Asked by: Lord Maginnis of Drumglass (Independent Ulster Unionist - Life peer)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the closure of bank accounts belonging to the Core Issues Trust by Barclays Bank; and what steps they are taking to ensure that bank accounts are not closed as a result of any unfair bias or unlawful discrimination against Christian organisations.
Answered by Lord Agnew of Oulton
Decisions about whether to provide specific products or services to individuals or businesses remain commercial decisions for banks, building societies and alternative finance providers. It would therefore be inappropriate for the Government to intervene in these decisions.
The Government believes that any dispute arising between financial services firms and their customers is usually best resolved by the parties involved. Should a customer be dissatisfied with a firm’s response to their complaint, then they may wish to consider an approach to the Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS). The government established the FOS to provide a free, independent dispute resolution service for bank customers, including eligible small businesses.
Asked by: Lord Maginnis of Drumglass (Independent Ulster Unionist - Life peer)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether all regulations relating to the actions that banks are legally required to take when there has been unauthorised or fraudulent activity on a customer’s account also apply to building societies.
Answered by Lord Agnew of Oulton
Banks and building societies are both regarded as credit institutions under the EU Capital Requirements Regulation. As such, where there are obligations for unauthorised or fraudulent activity in relation to a credit institution, these apply equally to banks and building societies, unless stated otherwise.
Every industry has a role to play in protecting themselves and their customers from fraud - from keeping their customers’ personal and card payment details safe, to ensuring they have adequate mechanisms in place to spot and stop fraudulent transactions. The scale of fraud requires a unified response with the private sector, particularly the banking industry, retailers, telecommunications industry and social media companies.
Asked by: Lord Maginnis of Drumglass (Independent Ulster Unionist - Life peer)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask Her Majesty's Government how much money UK banks have reported as having been stolen from customer accounts through hacking in each of the last three financial years.
Answered by Lord Bates
UK Finance collects voluntary information on fraudulent transactions in the finance sector, which is published on their website.
Gross losses from unauthorised fraudulent transactions going back to 2012 have been published in UK Finance’s “2017 Annual Fraud Update”.
Asked by: Lord Maginnis of Drumglass (Independent Ulster Unionist - Life peer)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether banking laws and regulations apply consistently across all regions of the UK.
Answered by Lord Bates
Financial services, including banking, is generally a reserved matter under the devolution settlements for Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales. The majority of banking laws and regulations therefore apply consistently across all regions of the UK.
Asked by: Lord Maginnis of Drumglass (Independent Ulster Unionist - Life peer)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what statutory reporting systems banks in the UK are subject to in respect of money stolen from customer accounts through hacking.
Answered by Lord Bates
Under the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000, both the Bank of England and the Financial Conduct Authority have powers that require regulated firms to report to them when that firm suffers operational disruption from a cyber attack.
Under the European Banking Authority’s Payment Services Directive 2 regulation, firms are also required to report operational or security disruption of payments services to the Financial Conduct Authority.
Asked by: Lord Maginnis of Drumglass (Independent Ulster Unionist - Life peer)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask Her Majesty's Government how many cases of illegal tobacco trading, and illegal tobacco purchase and use, have been brought before the courts in each of the past three years; what was the maximum, and the mean, penalty imposed; and what was the total gross cost of those prosecutions.
Answered by Lord Bates
Prosecutions for illegal tobacco can be brought for a range of offences from dealing in illicit product, on which UK duty has not been paid, to breaches of the Department of Health’s regulations for tobacco control. Prosecutions can also be brought by a range of organisations including the Crown Prosecution Service and Local Authorities. Data on the total number of cases brought before the courts; the cost of those prosecutions; and the costs or penalties related to all tobacco related offences is not held centrally.
HMRC is unable to provide specific data relating to ‘illegal tobacco trading’ and ‘illegal tobacco purchase and use’, as this split is not recorded in our data. The table below shows the total number of tobacco cases dealt with by HMRC’s Fraud Investigation Service over the past three financial years.
Financial Year | Operations Adopted | Revenue Loss Protected (at date of intervention) | Number of Individuals Convicted | Number of Individuals Acquitted |
2014/15 | 406 | £988,677,013 | 237 | 26 |
2015/16 | 324 | £1,004,101,439 | 268 | 26 |
2016/17 | 365 | £1,140,300,083 | 318 | 39 |
Please note that the above data do not correlate to each other - they are separate occurrences in a particular financial year.
Asked by: Lord Maginnis of Drumglass (Independent Ulster Unionist - Life peer)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what is their assessment of the Tobacco Manufacturing Association's recent survey finding that over 70 per cent of tobacco used in the UK is obtained from illicit sources abroad; and what is their assessment of the impact of that finding on health and tax revenues.
Answered by Lord Bates
The Tobacco Manufacturers’ Association survey reports that 72.5% of smokers purchased tobacco from non-UK duty paid sources. This included legitimate cross-border shopping, which provided it is for personal use, is not subject to UK duty. Therefore, this is not a direct measurement of the illicit market or tax gap.
HMRC publishes annual estimates of the tobacco illicit market on the GOV.UK website. Its latest estimate of revenue losses associated with illicit tobacco was £2.4 billion in 2015-16.
Tackling illicit tobacco, which undermines government taxation and public health policy is a government priority. Since 2000, when the government launched its first strategy to tackle illicit tobacco, the percentage tax gap for cigarettes has reduced in 2015-16 from 22% to 13% and for hand-rolling tobacco from 61% to 32%.