Asked by: Callum Anderson (Labour - Buckingham and Bletchley)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what information her Department holds on the total value of investments in (a) cash, (b) stocks and shares, (c) innovative finance and (d) lifetime ISAs in each of the past five tax years, broken down by investors' income bracket.
Answered by Tulip Siddiq - Economic Secretary (HM Treasury)
Information on the total value of ISA subscriptions, the total market value of ISAs, and the number of ISA holders and subscribers broken down by income bands is available in HMRC’s Annual Savings Statistics.
https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/annual-savings-statistics
Asked by: Callum Anderson (Labour - Buckingham and Bletchley)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what information her Department holds on the total market value of (a) cash and (b) stocks and shares ISA holdings in each of the past five tax years, broken down by investor income bracket.
Answered by Tulip Siddiq - Economic Secretary (HM Treasury)
Information on the total value of ISA subscriptions, the total market value of ISAs, and the number of ISA holders and subscribers broken down by income bands is available in HMRC’s Annual Savings Statistics.
https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/annual-savings-statistics
Asked by: Callum Anderson (Labour - Buckingham and Bletchley)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what the role of the (a) Bank of England and (b) Financial Conduct Authority will be in regulatory oversight of the digital gilt instrument pilot.
Answered by Tulip Siddiq - Economic Secretary (HM Treasury)
This pilot would allow us to make more informed decisions on Distributed Ledger Technology’s (DLT) potential future application to wider government debt issuance. Demonstrating feasibility on a government bond issuance will also support the private sector by providing a use case that will assist their own use and investment in the technology. The pilot puts the UK at the forefront of capital markets innovation. This experimental issuance is separate from the government’s normal operations and overall debt issuance programme. The pilot will utilise the Digital Securities Sandbox (DSS), which opened for applications in September 2024. The DSS utilises temporary modifications to legislation to provide an environment where firms can use developing technology, in particular DLT, to create, trade, and manage securities, under the supervision of the Bank of England and the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA). This enables activity to happen in a controlled and monitored setting, ensuring that potential risks are managed while fostering innovation. I set out in a Written Ministerial Statement on 18 November 2024, that the government will engage with the financial sector in the new year to explore what the issuance could look like and the technology options available to facilitate it.
Asked by: Callum Anderson (Labour - Buckingham and Bletchley)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what steps her Department is taking to manage potential risks associated with distributed ledger technology during the pilot digital gilt instrument issuance.
Answered by Tulip Siddiq - Economic Secretary (HM Treasury)
This pilot would allow us to make more informed decisions on Distributed Ledger Technology’s (DLT) potential future application to wider government debt issuance. Demonstrating feasibility on a government bond issuance will also support the private sector by providing a use case that will assist their own use and investment in the technology. The pilot puts the UK at the forefront of capital markets innovation. This experimental issuance is separate from the government’s normal operations and overall debt issuance programme. The pilot will utilise the Digital Securities Sandbox (DSS), which opened for applications in September 2024. The DSS utilises temporary modifications to legislation to provide an environment where firms can use developing technology, in particular DLT, to create, trade, and manage securities, under the supervision of the Bank of England and the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA). This enables activity to happen in a controlled and monitored setting, ensuring that potential risks are managed while fostering innovation. I set out in a Written Ministerial Statement on 18 November 2024, that the government will engage with the financial sector in the new year to explore what the issuance could look like and the technology options available to facilitate it.
Asked by: Callum Anderson (Labour - Buckingham and Bletchley)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, whether her Department is taking steps to involve private sector firms in developing distributed ledger technology for the digital gilt instrument pilot.
Answered by Tulip Siddiq - Economic Secretary (HM Treasury)
This pilot would allow us to make more informed decisions on Distributed Ledger Technology’s (DLT) potential future application to wider government debt issuance. Demonstrating feasibility on a government bond issuance will also support the private sector by providing a use case that will assist their own use and investment in the technology. The pilot puts the UK at the forefront of capital markets innovation. This experimental issuance is separate from the government’s normal operations and overall debt issuance programme. The pilot will utilise the Digital Securities Sandbox (DSS), which opened for applications in September 2024. The DSS utilises temporary modifications to legislation to provide an environment where firms can use developing technology, in particular DLT, to create, trade, and manage securities, under the supervision of the Bank of England and the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA). This enables activity to happen in a controlled and monitored setting, ensuring that potential risks are managed while fostering innovation. I set out in a Written Ministerial Statement on 18 November 2024, that the government will engage with the financial sector in the new year to explore what the issuance could look like and the technology options available to facilitate it.
Asked by: Callum Anderson (Labour - Buckingham and Bletchley)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what criteria her Department plans to use to assess the effectiveness of the digital gilt instrument pilot.
Answered by Tulip Siddiq - Economic Secretary (HM Treasury)
This pilot would allow us to make more informed decisions on Distributed Ledger Technology’s (DLT) potential future application to wider government debt issuance. Demonstrating feasibility on a government bond issuance will also support the private sector by providing a use case that will assist their own use and investment in the technology. The pilot puts the UK at the forefront of capital markets innovation. This experimental issuance is separate from the government’s normal operations and overall debt issuance programme. The pilot will utilise the Digital Securities Sandbox (DSS), which opened for applications in September 2024. The DSS utilises temporary modifications to legislation to provide an environment where firms can use developing technology, in particular DLT, to create, trade, and manage securities, under the supervision of the Bank of England and the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA). This enables activity to happen in a controlled and monitored setting, ensuring that potential risks are managed while fostering innovation. I set out in a Written Ministerial Statement on 18 November 2024, that the government will engage with the financial sector in the new year to explore what the issuance could look like and the technology options available to facilitate it.
Asked by: Callum Anderson (Labour - Buckingham and Bletchley)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, whether her Department plans to bring forward proposals to block public listings on national security grounds.
Answered by Tulip Siddiq - Economic Secretary (HM Treasury)
The previous government consulted on a power to block listings on national security grounds and published a summary of responses to this consultation in December 2021. The government keeps all policy under review.
Asked by: Callum Anderson (Labour - Buckingham and Bletchley)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what steps her Department plans to take to help incentive retail investment in domestic public companies.
Answered by Tulip Siddiq - Economic Secretary (HM Treasury)
The Government is committed to reinvigorating our capital markets to deliver growth across the UK and is pursuing ambitious reforms to make our markets even more competitive.
This is why we supported the implementation of the Financial Conduct Authority’s (FCA) listing reforms, and are supportive of the reform to overhaul the Prospectus rules to improve access for retail investors in the capital raising process.
The Government is also taking forward work to improve the information and support available to retail investors to help with their decision-making. This includes reforms to the UK’s retail disclosure regime and exploring options to expand the availability of investment support through the joint Government and FCA review of the boundary between financial advice and guidance.
Additionally, individuals can also save up to £20,000 into an Individual Savings Account (ISA) each year, including Stocks and Shares ISAs, and any savings income received within an ISA is tax free.
Asked by: Callum Anderson (Labour - Buckingham and Bletchley)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, whether the Government plans to accept all recommendations of the Digitisation Taskforce Interim Report, published July 2023.
Answered by Tulip Siddiq - Economic Secretary (HM Treasury)
The work of the Digitisation Taskforce is ongoing and it has not yet made any recommendations to government. The government looks forward to the taskforce providing its final report and will set out its response after that.
Asked by: Callum Anderson (Labour - Buckingham and Bletchley)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what further fiscal steps she is taking to help increase the international competitiveness of the UK's listing regime.
Answered by Tulip Siddiq - Economic Secretary (HM Treasury)
The government is committed to reinvigorating our capital markets to deliver growth across the UK and is pursuing ambitious reforms to make our markets even more competitive. The Chancellor will announce any fiscal decisions at the Budget in the usual way.