Financial Services and Markets Bill

Debate between Baroness Penn and Lord Northbrook

Committee stage
Monday 6th February 2023 Grand Committee

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

I will absolutely take away the noble Lord’s suggestion. I cannot speak for others but I would be happy to engage further on this before Report, drawing on the other strands of government work; I agree with the noble Lord that it might be useful to have other Ministers there too. I recognise that the other Bills are not as far along as this one is, so we will not be able to pre-empt some of that work, but I think we can co-ordinate it for noble Lords if that would be helpful.

Finally, I was dealing with Amendment 217 and noting that, by law, income from fines imposed by the courts needs to be paid into the consolidated fund. That income is not ring-fenced but is used towards general government expenditure on public services. The Government agree that it is important for bodies responsible for investigating and prosecuting fraud to be appropriately resourced to discharge their responsibility. The NCA’s budget is made up of a number of different funding streams. That budget has increased every year since 2019-20 and, as part of the 2021 spending review, it was allocated a settlement of more than £810 million. This represents an uplift of approximately 14%, or £100 million, compared with the previous spending review. The noble Baroness, Lady Kramer, asked me a few more specific questions beneath those headline figures; perhaps I can write to her and the Committee with that information.

The FCA and the PRA are operationally independent regulators funded by a levy on the firms they regulate. I would like to reassure the noble Baroness that the regulators already have the power to ensure that they are resourced appropriately, without the need to divert funds away from general government expenditure. As I said to the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, I recognise the important principle behind this amendment—that consideration should be given to how the proceeds of fines can support the costs of enforcement activity.

[Lord Northbrook (Con)]

Can the Minister address the point about Thames Valley Police not being reimbursed for the £7 million it spent, which has discouraged other police forces from carrying out those sorts of investigations? Will there be any sort of move to reimburse police forces investigating crimes of this sort?

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

I have heard the point and I acknowledge the principle that this amendment seeks to explore in terms of those incentives, but I point to the NCA’s budget and the regulators’ budgets. We seek to ensure that enforcement agencies have the proper money available to them to take enforcement activity. I also point out that, while the funds currently go into general expenditure, that funding is spent on other public services, so it does not go unspent elsewhere.

Economy: Spring Statement

Debate between Baroness Penn and Lord Northbrook

Thursday 31st March 2022 Grand Committee

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

My Lords, I understood the noble Lord’s points and attempted to describe why we have evolved a system of national insurance contributions that is separate from our income tax system. I am sure this will not be the last time we debate this subject, particularly with the noble Lord.

I was just talking about the choices we have made with this Spring Statement and since then. If you look at them in the round, they benefit the poorest households most. This Spring Statement recognises the impact of growing pressures on the cost of living. We continued with the health and social care levy because it will provide additional funding for the public’s priority of the NHS and, in time, as those reforms come on stream, for social care. I believe it was the right choice to do that and raise the thresholds for national insurance rather than to scrap or cut the health and social care levy altogether. If we were to do that, as advocated in the policy of the shadow Chancellor, because half the revenues from the health and social care levy come from the highest 15% of earners, a reversal would not be targeted at the lowest and middle earners.

The same goes for support to tackle energy bills. The shadow Chancellor has talked about scrapping VAT on domestic energy, which would also benefit high-income households most. There are choices to be made and they are really difficult—I do not shy away from that. But this Spring Statement provides a tax cut to support millions of people with the cost of living. We have set out how we plan to use taxes to support higher growth in this country in years to come and how, when we are on the path to that and to meeting our fiscal rules, we will share the proceeds of that growth.

I thank noble Lords for their patience with the length of my—

[Lord Northbrook (Con)]

Before the Minister sits down, can I kindly ask whether, in the interests of time, she would kindly write to me? I had some queries.

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

I will be happy to write to the noble Lord on his specific points. I apologise for not being able to cover them in my response. With that, I commend this Motion to the Committee.

New Businesses: Capital Gains Tax

Debate between Baroness Penn and Lord Northbrook

Wednesday 20th January 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

My Lords, the proposals for equalisation are currently in a report from the Office of Tax Simplification and do not represent government policy—although of course the Government will look at the recommendations of that report very carefully.

[Lord Northbrook (Con)]

My Lords, will my noble friend the Minister use her best endeavours to encourage the Chancellor to keep capital gains tax rates the same, and encourage him also to take the view that, within reason, lower rates of tax, particularly capital gains tax, can lead to higher revenues for the Treasury?

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

My Lords, the Government always consider the need to balance raising revenue with the principles of fairness and market efficiency when we take tax decisions. All tax decisions also take into account the impacts of behavioural change for those affected. At any fiscal event, the Government produce and publish policy costings which are scrutinised by the OBR, and these include relevant behavioural impacts on revenue.