories: Police
Andrew Rosindell: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs how many police officers have been arrested for criminal activity in each of the UK Overseas Territories in the Caribbean in the last five years. [293451]
Chris Bryant: The following table shows the number of arrests in the last five years but these figures do not necessarily translate into successful prosecutions.
| Number | |
Christmas
Mr. Prisk: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs how many Christmas functions arranged by his Department and its agencies (a) he, (b) officials of his Department and (c) officials of its agencies (i) hosted and (ii) attended in 2008; what the cost to the public purse was; and if he will make a statement. [295421]
Chris Bryant: This information is not held centrally and to provide it would incur disproportionate cost.
Colombia: Land Mines
Mr. Rooney: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what representations the Government have made to the Colombian Government on its use of land-mines to protect military installations. [293605]
Chris Bryant [holding answer 16 October 2009]: We have seen no evidence to suggest that the Colombian armed forces are using land-mines prohibited by the Ottawa Convention. We have therefore made no representations to the Colombian Government on the use of land-mines around military installations.
Mr. Love: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what representations the Government has made to the Government of Colombia in respect of that Government's use of land-mines to protect military installations. [295672]
Chris Bryant: We have seen no evidence to suggest that the Colombian armed forces are using land mines prohibited by the Ottawa Convention. We have therefore made no representations to the Colombian Government on the use of land mines around military installations.
Colombia: Trade Unions
Mr. Watson: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs pursuant to the answer of 13 July 2009, Official Report, column 108W, on Colombia, for which projects to strengthen labour relations in Colombia his Department is considering proposals. [295639]
Chris Bryant: In addition to supporting a UN Development Programme initiative aimed at improving human rights of trade unionists and the development of positive labour relations in Colombia, we are waiting for a revised proposal from the Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service (ACAS) on reconciliation and arbitration.
We will consider the merits of that proposal at the appropriate time. I had the pleasure of meeting Colombian trade unionists during my recent visit to Bogota. The Government strongly believe in the legitimate and important role that trade unions play in civil society. We therefore continue to monitor labour relations in Colombia closely, raising concerns with the Colombian Government as necessary.
Consolidated Contractors Corporation
David Davis: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what (a) meetings, (b) communications and (c) other contacts Ministers and officials in his Department have had with the Consolidated Contractors Corporation (CCC Group) and its international offshoots in the last five years. [294379]
Chris Bryant: The Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) has had no contracts or purchase orders with the Consolidated Contractors Corporation (CCC Group) in the last five years.
Regarding FCO meetings, communications, or other contacts with CCC Group, this information is not held centrally and could be provided only at disproportionate cost.
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