Laurence Turner: To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, pursuant to the Answer of 5 September 2024 to Question 3908 on Max Caller, what records were kept of that meeting.
Laurence Turner: I associate myself with the comments of Labour colleagues in this debate, but I want to speak about the particular issue of public sector pay and the attempts made in this debate and the preceding one to turn pensioners and public sector workers against each other, including the public sector workers who have been driven to rely on food banks and payday loans, who I was proud to represent as...
Laurence Turner: We will take no lectures on hospital admissions, given the state of the NHS that the right hon. Member’s party left us. The Conservatives claimed that they did not know what the pay review body recommendations would be, but the School Teachers’ Review Body recommendations were known to Ministers before July. They will know also that the different PRBs tend to make similar recommendations....
Laurence Turner: In my constituency, there are approximately 2,600 pensioner households that do not receive pension credit—that is one of the legacies of the previous Government—but are entitled to it. The Conservatives suggest that they would have rejected the pay review body recommendations, forgetting that one of the first acts of the Margaret Thatcher Government in 1979 was to accept the...
Laurence Turner: I declared my background in the trade union movement, and I note that the hon. Member for West Suffolk (Nick Timothy) wrote the manifesto, which he stood on, that proposed cutting the winter fuel allowance. Now that the winter fuel allowance is to be means-tested, we must boost the uptake of pension credit. I welcome the measures Ministers have announced today, so that the allowance can be...
Laurence Turner: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, what steps he is taking to help (a) reduce hostilities and (b) secure deliveries of humanitarian aid in Darfur.
Laurence Turner: To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, pursuant to the Answer of 30 July 2024 to Question 863 on Special Envoy on Freedom of Religion or Belief, when he plans to decide on the special envoy roles.
Laurence Turner: Last year, there was a 38% increase in the number of CAMHS referrals in Birmingham, while also a sharp fall in the number of young people seen within six months of a referral. Does the Minister agree that we need much more preventive support in schools, and closer working between education and health bodies?
Laurence Turner: To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, with reference to her Department's publication entitled ministerial meetings, July to September 2023, updated on 14 December 2023, whether the then Secretary of State's meeting with Max Caller on 26 September 2023 was attended by officials.
Laurence Turner: To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to section 8.1.1 of her Department's publication entitled School workforce census guide 2023: Guide for schools including academies within a Multi Academy Trust, published in July 2023, if she will make an assessment of the potential merits of collecting information on school support staff vacancies through the school workforce census.
Laurence Turner: To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether local authorities are required to monitor the average cost of delivering Education, Health, and Care Plans within their area.
Laurence Turner: To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, whether the draft Audit Reform and Corporate Governance Bill will contain measures to improve the quality of the auditing of public sector bodies.
Laurence Turner: To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, with reference to the report entitled Value for money and accountability: a report on the Birmingham City Council section 114 bankruptcy, published by Sheffield University's Audit Reform Lab on 19 August 2024, if her Department will make an assessment of the the (a) findings and (b) recommendations of that report.
Laurence Turner: To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether Access to Work applicants can contact that service in writing
Laurence Turner: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, pursuant to the Answer of 26 July 2024 to Question 266 on Roads: Birmingham and with reference to deposited paper DEP2024-0567, if she will place a copy of her Department's decision letter to Birmingham City Council dated 30 November 2023 in the House of Commons Library.
Laurence Turner: The decision to end single-word judgments will be welcomed by education professionals across Birmingham. I have seen in my own household the mental and physical toll that the old system could impose. Can the Minister confirm that the new school report card will allow Ofsted to assess SEND inclusion alongside SEND attainment?
Laurence Turner: If she will make an assessment of the potential impact of her Department’s statutory intervention at Birmingham City Council on the adequacy of public services provided by that council.
Laurence Turner: I recognise that the Secretary of State has inherited a very difficult situation. Under the Conservatives, Birmingham lost 40p in the pound and 60% of local authority jobs were lost—some of the sharpest cuts in the country. Our city is now facing cuts of more than 50% to some public service budgets, but new information has come to light and it is clear that part of the basis for the...
Laurence Turner: To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will make an assessment of the implications for his policies of trends in the retention of ambulance workers aged fifty and over in the last ten years.
Laurence Turner: To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many referrals have been accepted by Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services in Birmingham in each of the last five years.
