Arrivals Duty Free at UK Airports

Debate between Baroness Penn and Baroness Randerson

Thursday 30th March 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

My Lords, I will repeat what I said to the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, that this absolutely demonstrates that the priorities of the Scottish Government lie in the wrong place and are not aligned with the people in Scotland.

[Baroness Randerson (LD)]

My Lords, returning to the abolition in 2020-21 of the right to reclaim VAT on purchases made in high-street shops, I think the Minister said that nowadays that would cost a considerable amount. But the tourism and retail industries contest that claim. It is two years since that decision was made. Surely the Treasury has up-to-date details.

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

The noble Baroness is right that there are direct costs of offering any scheme through VAT being refunded but there may be indirect benefits in terms of stimulating tourism and other spending. The Treasury seeks to take both those issues into account when looking at these issues. When the decision was taken to withdraw VAT-free shopping for visitors, the Treasury also held a round table with the industry to hear those views. As I said to my noble friend Lord Vaizey, we continue to welcome representations to help to inform future decisions.

European Structural and Investment Funds and the European Agricultural Guarantee Fund

Debate between Baroness Penn and Baroness Randerson

Tuesday 21st March 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

My Lords, the commitment that the Government have made is that the replacement of EU funding in each nation will meet the levels that they previously received. That is the commitment that we are delivering through the shared prosperity fund.

[Baroness Randerson (LD)]

My Lords, Wales was a beneficiary of EU funding, as one of the poorest parts of the EU. The Welsh Government used a big slice of that funding to support university support partnerships across Wales and beyond. Because the new shared prosperity fund is administered by the UK Government and local authorities, there is no scope for universities to benefit in the same way, leaving a big hole in the amount available for university research, which is of course essential for levelling up. Will the Minister undertake that she will, with her colleagues, examine this problem and amend the UK’s funding mechanisms in order to solve the big hole that is appearing in university research funding? I declare an interest as chancellor of Cardiff University.

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

My Lords, the UK shared prosperity fund was designed to give local areas more discretion about how they spend that funding, aligned with local priorities. The UK Government provide significant support to our research sector, including through universities, but I am happy to take the noble Baroness’s feedback back to the Treasury.

IMF Economic Outlook

Debate between Baroness Penn and Baroness Randerson

Tuesday 31st January 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

My Lords, I believe that that is not a forecast but a modelling assumption. We will look at the record of the UK economy since leaving the EU, and we continue to grow. Since the Brexit referendum, we have grown at a similar rate to Germany, and, last year, we had one of the highest growth rates in Europe. So we look at the record and the outturn, not just the predictions.

[Baroness Randerson (LD)]

My Lords, last week, Tony Danker, the leader of the CBI, made a speech in which he remarked on the fact that private investment was flooding out of the UK because of the Government’s lack of a strategy to deal with the economic mess we are in. What is the noble Baroness’s response to that criticism from the main representative of business in the UK?

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

I believe that, last week, Tony Danker also welcomed a speech by my right honourable friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer that set out his vision for growth in the UK, looking at the sectors that we are most competitive in, setting out proposals for new regulatory freedoms in those sectors and investing in the drivers of our economy, such as education and enterprise.

Wales: Additional Financial Resources

Debate between Baroness Penn and Baroness Randerson

Wednesday 18th January 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

My Lords, the fiscal framework between the UK and the Welsh Governments was agreed in 2016; that added a needs-based factor into the Barnett formula to ensure that Wales receives fair funding. It receives at least 15% more funding per person than the equivalent UK government spending in the rest of the UK. In fact, in the current spending review period, that additional amount is 20%.

[Baroness Randerson (LD)]

My Lords, the lack of Barnett consequentials from the HS2 rail project—a railway not a foot of which will be built in Wales—is a glaring injustice. The recently confirmed extension of the project means that additional Barnett formula funding was confirmed for Scotland and Northern Ireland. Why not Wales?

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

As the noble Baroness will know, the Welsh Government do not receive Barnett on HS2 spending because rail infrastructure in Wales is a reserved matter and the UK Government continue to invest in rail infrastructure in both England and Wales.

Working from Home

Debate between Baroness Penn and Baroness Randerson

Monday 4th July 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

I understand the point the noble Baroness makes. We do need to move with the times on hybrid working; however, from the perspective of young people—I am not sure that I am one, but I may be slightly younger—there are some downsides to remote working regarding opportunities to mentor and learn in the job, or for people whose housing situations do not allow them space to work properly. It is all a question of balance. It is also right, after the peaks of what we saw during the pandemic, that people move more towards spending some time in the office and interacting with colleagues.

[Baroness Randerson (LD)]

My Lords, increased home working has led to a dramatic drop in sales of rail season tickets, down to 30% of pre-pandemic levels. Traditionally, rail companies relied heavily on this reliable source of funding. We have been promised for years the modernisation of ticketing on the railways, making tickets simpler to purchase, with cheaper and fairer fares. Can the Minister tell us when we are going to get this long-promised revolution?

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

My Lords, I believe that quite a bit of it is under way, but I am not as familiar with progress as my colleagues in the Department for Transport will be. What I can say is that an assessment by the National Infrastructure Commission found—the noble Baroness is right—that pandemic restrictions and associated increases in remote working did affect infrastructure use. However, it is too early to assume that long-term behaviour change such as increased remote working would lead to a wholly different pattern of infrastructure. In terms of our approach to transport infrastructure, there is an element of “wait and see” on the effects of the pandemic.

Heavy Commercial Vehicles in Kent (No. 1) (Amendment) Order 2020

Debate between Baroness Penn and Baroness Randerson

Thursday 26th November 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Randerson (LD) [V]]

My Lords, once again we are updating SIs that we dealt with last year. It is worth remembering that at that time the concept of lorry drivers needing a Kent passport was shocking, and that when the Minister was asked whether the timing of the sunset clause was sufficient, we were strongly reassured that it was generous. The first of these SIs extends the sunset clause from 31 December this year to 31 October 2021, so I ask the Minister again if she is convinced that this new date will be long enough. Are the Government convinced that they will not need Operation Brock after next October?

I am comparing the situation in Kent with the crisis the Government are facing in providing lorry parking for Holyhead. It was clear from an Answer given yesterday to a Question that there is no hope of a lorry park near Holyhead being up and running before July. In the meantime, customs clearance processes will take place in Warrington and Birmingham, over 100 miles from the port. This is obviously an open invitation for all manner of evasion of export and import controls. I echo the concerns of the noble Lord, Lord Bourne, about the serious disruption in north Wales, although the Reasonable Worst Case Scenario the Government produced seemed to dismiss this entirely.

In September, the Cabinet Office issued a Reasonable Worst Case Scenario for Borders at the End of the Transition Period, as I have just said. That estimated that 30% to 50% of trucks might not be border ready on 1 January and that this would lead to daily queues of 7,000 HGVs in Kent by February. I am assuming that we are now in that worst-case scenario, as we are 36 days away from the end of the transition and there is no deal. We had a taste of this earlier this week when the French border authorities trialled the new passport checks that will be required and five-mile queues of lorries developed on the M20.

So freight operators are being told to prepare for the change, and their very loud response is to ask exactly what kind of change they are supposed to prepare for. A spokesperson for Logistics UK has quite reasonably pointed out that the Government’s own hauliers’ handbook is incomplete, and press reports suggest it is pretty incomprehensible. As a large percentage of the hauliers crossing via the channel ports are not British, if it is to work, it also needs translation. Do the Government intend to translate the handbook, and when do they expect it to be ready? I am conscious that I have also asked this as a Written Question but I had not received a reply by the start of the debate. I apologise if I have received a reply since it started.

Like the noble Baroness, Lady Altmann, I will take this opportunity to ask about the state of preparedness of the government IT systems for the new border controls and what progress has been made on recruiting the additional staff required. How near the target are the Government?

These orders make some additional amendments to the 2019 orders as well. They modify the approved routes that an HCV can take to the ports and require them to have a Kent access permit when using the local road network. That is understandable as communities in Kent have suffered considerable disruption and inconvenience in the past when there have been short-term problems. The disruption we are discussing here will probably last for some months, of course, and it could possibly be semi-permanent. It will certainly cause supply problems, as an HCV held up on the journey out will almost certainly be delayed on its return, along with its load. So it is regrettable that this is all so close to the wire.

There is an additional specific exception in the Heavy Commercial Vehicles in Kent (No. 3) (Amendment) Order 2020, which goes along with these two, allowing hauliers from east Kent and Faversham to use local roads. Was this the only request for such an exception? As I said when we discussed this issue before, there are bound to be hold-ups for other local commercial traffic simply trying to go about its daily business in Kent.

Retailers and hauliers are particularly concerned about perishable goods, so these orders allow priority to hauliers carrying highly perishable goods, live animals and goods which

“would give rise to a disproportionate economic impact on a geographical area of the UK.”

The first two are clear but I wonder whether the Minister can help me with the very strange phraseology of the third exception. It strikes me that this could apply to a very large proportion of lorries. What about steel from south Wales or tinned peas from Lincolnshire? Each of those is very important to the local economy. Forgive me for being sceptical, but this sounds like a last-minute addition put in by a Minister to help a friend.

There is to be a prioritisation site at Ebbsfleet. Can the Minister tell us exactly how that will work? I am concerned that the criterion is that a lorry has to be carrying a single load of fresh or live seafood. Surely the issues about freshness and welfare of animals apply just the same if you have other items in your load as well?

The big pharmaceutical companies are concerned that supplies of medicines and vaccines could well be interrupted and delayed. Can the Minister explain why are they not included as a priority category? The Government apparently do not hold strategic food reserves. Can the Minister tell us what discussions the Department for Transport has had with other departments about shortages of strategic supplies and how they might be minimised?

Finally, I take issue with the Explanatory Memorandum’s impact assessment, which must surely go down in history as stretching credibility until it snaps. It says:

“There is no significant, lasting impact on business … the Check an HGV service will have a limited burden on industry once familiarised”.


That refers to a required set of documentation that will, according to Sainsbury’s, cost thousands of pounds per load. It continues:

“There is no … significant … impact on the public sector.”


Tell that to the police or the NHS or the local councils concerned—

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

I am sorry, I have to remind the noble Baroness of the time limit for contributions in this debate.

Green Investment Fund

Debate between Baroness Penn and Baroness Randerson

Wednesday 2nd September 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

Of course the Government want to support business and industry during this difficult time. We do not see a tension between getting our economy back on its feet now and meeting our longer-term targets on climate change action.

[Baroness Randerson (LD)]

My Lords, the Government are urging us to abandon home-working and to return to our offices with the old daily commute, but travelling to work creates harmful emissions. What assessment have the Government made of the impact of the return to the daily commute on both climate change and the health of the population?

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

As we can see from a slightly busier House today than before Recess, some noble Lords have returned to a bit of a commute. I do not think there has to be a contribution to climate change from commuting. That is why we have invested £2 billion in walking and cycling, which can contribute to people’s well-being. One of the things that we have seen during the pandemic is more flexible working structures that may allow people to get away from just peak travel. That can reduce congestion and reduce the impact on climate change.