The below Parliamentary question was asked by Robert Syms on 2014-06-12.
To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, what fraction of mean rated output will be achieved on average throughout the lifetime of Navitus Bay.
Gregory Barker
The Department does not undertake analysis or hold information of this nature relating to specific developments. The average load factor for offshore wind farms using five year historical data from 2008 to 2012 inclusive is 33.1%.
The below Parliamentary question was asked by Robert Syms on 2014-06-12.
To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, what the global mean carbon dioxide concentration in the atmosphere and partial pressure of carbon dioxide in the oceans will be (a) at the outset and (b) at the end of the Navitus Bay lifetime, if the project goes ahead, (c) at the end of the Navitus Bay lifetime, if the project does not go ahead.
Gregory Barker
The Department does not undertake analysis or hold information of this nature relating to specific developments. The average load factor for offshore wind farms using five year historical data from 2008 to 2012 inclusive is 33.1%.
The comments made by Robert Syms, the Conservative MP for Poole, on Twitter on 21 October 2022.
My view is that the best candidate to lead the Conservative Party is Rishi Sunak and I am happy to nominate him for the contest.
The comments made by Robert Syms, the Conservative MP for Poole, on Twitter on 20 October 2022.
I am glad the Prime Minister Liz Truss has accepted that things were not working and welcome her decision which has put the Country first. Her statement was dignified and i wish her well in the future.
The speech made by Robert Syms, the Conservative MP for Poole, in the House of Commons on 5 July 2022.
As the motion relates to a Treasury matter, may I pay tribute to the former Chancellor, my right hon. Friend the Member for Richmond (Yorks) (Rishi Sunak)? He had to get the country through a difficult period in the pandemic. He produced a number of interesting schemes, such as the furlough and the self-employment income support scheme, where the software worked and where people were helped. I think he was very creative in the way he handled a difficult situation. I know that it is not always easy for senior politicians to take decisions such as the one that he has taken today. I wish him well, along with the former Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, my right hon. Friend the Member for Bromsgrove (Sajid Javid). We will see how events unfold.
Let me start by taking a traditional Conservative position and saying that I do not like windfall taxes. The North sea is a tremendous British success story. We have got oil out of deep seas using technology, investment and British initiative over decades and we have benefited the nation in doing so. We are a nation that has oil and gas all the way around its coast, as Professor Peter Odell used to say in the 1970s. It is just a question of whether it is viable to get it out, and whether the tax and investment regime is good enough.
The North sea is quite mature now. Although the rise in prices is unwelcome for motorists, it certainly gives the opportunity to extend the life of some fields and makes other oil fields with more marginal prospects more viable. If we are looking for a resilient future for our country, getting the best out of our natural resources in the transition to net zero, I think we ought to have a stable tax network, not act like a Venezuelan junta by jumping in and trying to take money away from oil companies. And what are oil companies? They are normally vehicles for pension funds for lots of elderly people living up and down the country who rely on that income to pay their cost of living bills. There is no such thing as a painless tax rise. There is no magic money tree if we go and punch the oil and gas companies in the mouth. I think this is a very short-sighted policy. It may raise money, but the consequences are long term, and it may have an impact on investment.
Apart from the creation of an oil industry, there are thousands of jobs in oil services in and around Aberdeen, in many other parts of the United Kingdom and, now, worldwide. I think we ought to be proud of what this country has achieved, and we ought to be doing what we can to support those well-paid and important jobs as we go towards net zero.
I am not going to divide the House today. I do not think I would get a seconder, as I am probably the only person who is against the windfall tax at the moment, but we will see how this transpires. I think that a stable tax system in which people in the oil and gas industry can look decades ahead—because investment decisions sometimes take decades—is a much better way of dealing with the situation.
Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)
I understand the hon. Gentleman’s arguments, although I do not agree with them, but has he an alternative proposal for helping people to bring down their energy bills? I am sure that many of his constituents are deeply worried about how they will make ends meet, particularly with the next increase in bills coming this autumn. How does he suggest we help them?
Sir Robert Syms
I am not sure that the £5 billion raised from the oil companies will find its way into the pockets of people who are worried about their energy bills. As far as I know, it is going into the Treasury.
I return to my original simple point. The Government have already undertaken a number of measures to help with bills; the problem is the lag between the decision making and the assistance that they are giving. So there is always more pressure to do more. I am hopeful that, as we proceed, people will suddenly see some of the bail-out help with bills that the Government have already factored in. But I think that a stable tax system is a better way of proceeding than adding a higher levy on top of corporation tax rates, which are already higher than the rates for most other companies. Let us not forget that many of these oil companies were losing money 18 months ago when we were in lockdown.
I am unhappy with this policy. I will find it interesting to see how the Government bring the positives forward. I am pleased that they have listened to representations—and the former Chancellor was talking to the oil industry—but I think that in the long term this is bound to have a negative effect on investment in the sector, and that what we should be doing is cherishing and encouraging the sector so that we import less from other countries and give ourselves more resilience and security of supply.
That is really all that I wanted to say. I wanted to make my reactionary right-wing comments about windfall taxes, and I did not want the motion to go through without my putting them on the record.
Below is the text of the speech made by Sir Robert Syms, the Conservative MP for Poole, in the House of Commons on 15 March 2018.
I rise to discuss the UK tax treatment of CERN pensioners, but the subject goes rather wider than purely CERN. I mention CERN only because I have two or three constituents who are quite exercised by recent changes.
George Osborne brought in a change to do away with the concession whereby people with foreign pensions were taxed on 90% of their income, pushing that up to 100% in 2017-18. That has had a material effect on several of my constituents, but there must be people who worked for a number of organisations who are affected by the tax change when they land pensions back into the United Kingdom. I shall talk a little about CERN, but also about one or two other international organisations, because the more I look into this issue, the more complex it becomes.
CERN was set up by UNESCO in 1954 as an international organisation, based in Geneva, to carry out fundamental research in high-energy physics. The UK was among its 12 founding members; today, there are 22 member states. The host nations are Switzerland and France, and most of those who work at CERN on a day-to-day basis live in either Switzerland or France, in or around the vicinity of Geneva. CERN served as a model for successful European collaboration, and several similar organisations, working in fields such as space research, have since been created, based on its structure.
On retiring, CERN staff receive pensions in Swiss francs. They are not ungenerous pensions—some are in six figures—because these people are extremely able, talented scientists who have committed themselves to science. CERN staff can either stay in one of the host states or move elsewhere. Many member states offer favourable tax treatment to attract such staff to their country. They range from Austria, which allows CERN staff to retire tax-free, to Spain, Malta and Sweden, where low rates have been negotiated, typically in the order of 10%.
The UK never gave any kind of special privileges to CERN retirees, but there was provision under our tax law that 90% of foreign pensions would be taxed. If someone is on a six-figure pension and the first £8,000 or £10,000 is disregarded, bringing them down in all the various tax brackets, that concession is worth having. CERN pensioners, who are particularly bright, have to decide where they are going to land themselves and their families when they have finished working. Many wish to move back to the UK, and they previously saw the UK Government’s more modest concession as attractive enough for them to retire to places such as Poole.
I make one very important point about CERN pensioners: they have not benefited from UK tax concessions in any way. They do not get the 25% tax-free cash payment that a UK taxpayer gets. Effectively, they have earned their pension by working abroad for an international organisation in which we have a big interest. They have come back to the UK and then been given a slightly better tax position, probably in recognition of the fact that many people who have foreign pensions do not benefit from the reduced rate available to those who contribute to pensions in this country.
Pensioners of other international organisations that are similar to CERN do receive special concessions from the UK Treasury. I understand that there are organisations that represent those who have worked for the UN, or its various agencies, and that discussions are going on about the appropriate rate. I also know that there are discussions about pensioners from the World Bank. A number of European organisations work under similar terms and conditions as CERN. Known as the co-ordinated organisations, they include: the Council of Europe; the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts; the European Space Agency; the European Organisation for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites; the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation; and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. The International Service for Remunerations and Pensions, which is based in Paris, is responsible for the pay and rations of all those bodies. As I understand it, the civil servants who work for these co-ordinated organisations are taxed on only 50% of their salaries.
There are therefore examples of concessionary rates for organisations in which Britain participates, and my constituents have a very simple request: if the UK Treasury is not going to tax them on 50% of their income, which I somehow doubt that it will, they wish to go back to the 90% rate with which they were happy. Many decided to move back to the United Kingdom on the basis of that proposition. I stress that, because some of the pensions are high, over 20 years, the amount in question represents probably a couple of million pounds’ worth of sterling. We should bear in mind that the money is landed back in the UK in Swiss francs, and that it is not only taxed but spent in the United Kingdom.
There is actually a very strong economic argument for making a pitch to people with good international salaries to come back to the UK to retire in order to feed the very important column that is UK invisible earnings. My constituents thought that they would be taxed at only 90%, but feel that the rules have changed, so they would like the UK Government to reconsider.
When I asked the House of Commons Library what happened to civil servants who retired from the EU, I was told very politely that the EU taxed them and kept the money. I am very surprised that Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs—it must be letting the side down—does not have any say over EU civil servants who retire back to the UK. I suspect that that is one of those fine points of detail that will be dealt with in the withdrawal negotiations. If those people were given a preferential arrangement, I would be extremely surprised if the UK Government were to change that and make those people’s pensions taxable at 100%.
This complex area involves a number of tax treaties and several international organisations, all of which operate to a different range of rules. My essential point is that a few of my constituents who worked hard in the scientific sector and earned good pensions thought that they had a proposition that meant that they were taxed at 90%, but now feel somewhat aggrieved that the previous Chancellor has pushed their rate up to 100%. As I have said, that was not the most generous tax proposition—those of other countries are far more generous—but that rate was attractive enough to get these people to move to places such as Poole. I hope that the UK Government will consider the options. Given that this is a complex area, I wonder if the Minister might be willing to meet me and a few CERN pensioners to discuss the matter more fully so that we can get to the bottom of whether they are being treated fairly and reasonably.
Finally, I congratulate the Minister on taking his post. He is among the Members on these Benches who I always thought was destined for high things. He had to start somewhere, and Economic Secretary to the Treasury is a fine and important post.