Levelling Up: North-east England
Debate between Baroness Penn and Lord Foulkes of Cumnock(11 months, 2 weeks ago)
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Baroness Penn (Con)
The noble Lord is absolutely right that the north-east has huge potential when it comes to green jobs and industries, and that has been a real focus of government investment in the north-east, along with leaders there. We announced the investment zone for the north-east last month. That is all focused on advanced manufacturing, green industries and the creation of jobs there. It is backed by a huge amount of government funding, and we have already seen great results from it. I think we will see an increase in green jobs in the north-east, as well as across the rest of the country.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op)
My Lords, does the Minister agree that one of the best things about the north-east of England is that you are almost in Scotland? However, as the noble Lord, Lord Beith, said, when you get to the A1 in the north-east of England, it narrows down almost to a country lane—to a single-file road. Will the Minister answer the noble Lord’s question? When is it going to be dualled? That will be a symbol of Scotland and England remaining part of the United Kingdom.
Baroness Penn (Con)
I am going to have to disappoint the noble Lord. I do not have a date for him on when that project will be completed. Essential for improvements to transport across the north of England and in the north-east is the extra funding that will be made available for it through the cancellation of the final leg of HS2.
Bank of England: Interest Rate Policy
Debate between Baroness Penn and Lord Foulkes of Cumnock(1 year, 4 months ago)
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Baroness Penn (Con)
Much as noble Lords continue to ask me to comment on the conduct of monetary policy by the Bank of England, as I said, the Government do not comment on the conduct or effectiveness of monetary policy. We continue to support the MPC as it takes action, and we focus on making the tough decisions necessary to tackle inflation.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op)
My Lords, does the Minister not realise that this mortgage rate misery comes on top of the huge increase in the cost of energy and the continued increase in food prices and other costs? How do the multi-millionaires who run this Government find out how ordinary people are affected?
Baroness Penn (Con)
The noble Lord does not reflect on the action that has been taken by this Government that has supported those who struggle most to meet the rising cost of living, with more than £90 billion of support last year and this year focused on those who need it the most, including the energy price guarantee, direct support with energy bills and cost of living payments worth hundreds of pounds to millions of families across the country.
Gross Domestic Product: Wales and the UK
Debate between Baroness Penn and Lord Foulkes of Cumnock(1 year, 4 months ago)
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Baroness Penn (Con)
It is hard to tell from the other side whether there is a success story or not when it comes to Wales. I think that the best success comes when the UK and Welsh Governments work together in the interests of the people of Wales, and the record that we can see is testament to that.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op)
My Lords, can I ask a question where I think, for once, the noble Baroness, who is an excellent Minister, might be able to give me a positive answer? The Advocate-General for Scotland has agreed, at my request, to instruct his officials to investigate ultra vires expenditure by the Scottish Government. That is a great step forward. Can the Minister give an assurance that her officials in the Treasury will work co-operatively with the Advocate-General’s officials?
Income Tax Threshold
Debate between Baroness Penn and Lord Foulkes of Cumnock(1 year, 4 months ago)
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Baroness Penn (Con)
My noble friend is absolutely right. That is why, when we have looked at what support we can put in place for people, our number one aim is not to make the problem of inflation worse. We were able to do that through announcing the mortgage charter, which will provide important relief to people struggling with higher interest rates while not making the problem worse.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op)
My Lords, is the Minister aware that the noble Lord, Lord Balfe, and others are lucky that they do not live in Scotland, where middle-income taxpayers pay even more tax, which the Scottish Government then use in areas where they have no responsibility—such as a Minister for Independence, serviced by 20 UK civil servants and paid for by our taxes? It is about time the Treasury did something about that. When will the Government do it?
Baroness Penn (Con)
I absolutely agree with the noble Lord that the UK income tax system is more competitive than the Scottish system and that we deliver better value for money.
VAT: Building Repairs and Maintenance
Debate between Baroness Penn and Lord Foulkes of Cumnock(1 year, 7 months ago)
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Baroness Penn (Con)
My noble friend raises an important point. He is right that the renovation of existing properties can be an energy-efficient way to bring them back on to the market. There are special reduced rates of VAT for the renovation of properties that are converted either from commercial to residential use or from one residential use to another, if they are renovated after a period of two years without use. A temporary zero rate of VAT applies to installations of qualifying energy-saving materials, such as insulation, to address some of the points my noble friend raised.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op)
My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Swire, has just reminded me that, the last time I intervened with the Minister, I asked her to get Treasury officials to intervene in Scotland to stop the improper expenditure—she said she would not. Will she rethink that in light of recent events?
Arrivals Duty Free at UK Airports
Debate between Baroness Penn and Lord Foulkes of Cumnock(1 year, 7 months ago)
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Baroness Penn (Con)
My Lords, I reassure the noble Lord that the Government fully understand the contribution that tourism makes to our economy. To pick up his point about the Covid pandemic, through the pandemic the UK Government provided over £37 billion to support the tourism, leisure and hospitality sector in the form of grants, loans and tax breaks. Since then, the Government have contributed to various successful campaigns to stimulate recovery, including the £10 million National Lottery Days Out scheme and efforts by VisitBritain to deliver its international marketing campaign.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op)
My Lords, following the question from the noble Lord, Lord Vaizey, who mentioned the Scottish National Party, is the Minister aware that in Scotland we have had a Minister for Tourism—which includes what we are talking about in this Question today—since 1999, but the current Government of Scotland have made no such appointment? Instead, they have appointed a Minister for Independence, when the Prime Minister has rightly ruled out a referendum. As a Treasury Minister, will she get her officials to look into this unauthorised expenditure by the Scottish Government?
Baroness Penn (Con)
My Lords, I will say that it shows that the Scottish Government’s priorities lie in the wrong place, instead of seeking to address the priorities of the people of Scotland, whether it is tourism or improving their health and education systems. I think the people of Scotland would welcome a greater focus on those issues and less of a focus on something on which we recently had a referendum that settled the issue.
Carers in England
Debate between Baroness Penn and Lord Foulkes of Cumnock(1 year, 8 months ago)
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Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op)
My Lords, the Treasury does not seem to understand that by spending more money in one area, you can save even more in another area. If we spend more money in care homes, we can save a lot of money in the health service. As my noble friend Lord Haskel said, if we spend more money on carers, they can go out to work and help the economy. I have great faith in the noble Baroness. She has a lot of experience and is very persuasive. Will she go back to the Treasury and try to persuade it of this truth?
Baroness Penn (Con)
Perhaps I can persuade the noble Lord to have a little more faith in the Treasury’s attitude towards these things. I set out in an earlier answer the additional money that is going into social care this year and next, which was announced alongside healthcare spending. But the amount that we were putting into social care was precisely to acknowledge the role it plays, for example, in reducing delays to discharge that are affecting our health system.
Alcohol Duty Bands
Debate between Baroness Penn and Lord Foulkes of Cumnock(1 year, 10 months ago)
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Baroness Penn (Con)
My Lords, one of the big changes that we are making to alcohol duties is to ensure that higher-strength alcohol is taxed at a higher rate. This puts the points that the noble Lord makes at the heart of our approach. The normal process is to review alcohol duties on a yearly basis and take a decision in the round, and that will continue.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op)
My Lords, what discussions have the Treasury and the UK Government had with the Scottish Government, who clearly have an interest in this in relation to two aspects—one being minimum-unit pricing, which has not had the desired effect that the Scottish Government expected, and the other being their consideration of implementing a tax on whisky producers in Scotland to raise money to cover some of the expenditure of the Scottish Government?
Baroness Penn (Con)
My Lords, the Government have regular dialogue with the Scottish Government—indeed, the Prime Minister is there today. I agree with the noble Lord that the minimum-unit pricing approach has not always had the desired effect. The UK Government’s position is to address this through the level of duties, and relating that to the strength of alcohol. That is the better approach, and one that we can take now that we have left the EU.
Chelsea Football Club
Debate between Baroness Penn and Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
Baroness Penn (Con)
The noble Lord is quite right that football has had numerous opportunities to get its house in order. It has failed to do so. That is why we undertook the fan-led review and are considering its recommendations very carefully.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op)
My Lords, can I recommend to the Minister that she reads the really excellent—even though I modestly say so—Council of Europe report on football governance, which endorses the Tracey Crouch recommendations and encourages much greater fan ownership such as that of Heart of Midlothian Football Club? That is the largest fan-owned club in the whole of the United Kingdom, and the more of that the better. If Chelsea, Arsenal, Manchester United and many other clubs could move in that direction, football would be much better in the United Kingdom.
Baroness Penn (Con)
I thank the noble Lord for his bedtime reading recommendation and join with him in the spirit of what he says about the need for greater fan involvement in the governance of football.
Crypto Currencies
Debate between Baroness Penn and Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
Baroness Penn (Con)
It is probably worth trying to distinguish between different forms of crypto assets: unbacked crypto assets such as bitcoin can be highly volatile and speculative, and are therefore being regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority in terms of promotions; stablecoins tied to a reference asset could be used as a widespread means of payment and potentially deliver improvements in cross-border transactions; and the underlying blockchain technology could have a number of benefits, improving the efficiency of the settlement processes and reporting and enabling greater automation. So, it really is a question of a having a slightly more nuanced view of these different assets and regulating them appropriately.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op)
In one part of the United Kingdom, the Scottish National Party cannot make up its mind even on the existing currency and—if it were, unfortunately, to move towards independence—whether to accept the pound, move to the euro or go back to the groat. Is that not an extra reason why we should all be saying to Ms Sturgeon and her mob that they should concentrate on delivering services in the devolved areas and forget about their independence campaign?
Baroness Penn (Con)
My Lords, whenever the noble Lord stands up, I either strongly agree or strongly disagree with him; in this case, I strongly agree.
Enterprise Investment Schemes
Debate between Baroness Penn and Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
Baroness Penn (Con)
My Lords, I am not sure that I agree with the premise of the noble Lord’s question. However, he is right to say that one way to judge whether the levelling-up agenda is having the effect that we would want it to have is having greater take-up of these schemes for companies outside, as well as inside, London.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op)
My Lords, this is the latest example of one of the disasters of Brexit. Yesterday, we heard at the European Affairs Committee about Horizon Europe and the problems there. We are about to see the resignation of the First Minister and Deputy First Minister in Northern Ireland. There is disaster after disaster, yet we were promised £350 million a week for the National Health Service. As a Treasury Minister, could she tell us when that is going to come?
Baroness Penn (Con)
My Lords, we have put more than that sum of money into the health service, although I am not sure what that has to do with the Enterprise Investment Scheme. However, I can tell the noble Lord that those have continued to have success since our departure from the EU: £2.7 billion of funds were raised across three schemes last year and investments in VCTs are up 437% this year.
Covid-19: Hospital Patient Referrals
Debate between Baroness Penn and Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
Baroness Penn (Con)
My Lords, I can absolutely make that assurance in the case of testing. In the case of vaccination, there may be individual circumstances for a patient that make vaccination not appropriate at that point—for example, if you are symptomatic with Covid, you may not then be vaccinated. If you test positive, you are not discharged into a care home setting; you are discharged into an approved setting that has the right processes in place so that you can get the care that you need while being appropriately isolated.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op)
My Lords, while the Minister is doing a really excellent job at answering these questions, it does raise the question as to why the Minister responsible—the noble Lord, Lord Bethell—is in hiding. Is it because, unlike the noble Baroness, he is one of the guilty people responsible for the care home scandal, or is it because of his links with Gina Coladangelo?
Central Bank Digital Currency
Debate between Baroness Penn and Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
Baroness Penn (Con)
My Lords, the Treasury continues work with the Bank of England on its discussion paper and next steps for that. The Bank has also been part of a coalition of central banks, including the Federal Reserve and the European Central Bank, in considering the roles of CBDCs internationally and the importance of cross-border interoperability of such CBDCs.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op)
My Lords, further to the question asked by the noble Lord, Lord Vaizey, what specifically is being done to learn from experience in other countries, including the digital yuan in China, the e-krona in Sweden and in particular the sand dollar in the Bahamas, which is already in operation?
Baroness Penn (Con)
The noble Lord is correct that a number of countries have launched pilots of central bank digital currencies, which the UK is looking at closely. As I noted previously, the UK is also leading international work to ensure that there are standards for CBDCs and that they are interoperable across different jurisdictions.
Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme: Working Parents and School Closures
Debate between Baroness Penn and Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
Baroness Penn (Con)
My Lords, I am happy to take that back, but as regards the vaccination schedule, we are following the initial first wave set out by the JCVI, which goes by clinical vulnerability and particularly by age. I know that we will consider further waves after that and that we will consider the latest evidence, including on transmission and the impact on workers and public services.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op) [V]
But is the Minister not aware that in an unprecedentedly large response, the TUC found that more than 70% of those who asked their employers to put them forward for furlough were refused? The Government are refusing to make this a legal obligation on the very same day that down the Corridor, in the Commons, they are refusing to continue the £20 increase in universal credit. They are being exposed yet again for the mean and heartless Government they are.
Baroness Penn (Con)
The support that the Government have put in place through the furlough scheme and other schemes during this pandemic is absolutely unprecedented compared to any time in our history. The Government are there for families and people struggling through very difficult times, and will continue to be.
NHS: GP Vacancies
Debate between Baroness Penn and Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
Baroness Penn (Con)
My Lords, the noble Lord is correct that the Government are committed to increasing the number of doctors working in general practice. It is about not only increased recruitment—that is why we are increasing training places to 4,000 next year—but increased retention, which is incredibly important. A number of new retention schemes, which were included in the updated GP contract, have now been launched.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op) [V]
My Lords, will the Minister concede that, in spite of the much-vaunted promises by Tory election manifestos, the actual number of GPs has decreased for the first time since the 1960s. Does she not find explaining the difference between rhetoric and reality somewhat embarrassing?
Baroness Penn (Con)
My Lords, the noble Lord is correct that the number of GPs is down by 600 on last year. My understanding is that a number of factors have impacted this, including foundation doctors on placement in general practice being redeployed to secondary care during the Covid crisis; GPs working in NHS 111 during the Covid crisis; and the quality and completeness of data being impacted by Covid. But he is right: we need to do more. We have increased recruitment, and our emphasis is also on increasing retainment so that we can increase the number of GPs.
Covid-19: Levelling-up Agenda
Debate between Baroness Penn and Lord Foulkes of Cumnock
Baroness Penn (Con)
One of the important measures that we have announced on education is a catch-up tutoring programme, which has funding that goes to schools across the country, and particularly targets funding on those children who need most support. That will ensure that, although children have missed time at school this year, they will be able to catch up on it in future years.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op)
My Lords, does the Minister not realise that we are dealing not just with the effect of the Covid pandemic but with 10 years of Tory austerity, and so a great deal of levelling up is needed? Specifically, can she tell me what the Treasury is doing to make sure that the money allocated for Scotland is spent by the Scottish Government on the purposes that it was intended for, and not used as a sort of nest-egg to give to their friends?
Baroness Penn (Con)
My Lords, I will not try to overturn the devolution settlement in answering the noble Lord’s question. However, I can confirm that, during the pandemic, we have provided over £8.9 billion of funding to the devolved Administrations, which includes £4.6 billion for Scotland.