The Department of Health and Social Care has provided the following answer to your written parliamentary question (56363):

Question:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how much and what proportion of the £36 billion announced by the Government to tackle waiting lists as a result of the covid19 outbreak will be spent on the salaries of additional medical staff. (56363)

Tabled on: 15 October 2021

This question was grouped with the following question(s) for answer:

1. To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many additional nurses and doctors he plans to recruit for his Department’s waiting list initiatives. (56708)
   Tabled on: 15 October 2021

Answer:
Edward Argar:

The Department is working closely with NHS England and NHS Improvement to develop a plan for how that funding will be used, including the recruitment and salaries of additional medical staff.

The answer was submitted on 22 Oct 2021 at 10:44.

Question:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what the 2020-21 budget is for housing illegal migrants. (77354)

Tabled on: 18 November 2021

Answer:
Tom Pursglove:

Accommodation costs are commercially confidential; therefore, the Home Office does not publish this information.

The answer was submitted on 24 Nov 2021 at 15:42.

Yesterday the Commons passed the latest pandemic controls, which had been introduced the previous night. As always the Opposition parties all wanted the current controls and recommended more. The Conservative benches were more divided, with a minority questioning the value and wisdom of these further restrictions on our liberties.

We have now seen that a Labour government in Cardiff and an SNP government in Edinburgh have  not been more successful than England at getting case and hospital rates down more and keeping them down by enforcing stricter regulations for longer. The controls are  now going on around the world against air travel from southern Africa where the latest variant was first detected, only to discover that the new mutant has already broken out and is present in countries around the world well beyond southern Africa. Some think this new mutant is likely to spread more rapidly but to be mild. Let us hope it is not a new lethal killer.

I have raised  the issues of whether the NHS has now improved airflows, introduced more UV filters and cut the chances of cross infection. I have also asked about better treatments. During the debate others raised the question of why past forecasts of rising case numbers and deaths have often been inaccurate, how much virus the masks do actually contain and whether these rules will be lifted before Christmas when Parliament is no longer in session.

The NHS senior management needs to make sure the pace and distribution of more vaccinations is fair and achievable and tell us more about treatments and infection control.

An extract from my book on the green revolution:

Governments this century have taken to meet together to discuss how they can close down a large number of carbon based industries in their jurisdiction and how they can write off the asset values of all those deposits of fossil fuels and of all those businesses that process them or rely on them to power their activities. It is true they meet full of hope that the replacements they offer will unleash an offsetting wave of new investment and jobs. The EU itself as one of the leading architects of the green revolution is preparing programmes and subsidy budgets to tackle left behind communities that used to rely on oil wells and coal mines, on petro chemicals and on traditional industries like cement, steel and ceramics with a high use of carbon based energy. The transition will be difficult and painful for some.

As we have seen , the car and food industries are central to the changes. The existing car makers may not succeed in changing over to making enough of the new electric cars and may watch as rivals emerge with the winning products. Agriculture will take time for many farmers to convert from animal husbandry to the new crops and to tree growing. Many jobs and thousands of traditional factories will be lost as investment hurries into the new fields and as the new jobs are created for those willing to train and change.

Governments tell us there is an avalanche of investment money wanting to go into the revolution. Many of the large quoted companies of the oil and gas and other traditional sectors are keen to sell on some of their fossil fuel assets and move into the new green areas, further impelling valuations of the new upwards. This will assist governments in their quest for the new paradigm.

Meanwhile the questions posed about security of supply by events  in September 2021 will need an answer. Governments need to tell us how they will fill the potential energy gap as we transition to a renewable system, and need to come clean on how they will raise taxes as fossil fuels run down and with that lose the heavy tax revenue they carry.

Above all the joint working of governments and companies needs to reveal the range of product and changes to lifestyles that will appeal and be willingly adopted and paid for by the public. Only if a top down revolution fires the popular imagination and becomes a bottom up revolution will the passage to a green future be possible. To succeed green products need to be cheaper and better than the products they wish to displace..

I am delighted to say that Build Back Green is now published and available. You can find it at:

I find it curious that the Chancellor tells us he is a lower tax Chancellor when all he seems to do is put the taxes up. I would like to believe him, as he is right in thinking lower tax rates would be good for growth and  the economy. I will give enthusiastic support when he announces the lower taxes.

Unhelpful briefing implies the higher taxes like  National Insurance, Corporation Tax and frozen Income  tax allowances are some  kind of punishment for the PM wishing to increase spending. The polite on the  record  rationale is they need these rises to get the deficit down post the pandemic spending bulge.

None of this makes any sense. The  Treasury has just had to slash its deficit forecast by £50 bn for this year thanks to the surge in growth, with no tax rises yet imposed. The evidence shows if you keep rates down and go for growth the deficit falls. The danger now is the big tax rises will do the  opposite. They will slow growth going into the next financial year as the rates bite, leading to a higher deficit.

I urge the Chancellor to do what he says he believes. set lower tax rates to boost jobs, incomes and investments.There is nothing stopping him getting more spending control into areas like railways and test and trace where there have been large increases.