Tag: Lord Myners

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Myners on 2016-03-17.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether the Office for Budget Responsibility has produced its own forecast of the consequences of the UK leaving the EU.

Lord O’Neill of Gatley

The Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) prepares its forecasts on the basis of the current Government policy and does not look at alternative policy scenarios. Government policy is to remain within the EU. Therefore the OBR has not factored into its forecast the impact of a UK exit from the EU.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Myners on 2016-04-14.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of whether children of a first marriage are disadvantaged compared with the children of subsequent marriages under current inheritance tax rules.

Lord O’Neill of Gatley

Inheritance tax is generally levied on estates rather than on beneficiaries. Although any legacies to a spouse or civil partner will be exempt, the relationship between the deceased and the beneficiaries usually has no effect on the inheritance tax liability of an estate under the current rules. The children of first marriages and of subsequent marriages, and indeed other beneficiaries of the deceased, will generally be treated in the same way.

The Government considered whether children of a first marriage would be disadvantaged compared with children of subsequent marriages when developing legislation for the new residence allowance. This is being phased in from April 2017 for individuals who leave their home to their children, grandchildren or other direct descendants. The definition of direct descendants includes a person who was at any time a step-child of the deceased so it would apply equally to children of first and any subsequent marriages.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Myners on 2016-04-26.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether the Pensions Regulator will appoint an investment bank and retail consultancy to support its investigation into the events preceding BHS going into administration.

Baroness Altmann

Parliament gave the Pensions Regulator independence in how it operates. It is for the Regulator to determine how it wishes to undertake any investigation into matters relating to the BHS pension scheme.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Myners on 2016-05-09.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they plan to investigate the growth in the number of banks offering unsecured credit cards with interest and principal payment grace periods of more than three years, in the light of the most recent report by MoneyFacts.

Lord O’Neill of Gatley

The Government has fundamentally reformed regulation of the consumer credit market, which includes the credit card sector. Consumer credit regulation transferred from the Office of Fair Trading to the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) on 1 April 2014.

The FCA is currently undertaking a thorough review of the credit card market through its ‘credit card market study’. On 3 November 2015 the FCA published its interim report which found that the market was working reasonably well for most customers.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Myners on 2016-06-20.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government, further to the Written Answers by Lord O’Neill of Gatley on 6 June (HL348 and HL349), whether the Bank of England will have regulatory responsibility for the subsidiary clearing house of Deutsche Börse incorporated in Germany; and, if it will not, which regulator would have responsibility in the event of a dispute between the clearing house based in the UK and the one based in Germany.

Lord O’Neill of Gatley

As announced by the companies in February 2016, the existing regulatory framework of all regulated entities within the combined group would remain unchanged. This is subject to the regulatory review which will take place once the regulators are notified by the companies.

European Regulation No 648/2012 (EMIR) requires coordination amongst regulators for supervisory and authorisation matters with regards to CCPs.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Myners on 2016-03-17.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they will review the possible consequences for financial stability of the consolidation of central clearing houses.

Lord O’Neill of Gatley

European Regulation No 648/2012 (EMIR) establishes a strict supervisory framework for CCPs, which in the UK are regulated by the Bank of England.

EMIR’s requirements – which continue to apply in the event of a merger or change of control of a CCP – include that a CCP must be sufficiently well-resourced to withstand extreme market events, including the simultaneous default of its two largest clearing members.

In the event of a qualifying change of control the Bank of England must under EMIR also assess the suitability of the proposed acquirer and financial soundness of the proposed acquisition.

Copies of the Bank of England’s 2016 report on supervision of financial market infrastructures were laid before Parliament on 4 March and are available in the House library.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Myners on 2016-04-19.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of whether there would be any disadvantages of the London Stock Exchange being headquartered outside the UK.

Lord O’Neill of Gatley

I refer the noble Lord to my written answers of 26 April (HL7583, HL7584, HL7585, and HL7586)

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Myners on 2016-04-26.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they will review decisions taken by the Pensions Regulator in connection with the BHS pension schemes.

Baroness Altmann

In accordance with Parliament’s wishes, the Regulator has operational independence. Whilst performance against its key targets is regularly reviewed by the Department, this does not encompass its regulatory decision-making or the conduct of its investigations. It would be entirely inappropriate and improper for Ministers to comment on or intervene in these areas.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Myners on 2016-05-09.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they will investigate the case for sales of gift vouchers by retailers to be backed by cash collateral held in independent escrow.

Baroness Neville-Rolfe

Her Majesty’s Government has asked the Law Commission to consider the treatment of gift vouchers and pre-payments in the event of retailer insolvency. The Government will consider carefully any recommendations that may emerge on this question once the Law Commission’s report is published in the summer of 2016.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Lord Myners on 2016-07-13.

To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they have made an estimate of the cost of their monetary policy on the solvency of pension schemes, and whether they plan to use the profit made from quantitative easing to strengthen the financial position of the Pension Protection Fund.

Lord Freud

The UK’s monetary policy framework gives operational responsibility for monetary policy to the independent Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) at the Bank of England. Decisions on setting monetary policy are for the judgement of the Monetary Policy Committee.

The Government is sensitive to the fact that there will be those who gain and those who lose from any particular monetary policy decision. Such distributional effects typically balance out over the course of a policy cycle.

Over the last six years low interest rates have helped households and businesses through challenging economic times. Furthermore, as the Bank of England has explained in its article entitled "The distributional effects of asset purchases" published in its 2012 Q3 Quarterly Bulletin: "Without the Bank’s asset purchases, most people in the United Kingdom would have been worse off. Economic growth would have been lower. Unemployment would have been higher. Many more companies would have gone out of business. This would have had a significant detrimental impact on savers and pensioners along with every other group in our society."

The Pension Protection Fund is financially sustainable and there are no plans to further strengthen it. The PPF 2015/16 annual report said that the Fund has over £22 £23 billion assets under management and is 115 116.3 per cent funded.

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