Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Alex Cunningham and Anne-Marie Trevelyan

Tuesday 18th July 2023 Commons Chamber

[Anne-Marie Trevelyan]

My hon. Friend is right. The opportunities the Indo-Pacific brings for UK citizens and businesses are enormous and we look forward to the comprehensive and progressive agreement for trans-Pacific partnership being one more new opportunity for them to discover one of the most exciting parts of the world.

[Alex Cunningham (Stockton North) (Lab)]

Following up the question from my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne Central (Chi Onwurah), a Billingham constituent is regularly in touch with me. Her Ugandan girlfriend lives in fear of her life every day, as new laws have seen more and more LGBT+ people persecuted. What more can the Government do with our allies to help people such as my constituent’s girlfriend and protect LGBT+ activists and human rights defenders in Uganda?

Steel Safeguards

Debate between Alex Cunningham and Anne-Marie Trevelyan

Wednesday 29th June 2022 Commons Chamber

[Anne-Marie Trevelyan]

I have had a number of meetings with various groups of downstream users of steel, where I have learned a great deal about all sorts of things. What came across strongly was that category 12A was where we had a shortage of capacity for our downstream users to use without getting caught in the tariff framework, because we do not produce enough of it here and so it must be imported. As I say, we have set out the change to that tariff rate quota to ensure—I hope—that our downstream users who want to make use of that particular quality of steel will be able to do so without tariff imposition.

[Alex Cunningham (Stockton North) (Lab)]

As the hon. Member for Redcar (Jacob Young) acknowledged, we all know how the Government abandoned the steel industry on Teesside and failed to provide support in the recent past. Thousands of people lost their jobs as a result. We are, however, being promised a renaissance, with investment in clean green steel. News releases and talk are cheap—where is the action?

[Anne-Marie Trevelyan]

As I mentioned, there is a £1 billion net zero innovation portfolio, managed by the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, in which we are seeing the thinking and the projects coming through to help our industries move into clean steel and the clean generation of any number of parts of our economy, so that we can meet our net zero commitments. We have committed to be 78% net zero by 2035—this is one of the highest commitments in the world. That is a huge challenge and every one of our industries needs to be involved, making changes not only to themselves but through their supply chains, so that we can meet that net zero challenge. We are doing that not because we like a big industrial challenge, but because it is incredibly important that we do it, as part of our commitment to the global challenge to bring down our carbon dioxide emissions and because British businesses are designing and coming up with the innovative solutions with which we can help the rest of the world to do it. My Department is proud of, and is championing, all that British innovation is doing with the rest of the world to help it meet those challenges as well.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Alex Cunningham and Anne-Marie Trevelyan

Thursday 21st October 2021 Commons Chamber

[Anne-Marie Trevelyan]

I could not have put it better myself.

[Alex Cunningham (Stockton North) (Lab)]

As we have heard, human rights are too often forgotten in our trade deals. I believe that the Foreign Secretary is now courting Saudi Arabia even more, to name just one of the countries that has a dubious record. When will the Government start getting serious about human rights and make it clear to countries around the world that until they get their human rights records sorted out, they are not going to get trade deals with the UK?

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Alex Cunningham and Anne-Marie Trevelyan

Tuesday 6th July 2021 Commons Chamber

[Alex Cunningham (Stockton North) (Lab)]

  CF Fertilisers in Billingham in my constituency is one of the two remaining primary ammonia plants in the UK. The Department for Transport anticipates that 80% of UK domestic shipping will rely on ammonia for fuel by 2050, and CF Fertilisers will have a critical role to play. It has been hugely proactive in reducing emissions, but it is reliant on carbon capture and storage to decarbonise further. What plans does the Minister have to select and progress ammonia decarbonisation within phase 1 of the CCS programme, plus the sequencing process?

[Anne-Marie Trevelyan]

As the hon. Gentleman will know, the process is in full swing and we will make an announcement before too long about those first clusters, and who will be able to lead in the carbon capture, utilisation and storage programme. The sixth carbon budget means that we have brought in the challenge of getting to grips with aviation and shipping fuels, and the Department for Transport is focusing on how that will be part of the net zero strategy.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Alex Cunningham and Anne-Marie Trevelyan

Tuesday 9th February 2021 Commons Chamber

[Anne-Marie Trevelyan]

There was an extensive series of engagements to support the drafting process for the safer working guidance, with more than 1,000 users responding. The safer working guidance has had 3.3 million views, and the evidence shows that it is working well and supporting those who are doing the incredibly important work of keeping utility services going. My door is always open, and I would be very happy to discuss any concerns with the hon. Gentleman and his constituents.

[Alex Cunningham (Stockton North) (Lab)]

What plans he has to support the development of the renewable energy sector.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Minister for Business, Energy and Clean Growth (Anne-Marie Trevelyan)]

The UK is a major global market for renewables, and we have world-leading ambitions for deployment. We aim to deliver up to double the renewable capacity at the next contracts for difference round at the end of this year, compared with the last round. We are spending £160 million to support new port and manufacturing infrastructure needed to achieve our 40 GW offshore wind ambition, which will secure local jobs and benefits.

[Alex Cunningham [V]]

We all know how essential it is to provide our industries with renewable energy at an affordable cost, but it is also essential for the transportation of energy through the national grid so that firms in my area such as CF Fertilisers do not face even greater costs. What will the Minister do to ensure that there is a first-class regulatory environment for all energy transportation, including a fair system for shorthaul gas still being considered by Ofgem?

[Anne-Marie Trevelyan]

We have ambitious targets for future decarbonisation and the systems that will go with it. We will be publishing an industrial decarbonisation strategy in the very near future, which will help to support businesses as we look at all the issues that the hon. Gentleman raises.

School Funding: North-east of England

Debate between Alex Cunningham and Anne-Marie Trevelyan

Wednesday 26th April 2017 Westminster Hall

[Mrs Trevelyan]

As the hon. Lady knows, I support the USO and campaigned very hard to ensure that we got it into the Digital Economy Bill. I speak as someone for whom 1 megabit is still a very good day in my house. It is still a challenge for many of my constituents whose children need to do their homework online, but we are getting there. We have kicked the system into a more proactive premise, but I agree that getting access across the board is vital. It will be no good for my constituents to see Newcastle with superfast broadband at 100 megabit or 1 gigabit, because we still cannot download a basic file to do homework. We need to ensure that the universal service obligation spreads across the nation to every home.

The hon. Member for Washington and Sunderland West raised the issue of the apprenticeship levy, which for small schools in Northumberland is proving to be problematic because councils have been given the freedom to pass the levy fee on. It is an issue for a small school that suddenly got a bill for £10,000 a few weeks ago and will not take up the opportunity of an apprenticeship, and I very much hope the Minister looks at it in more detail.

[Alex Cunningham (Stockton North) (Lab)]

Schools in my area have contacted me about the apprenticeship levy. The hon. Lady says that the local authorities have the ability to pass the levy fee on to schools. Local authorities in my area have suffered tens of millions of pounds-worth of cuts. Does she expect them to pick up the bill or does she think the Government should offer a concession or do away with it for schools?

[Mrs Trevelyan]

The question is how the levy is used. For some of my larger schools the apprenticeship levy is a reasonable fee to pay because they will have the opportunity to benefit from apprentices and will increase their cohort of staff. We need to be a little more flexible and encourage councils to think more constructively in how they deal with the levy.