Tag: 2016

Gregory Campbell – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for International Development

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Gregory Campbell on 2016-03-02.

To ask the Secretary of State for International Development, if she will make representations to the Indian government on the incidence of attacks on Christian property and families in parts of that country.

Mr Desmond Swayne

India’s Constitution guarantees freedom of conscience and the right to freely profess, practice and propagate religion. The Indian government has a range of policies and programmes to support religious minorities. However, incidents of discrimination against minority communities in India, including Christians, do still occur.

Officials at the British High Commission continue to discuss minority issues, including religious tolerance of Christians, with civil society, the Indian National Commission for Minorities, with Indian ministers and ministries, and with relevant State-level authorities.

01/01/2023
Karl McCartney – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Women and Equalities

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Karl McCartney on 2016-04-11.

To ask the Minister for Women and Equalities, what steps the Government plans to take to ensure equality of educational attainment between boys and girls at all key stages.

Nick Gibb

Our goal is to deliver educational excellence everywhere, so that every child and young person can achieve to the best of his or her ability. Girls’ key stage 2 results are better than ever and their entries to mathematics and science A levels have increased by more than 12,000 since 2010. We continue to consider what more needs to be done to support equality in educational attainment, in particular the justified concerns about white working class boys.

01/01/2023

Anne Main – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Cabinet Office

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Anne Main on 2016-05-03.

To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, how much his Department and its agencies and non-departmental public bodies have spent on infraction proceedings in each of the last 10 years.

Matthew Hancock

The Cabinet Office, its agencies and non-departmental public bodies have incurred nil expenditure on infraction proceedings before the European Court of Justice.

Figures held centrally by the Cabinet Office are set out below, which show costs incurred by other government departments in engaging counsel as a result of infraction proceedings issued against the UK before the Court.

	2010/2011	2011/2012	2012/2013	2013/2014	2014/2015	2015/2016	2016/2017 (year to date)
BIS	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil
CO	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil
DCLG	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil
DCMS	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil
DECC	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil
DEFRA	Nil	£1,740.00	Nil	Nil	Nil	£8,791.61	£966.66
DfE	£780.00	3,630.00	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil
DfT	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil
DFID	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil
DH	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	NIl	NIl
DWP	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil
FCO	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil
HMT (HMRC)	£687.50	£3,797.50	£16,610.67	£24,004.95	£6,749.99	£9,834.99	Nil
HO	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil
MoD	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil
MoJ	Nil	Nil	£2,520.00	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil
NIO	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil
SO	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil
WO	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil

*The above represents all data held. We do not hold financial records on these matters before FY 2010/2011.

The UK has never been fined by the European Court of Justice as a result of infraction proceedings.

Costs for departments include costs incurred by non-departmental public bodies and agencies for which they are the lead department. While some departments will have incurred ad hoc costs in the pre-litigation stage of infraction proceedings, and costs associated with the attendance of government officials at infraction hearings, the cost of identifying that data would be disproportionate.

Departments do not quantify the cost of time spent by government officials throughout the infractions process.

01/01/2023

Chi Onwurah – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Culture, Media and Sport

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Chi Onwurah on 2016-06-15.

To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, what the timetable is for the Digital Economy Bill.

Mr Edward Vaizey

The Digital Economy Bill will be introduced to Parliament shortly.

01/01/2023
Jeff Smith – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Culture, Media and Sport

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jeff Smith on 2016-09-12.

To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, what assessment she has made of the effect on consumers of the practice by certain mobile phone companies of enforcing a two-week wait before customers can receive their unlock codes in order to change provider.

Matt Hancock

At Autumn Statement 2015, we challenged the mobile phone industry to improve their handset unlocking practices; since then operators have committed to unlocking many more of their customers’ handsets for free, and as of this autumn, no major mobile provider will charge a customer to unlock their phone outside of an initial contract period.

During the Government assessment of handset unlocking practices in early 2016, the major mobile providers were challenged on their turnaround times for issuing unlock codes. Although many providers state that it can take up to 10 working days to issue an unlock code, this is only in the instance that the provider has to contact the handset manufacturer to obtain the unlocking code. In the majority of cases, providers are able to issue unlock codes within 1-3 working days.

01/01/2023
Helen Hayes – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Communities and Local Government

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Helen Hayes on 2016-10-19.

To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, what assessment he has made of the potential merits of extending a ban from operating as a letting agent or sales agent to include a ban on operating as a sales agent or letting agent.

Gavin Barwell

The Housing and Planning Act 2016 introduces a package of measures to help local authorities crack down on rogue landlords and letting agents. They include the ability to seek a banning order against a landlord or letting or managing agent who has been convicted of a banning order offence. This provision is expected to come into force in 2017.

There are separate powers to ban sales agents under the Estate Agents Act 1979. Letting agents and sales agents carry out different functions and operate under different legislation. We do not currently have any plans to introduce legislation that would ban someone from being a sales agent where they have been banned from being a letting agent or vice versa. I would be happy to meet the hon. Member for Dulwich and West Norwood to discuss this issue.

01/01/2023
Sue Hayman – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the HM Treasury

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Sue Hayman on 2016-01-12.

To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, what progress his Department has made on reducing levels of tax avoidance by large corporations; and if he will make a statement.

Mr David Gauke

The UK initiated the G20/OECD Base Erosion and Profit Shifting project and has already taken action to implement two of the internationally agreed outputs with domestic legislation to introduce country-by-reporting and rules to address hybrid mismatches.

In addition, the UK played a key role in securing the successful EU agreement on automatically exchanging information on tax rulings, reached at the ECOFIN Council in October 2015.

Complementary to international efforts to tackle this issue, we introduced the Diverted Profits Tax from April 2015 to counteract the diversion of profits from the UK by large multinational enterprises.

In the summer Budget 2015 we legislated to improve the effectiveness of our Controlled Foreign Company (CFC) regime by removing the ability for companies to use UK losses and reliefs against their CFC charge.

01/01/2023
Gavin Newlands – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Gavin Newlands on 2016-02-04.

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, what his Department’s policy is on the use of debt collection agencies to collect outstanding payments.

Joseph Johnson

The core Department’s policy is governed by HM Treasury’s ‘Managing Public Money’ guidance. This sets out that public sector organisations should always pursue recovery of debts. In practice there will be both practical and legal limits to how cases should be handled. So each case should be dealt with on its merits. Within BIS, the use of a debt collection agency would only be considered after all other methods of recovery had failed.

01/01/2023
Dan Jarvis – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Transport

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Dan Jarvis on 2016-03-02.

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what assessment he has made of the potential effect of the Civil Aviation Authority’s proposal to increase the fee for holding aerial displays on the viability of the aerial display industry.

Mr Robert Goodwill

The Civil Aviation Authority has consulted publicly on proposed air display and low flying permission charges. After this consultation, the Civil Aviation Authority would need to consult the Secretary of State, before making the scheme. When the Civil Aviation Authority consults the Secretary of State on any scheme, he will consider that scheme, including considering possible impacts on the viability of the aerial display industry.

01/01/2023
Tom Brake – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Tom Brake on 2016-04-08.

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, if he will estimate the number of (a) UK firms based in the North East of England that trade with other EU member states and (b) people employed by those firms.

Anna Soubry

HMRC Regional Trade Statistics on the number of firms trading with the EU are publically available through the UKTradeInfo website.

HM Treasury has published estimates of the number of UK jobs linked to EU exports broken down by region. These are available through the GOV.UK website.

01/01/2023