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23 Jun 2010 : Column 266W—continued
Landfill
Hilary Benn: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs when she plans to publish her response to the consultation on landfill bans. [3593]
Richard Benyon: The Consultation on the Introduction of Restrictions on the Landfilling of Certain Wastes closed on 10 June 2010. Responses are currently being collated and analysed. The Government will publish a response to the consultation in due course.
Future policy on reducing landfill will be considered in the context of the Government's recently announced review of waste policy in England.
National Parks: Finance
Mr Liddell-Grainger: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what budgetary allocations she has made to each national park for (a) 2010-11 and (b) 2011-12. [3147]
Richard Benyon: Savings to DEFRA's 2010-11 budgets totalling £162 million were recently announced. The revised allocations for each of the national park authorities are as follows:
| £ | |
| Note: The allocation for the Lake District includes £250,000 for repairs to the rights of way network caused by flooding, and £1,800,000 for refurbishment of office accommodation for the New Forest National Park Authority. | |
The allocations for 2011-12 will be announced later this year.
Set-aside Schemes
Mr Spencer: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what recent discussions she has had on the objectives of the Campaign for the Farmed Environment; and if she will make a statement. [3063]
Mr Paice: The Government remain strongly committed to the Campaign for the Farmed Environment, which we consider an excellent example of the farming industry taking responsibility for its environmental impacts. The Secretary of State and I met a number of senior representatives of the campaign's partner organisations at the recent cereals show, and look forward to receiving the campaign's Progress Report later this month.
Waste Disposal
Hilary Benn: To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what the timetable is for the forthcoming survey on industrial and commercial waste. [3592]
Richard Benyon: The project was initiated in February 2010 and fieldwork began in early June 2010. The fieldwork phase is due to complete at the end of October 2010. DEFRA is expecting to receive and publish provisional results by mid October 2010, with the final outputs (i.e. detailed analysis, final report, and final anonymised dataset) due in early December 2010.
International Development
Departmental Pay
Mr Watson: To ask the Secretary of State for International Development pursuant to the answer of 7 June 2010, Official Report, column 53W, on departmental manpower, what the salary range is of staff employed at each grade in the private office of each Minister in his Department. [3254]
Mr Duncan: Details of the salary range for full-time staff at each civil service grade employed at the Department for International Development (DFID) are provided in the following table.
| DFID grade | Equivalent traditional civil service grade | Pay range (London scale) |
International Assistance: Water
Glenda Jackson: To ask the Secretary of State for International Development if he will urge the Adaptation Fund Board to prioritise those projects committed to providing sustainable access to safe drinking water and basic sanitation and hygiene in line with Millennium Development Goal 7. [3156]
Mr O'Brien: The Adaptation Fund finances climate adaptation projects that benefit vulnerable communities and are proposed by developing countries. The Board's criteria specify that projects should clearly meet the needs of vulnerable communities but do not prioritise one Millennium Development Goal above the others. Some proposals include access to safe drinking water and basic sanitation and hygiene. Others cover issues such as food security, health and disaster risk reduction. The Adaptation Fund Board considers proposals on their merit on a case by case basis.
In "The Coalition: our programme for government", the Government highlighted their commitment to clean water and sanitation, stating that we will prioritise aid spending to ensure everyone has access to these and other services, and will particularly focus on the rights of women, children and people with disabilities.
Glenda Jackson: To ask the Secretary of State for International Development what steps his Department is taking to achieve the sanitation targets defined in the United Nations Millennium Development Goals. [3157]
Mr O'Brien: In "The Coalition: our programme for government", the Government highlighted their commitment to clean water and sanitation, stating that we will prioritise aid spending to ensure everyone has access to these and other services, and will particularly focus on the rights of women, children and people with disabilities.
In the coming months DFID will be reviewing its aid programme to determine how we can achieve better value for money for the taxpayer and accelerate progress towards the MDGs, including the target on clean water and sanitation.
Glenda Jackson: To ask the Secretary of State for International Development what proportion of his Department's budget for 2010-11 has been allocated for the purpose of meeting the Millennium Development Goal target of providing safe drinking water in sub-Saharan Africa. [3158]
Mr O'Brien: In "The Coalition: our programme for government", the Government highlighted their commitment to clean water and sanitation, stating that we will prioritise aid spending to ensure everyone has access to these and other services, and will particularly focus on the rights of women, children and people with disabilities.
Under the previous Government 2.7% of the Department for International Development (DFID) budget was allocated to improving water and sanitation in Sub-Saharan Africa in 2010-11.
In the coming months DFID will be reviewing its aid programmes to determine how we can achieve better value for money for the taxpayer and accelerate growth towards the MDGs. Aid spending to improve access to clean water and sanitation in Sub-Saharan Africa will be reviewed as part of this process.
Kyrgyzstan: Internally Displaced People
Glenda Jackson: To ask the Secretary of State for International Development what steps his Department is taking to assist Uzbeki people displaced by the recent violence in Kyrgyzstan; and if he will make a statement. [3619]
Mr Andrew Mitchell: The Department for International Development (DFID) is monitoring the situation in Kyrgyzstan closely. We are in regular contact with the United Nations and the International Committee of the Red Cross locally and at HQ level. The UK provides core funding to these and many other international humanitarian agencies.
Kyrgyzstan: Politics and Government
Lindsay Roy: To ask the Secretary of State for International Development what recent assessment he has made of the humanitarian situation in the Kyrgyz Republic. [3844]
Mr Andrew Mitchell: The Department for International Development (DFID) is monitoring the situation in Kyrgyzstan closely. We are in regular contact with the United Nations and the International Committee of the Red Cross locally and at HQ level. As of 18 June, the United Nations estimates that 191 people are dead and 400,000 people have been displaced. The Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs has estimated that 100,000 refugees have crossed the border to Uzbekistan.
Palestinians: International Assistance
Andrew Stephenson: To ask the Secretary of State for International Development what steps his Department is taking to ensure that aid which it sends to Gaza reaches those who need it; and if he will make a statement. [3488]
Mr Duncan: The UK does not send aid directly to Gaza. However, we do fund the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) which provides basic services to Gazan refugees such as education, health care and food aid.
Due to restrictions on access UNRWA and other aid organisations have found it difficult to import into Gaza all the items they need to carry out their work effectively. DFID is therefore funding a United Nations team to work with the Government of Israel and aid agencies to facilitate the transfer of goods into Gaza.
The announcement by the Government of Israel of an easing of restrictions, including a move from a list of permitted items to a list of banned goods, is a step in the right direction. We will continue to press the Government of Israel to ensure they deliver on their commitments.
Business, Innovation and Skills
Departmental Internet
Mr Watson: To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills what the URL is of each website managed by (a) his Department and (b) each non-departmental public body and agency for which his Department is responsible. [2360]
Mr Davey: The information requested is as follows.
(a) URLs of websites managed directly by the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) are:
The following websites managed by BIS are shortly to be closed, with content to be moved to:
(b) URLs for websites managed by the Department's NDPBs and agencies This list of sites is drawn from the centrally-managed Government Website Database. To contact each NDPB to provide this information would incur disproportionate costs.
The Department's Executive Agencies (Companies House, the Insolvency Service, the Intellectual Property Office, the National Measurement Office and the Skills Funding Agency) will reply separately.
Council for Science and Technology
Strategic Advisory Board for Intellectual Property (SABIP)
Advisory Conciliation and Arbitration Service (ACAS)
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