The below Parliamentary question was asked by Anna Turley on 2015-11-04.
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, what due diligence was undertaken by his Department prior to the purchase of the Redcar coke ovens and blast furnace.
Anna Soubry
The purchase of the Redcar coke ovens and blast furnace was a commercial transaction between SSI and Tata Steel, both privately owned companies.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Anna Turley on 2015-11-13.
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, what assessment he has made of the effect of raising the minimum wage on the capacity of charities to deliver public services.
Mr Rob Wilson
The National Living Wage will benefit low paid workers across all sectors, including charity workers delivering public services on behalf of the state.
Government is taking steps to support employers with the transition. For example, the employer National Insurance Bill for businesses and charities will be cut by £1000 from April 2016.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Anna Turley on 2016-04-19.
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what comparative information his Department holds on the rate of pregnancies affected by neural tube defects in the UK and in other EU member states.
Ben Gummer
The prevalence of neural tube defects in live births, fetal deaths (over 20 weeks’ gestation) and terminations of pregnancy for fetal anomaly in 2012 in the British Isles Network of Congenital Anomaly Registers, registers (covering 36% of the births in England and Wales) was 12.5 per 10,000 births (source: Congenital anomaly statistics 2012, England and Wales (2014)).
In European Surveillance of Congenital Anomalies registries (covering 25.8% of the births in the United Kingdom) the prevalence of neural tube defects in 2012 for the UK was 12.53 neural tube defects per 10,000 births. By comparison, other European Union member states ranged from 1.75 per 10,000 births to 17.37 per 10,000 births. Differences in total prevalence rates may reflect a number of factors including genetic and environmental differences.
Data on prevalence is available at:
http://www.eurocat-network.eu/AccessPrevalenceData/PrevalenceTables
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The below Parliamentary question was asked by Anna Turley on 2016-06-08.
To ask the Prime Minister, when he plans to reply to the letter of 27 April 2016 from the hon. Member for Redcar and the hon. Member for Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland on the All Party Parliamentary Group on Steel.
Mr David Cameron
A reply has been sent.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Anna Turley on 2016-07-18.
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, if she will bring forward plans to consolidate existing legislation on online abuse and malicious communication.
Sir Oliver Heald
Legislation that can be used to prosecute online abuse and related offences includes the Protection from Harassment Act 1997; the Malicious Communications Act 1988; and the Communications Act 2003. The Criminal Justice and Courts Act 2015 made changes to the relevant offences in these last two Acts which aim to ensure that people who commit them are prosecuted and properly punished.
The Government believes that current legislation is sufficient and does not intend to consolidate existing legislation relating to online abuse and malicious communication.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Anna Turley on 2016-10-07.
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether there are any remaining staff on the former SSI site responsible for environmental management; what estimate she has made of the number of staff responsible for environmental management who are no longer employed; and what assessment she has made of the minimum level of environmental staffing required.
Dr Thérèse Coffey
The Environment Agency has been working closely with the Official Receiver in order to ensure that the site is being safely overseen by staff under his direction. Whilst staffing matters are for the Official Receiver to decide, the Environment Agency are in regular contact with staff overseeing the former SSI site and do not have any concerns with regards to their environment management.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Anna Turley on 2015-11-03.
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, if he will assess the performance of the Official Receiver during the liquidation of SSI UK.
Anna Soubry
It is not part of the Secretary of State’s functions to assess the performance of the Official Receiver when acting as liquidator. The Secretary of State cannot interfere in the administration of the liquidation.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Anna Turley on 2015-11-13.
To ask Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer, whether the Enterprise Investment Scheme, Venture Capital Trust, tax relief or Seed Enterprise Investment Scheme have offered low-risk investment opportunities in energy generation; and what his Department’s definition of low-risk is in this context.
Mr David Gauke
The purpose of the tax-advantaged venture capital schemes is to provide funding to smaller, higher-risk companies that would otherwise struggle to access finance to develop and grow. To target the schemes at these companies, and to ensure investment is not crowded out by low-risk investment opportunities, the schemes exclude certain activities from qualifying for investment under the schemes.
The list of excluded activities is updated as necessary to exclude activities that are able to access finance from the market and which may therefore be regarded as lower risk. These include asset-backed activities, such as property dealing and development, leasing of assets or exploiting acquired copyrights, general financial and professional services, and financing activities that can divert the tax reliefs to non-qualifying activities. For these activities, a lack of proven track record is unlikely to affect the company’s ability to access finance. In addition, such activities are likely to have collateral against which loans can be secured.
In recent years, the Government has been concerned about the disproportionate amount of tax-advantaged investment in certain energy generation activities. Their asset-backed nature makes it easier for these activities to access mainstream finance. Therefore the Government has taken several steps to exclude certain types of energy generation from the schemes, including in 2012, 2014 and 2015.
The Government keeps all tax-advantaged venture capital schemes under review, and makes changes where necessary to ensure the schemes remain well-targeted and effective.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Anna Turley on 2016-04-19.
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what his policy is on a person providing child maintenance having their payments regarded for the purpose of an income assessment for means-tested benefit.
Priti Patel
A person who is providing child maintenance does not have their payments disregarded for the purpose of an income assessment, in a means-tested benefit, as this would amount to the tax payer meeting a person’s liabilities.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Anna Turley on 2016-06-24.
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps he is taking to ensure that airport expansion at (a) Heathrow and (b) Gatwick Airport will benefit the UK steel industry.
Mr Robert Goodwill
The Government’s steel procurement guidance sets out how government buyers should source steel in a more strategic and transparent way and will help to ensure that UK manufacturers are in the best possible place to react to tenders for major procurements when they arise. We would encourage companies to adopt the guidance where possible in their own purchasing activities.
Airports are privately owned companies and all of the promoters have proposed privately-funded schemes. It would be for the airport to procure the materials they need as these are privately financed and developed projects.