The technical report issued by Norfolk County Council on 1 June 2016.
Technical Report (in .pdf format)
Tag: 2016
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Helen Goodman – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Home Office
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Helen Goodman on 2016-01-13.
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps she is taking to prevent laundered money entering the London housing market.
Mike Penning
The Government is committed to protecting the integrity of our financial system and to ensuring that the UK is a hostile environment for illicit finance, to protect our national security and promote growth. The Government is also committed to ensuring that we maintain a robust and proportionate anti-money laundering regime.
Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs (HMRC) is the anti money laundering supervisor of estate agents and takes a robust, intelligence led approach to ensuring compliance with the Money Laundering Regulations 2007 (the Regulations). An estate agent should not operate as such unless they are registered with HMRC under Regulations. It is an offence to carry out relevant business without registering with HMRC and the Estate Agency Business (EAB) may be penalised or face criminal prosecution if they fail to do. All those dealing with property transactions in the UK are regulated for money laundering purposes, including banks, the legal and accountancy sectors, and estate agents, and are required to report suspicious activity to the National Crime Agency. The Suspicious Activity Reports regime is currently being reviewed to make it a more effective mechanism for identifying money laundering and terrorist financing.
The National Risk Assessment of money laundering and terrorist financing was published on 15 October 2015. This identified the threats and vulnerabilities we face in these areas, and an Action Plan will be published shortly, setting out the steps that the Government will take to address them.
The Prime Minister made clear in his Singapore speech on corruption last year that the Government is determined to make sure the UK does not become a safe haven for corrupt money. As a first step he asked the Land Registry to publish data on which foreign companies own which land and property titles in England and Wales. The Prime Minister’s Anti-Corruption Summit in May will also consider what more the Government can do to tackle flows of illicit finance at home and abroad.
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Oliver Colvile – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Oliver Colvile on 2016-02-05.
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what progress her Department is making on developing effective management strategies for Marine Conservation Zones.
George Eustice
The Government is committed to delivering a ‘Blue Belt’ of well-managed Marine Protected Areas around our coasts. Marine Conservation Zones (MCZs) are given legislative protection under the Marine and Coastal Access Act 2009. Under this Act, a consent or licence can only be agreed where there is no significant risk to the conservation objectives of the MCZ, except in exceptional cases and subject to stringent conditions.
Where fishery management measures are required, Defra is working with the Inshore Fisheries Conservation Authorities and the Marine Management Organisation to identify appropriate fisheries management measures for all Tranche 1 MCZs by the end of this year and, as a result, those site features considered to be at “high risk” are already being protected. For Tranche 2 MCZ sites, appropriate fisheries management measures will be identified by the relevant authority within two years of designation.
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Steven Paterson – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Defence
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Steven Paterson on 2016-03-02.
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, what projects are being undertaken by the cyber transformation team in the (a) Army, (b) Royal Navy and (c) Royal Air Force.
Penny Mordaunt
Each Service is seeking to address their own unique cyber defence challenges. Activities include: introducing cyber into training; strengthening cyber education for the whole organisation; integrating cyber into the strategic planning processes; improving career management for cyber specialists; and developing a better understanding of Defence’s cyber vulnerabilities. All activities are brought together through the Defence Cyber Programme to ensure a holistic and coherent approach across the Ministry of Defence.
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Charles Walker – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the HM Treasury
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Charles Walker on 2016-03-23.
To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, what assessment he has made of the potential effect of implementation of the Fourth EU Money Laundering Directive, 2015/849 on trade between US and European banks and financial service companies and their UK equivalents which include on their Board a Member of the House of Lords.
Harriett Baldwin
Under the Fourth Anti-Money Laundering Directive, which will be transposed into national law by June 2017, a politically exposed person is one who has been entrusted with a prominent public function domestically or by a foreign country. The Government will publish an Impact Assessment in due course. This will set out the benefits and costs for businesses in a wide range of sectors, including banking and financial services.
The changes proposed under the Directive should not prevent any individual in this category from gaining or maintaining access to financial services. Board appointments will remain a matter for individual banks and financial services companies in line with relevant codes and regulations. The Treasury regularly raises the Directive with financial institutions and the regulator, and we encourage financial institutions to take a proportionate, risk-based approach when applying these measures.
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Lord Laird – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Northern Ireland Office
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Laird on 2016-05-04.
To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether parity of esteem as established in the Belfast Agreement 1998 applies to (1) people temporarily residing in Northern Ireland, and if so for how long such people have to live there for parity of esteem to apply; and (2) people who live outside Northern Ireland but work in the province.
Lord Dunlop
As I have explained in my previous replies to the noble Lord, the concept of ‘parity of esteem’ is expressed and defined in the 1998 Belfast Agreement in relation to people living in Northern Ireland. This Government sees parity of esteem as treating everybody in Northern Ireland fairly and with equal respect, just as it is committed to treating people fairly and with equal respect wherever they live in the United Kingdom.
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Rushanara Ali – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Rushanara Ali on 2016-06-20.
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, if he will make an assessment of the implications for his policies on benefits eligibility of the conclusion in the University of Hull report, entitled Mapping hunger, published in April 2016, that food bank use is highest in areas with people in skilled manual work or where more people are unable to work due to long-term sickness or disability.
Justin Tomlinson
This government is determined to move to a higher wage society, introducing the new National Living Wage that will benefit over 1 million workers directly this year, and spending £80 billion on working age benefits to ensure a strong safety net for those who need it most. We are also committed to supporting people with disabilities and currently spend a record £50 billion a year doing so.
There are no plans to amend our reforms that are ensuring that work always pays and are restoring fairness for hardworking taxpayers. As the All-Party Parliamentary Inquiry into Hunger noted, the reasons why people use food banks can be complex and are frequently overlapping. Their use cannot be attributed to a single cause.
Our welfare system provides a strong safety net to those who need extra support.
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Chi Onwurah – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the HM Treasury
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Chi Onwurah on 2016-09-05.
To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, with reference to paragraph 4.3.2 of the Open Banking Standard report published in February 2016, what assessment the Government has made of the (a) cyber security, (b) data protection and (c) fraud risks an open banking environment introduces.
Simon Kirby
The Open Banking Working Group was created at the request of the government to explore options for allowing customers to use their bank data in a safe, secure and efficient manner. The Group published its report in February 2016. The conclusions reached represent the views of the Working Group and are not government policy.
Subsequently, the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) issued the final report of its investigation into retail banking on 9 August 2016. As part of this, the CMA requires nine leading UK banks to create an open API (Application Programming Interface) to allow access to customer account information as set out in the revised Payment Services Directive (PSDII), which will come into force in January 2018. Informed consent, data protection and cyber security are key considerations in the PSDII, and the government will be consulting on the transposition of this directive shortly.
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Steve McCabe – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department of Health
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Steve McCabe on 2016-10-20.
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, pursuant to the Answer of 11 October 2016 to Question 46555, if he will provide local authorities with an increased level of ring-fenced funding for social care in excess of that provided by the Better Care Fund.
David Mowat
Social care continues to be a key priority for the Government. This is why against the context of tough public sector finances the Government has taken steps to protect social care services. However, it is for local authorities to decide how to prioritise their spending based on local priorities and need.
The Autumn 2015 Spending Review settlement announced that local authorities who are responsible for social care would have the ability to raise additional funding to spend exclusively on adult social care through an annual council tax raise of up to 2% above the existing threshold. This new funding for adult social care will be pooled with additional funding from the Better Care Fund. The Government will be making further funding available to councils for adult social care through an improved Better Care Fund, rising to £1.5 billion by 2019-20.
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Andy Slaughter – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Ministry of Justice
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andy Slaughter on 2016-01-13.
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, if he will take steps to implement the Low Commission’s recommendation that legislative proposals should be brought forward to (a) make the Access to Justice Foundation the recipient of unclaimed damages in collective actions and (b) introduce a compulsory Interest on Lawyer Trust Accounts scheme for firms with profits above an agreed threshold with the proceeds of that scheme being paid to the Access to Justice Foundation.
Mr Shailesh Vara
The Government commends those providers of legal services who already use the monies generated from their client accounts to help fund pro bono and charitable work. We would encourage other providers to follow that example. We want to create a one nation justice system to work better for victims and to deliver a faster and fairer justice for all citizens. We are considering how this can be taken forward.