Conor McGinn

Our consultation on the feed-in tariff review reflects the need to balance sector support whilst keeping bills down for consumers.

We strongly welcome evidence from the sector during this review consultation, which ends on 23 October.

We will consider the CMA’s provisional findings carefully and respond shortly.

DECC domestic energy bill estimates are only produced at Public Energy Supply (PES) regional level, we do not have bill data for constituency level. The St Helens North constituency covers two PES regions, North West and Merseyside & North Wales.

The tables below shows the estimated average annual 2014 energy bill (2015 data is not yet available) for customers in the UK, and the two relevant PES region.

These are based on an assumed annual consumption of 3,800 kWh of electricity and 15,000 kWh of gas per year.

I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave to the hon. Member for Bury South (Mr Lewis) on 10 June 2014, UIN 199388.

I have placed a list of UK Government delegates since January 2014 in the Library of the House.

Industrial Strategy is a long-term whole-of-government approach to support economic growth. The partnership between business and all parts of government has delivered, and continues to deliver, a range of opportunities to help create growth, jobs and economic prosperity across the UK. Whilst there are many examples of collaboration at a local level delivering industrial strategy objectives and economic growth (see www.bit.ly/instratmap), industrial strategy operates on a thematic and sectoral basis.

The Government is committed to creating a Northern Powerhouse, enabling the North of England to reach its potential as a driving force in the UK economy. The Government works closely with the Local Enterprise Partnerships across the North West, which are responsible for determining the priorities for investment in their areas in line with their strategic economic plans. This includes the expanded growth deals agreed in January 2015 with each Local Enterprise Partnership, which committed a total of £1.25bn of investment in the North West area over the lifetime of the deals (2015-2021), including £263.9m for the Liverpool City Region.

Further to the answer given on 28 April 2020 to PQ 37764 and to PQ 96068 on 28 September, the charitable and voluntary sector plays an important role in the support available to veterans and the wider Armed Forces Community. The Government provides a range of financial support to the sector including through regular grants to the Armed Forces Covenant Fund Trust, which this year received £20m to distribute. A further £6m was provided to nearly 100 charities through the COVID-19 Impact Fund. This includes both funding for local projects and for organisations who operate nationally, including in the North West. The Government does not hold centrally a complete breakdown of the funding charities and organisations which support veterans in St Helens and Merseyside have received.

We encourage everyone to download and use the NHS COVID-19 app.

The National Security Adviser is the principal adviser to the Prime Minister and Cabinet on national security strategy, policy, capability and civil contingencies.

Details of the National Security Council's membership is publicly available on GOV.UK. It is a long established precedent that information about the discussions that have taken place in Cabinet and its Committees, and how often they have met, is not shared publicly.

The information requested falls under the remit of the UK Statistics Authority. I have therefore asked the Authority to respond.

A list of Ministerial delegates at each Summit are included in the official communiques published following a Summit meeting. These can be found on the British-Irish Council website https://www.britishirishcouncil.org/publications

The UK Government Ministers in attendance at each of the British-Irish Council Summits that have taken place since 2010 are listed below.

Requiring some form of identification to vote was successfully tested at the local elections on 3 May by five local authorities: Bromley, Gosport, Swindon, Watford and Woking. The overwhelming majority of people cast their vote without a problem and the success of the pilots proves that this is a reasonable and proportionate measure to take, and there was no notable adverse effect on turnout.

The estimate by the political lobby group the Electoral Reform Society is exaggerated and inaccurate. Data from Returning Officers across all five participating local authorities shows that there were 340 electors asked to return to the polling station with the correct identification who did not subsequently return. This represents 0.16% of the votes cast.

This reflects that such identification was a brand new requirement, and a few electors may not have read the publicity that they were sent about the pilots.

However, the experience of Northern Ireland, where paper ID has been required since 1985 and photo ID since 2003, illustrates that there should be no issue with voters not knowing - once the requirement has become established.

The Electoral Commission is responsible for carrying out an independent, statutory evaluation of the pilot schemes and will publish its findings in the summer of 2018; this will be an opportunity to review how the publicity arrangements operated and could be improved. This is one of the benefits of piloting the policy.

Requiring some form of identification to vote was successfully tested at the local elections on 3 May by five local authorities: Bromley, Gosport, Swindon, Watford and Woking. The overwhelming majority of people cast their vote without a problem and the success of the pilots proves that this is a reasonable and proportionate measure to take, and there was no notable adverse effect on turnout.

The estimate by the political lobby group the Electoral Reform Society is exaggerated and inaccurate. Data from Returning Officers across all five participating local authorities shows that there were 340 electors asked to return to the polling station with the correct identification who did not subsequently return. This represents 0.14% of the votes cast.

This reflects that such identification was a brand new requirement, and a few electors may not have read the publicity that they were sent about the pilots.

However, the experience of Northern Ireland, where paper ID has been required since 1985 and photo ID since 2003, illustrates that there should be no issue with voters not knowing - once the requirement has become established.

The Electoral Commission is responsible for carrying out an independent, statutory evaluation of the pilot schemes and will publish its findings in the summer of 2018; this will be an opportunity to review how the publicity arrangements operated and could be improved. This is one of the benefits of piloting the policy.

There was an error in the data previously presented. Whilst the individual totals of votes cast in each local authority were correct, the overall total was incorrectly summed. The previously quoted total of votes cast of 206,741 should have been 234,506. As a result, the percentage of people who did not return as a proportion of number of votes cast was overstated, incorrectly given as 0.16%. The correct figure is 0.14%. The attached table contains the correct data.

As part of its planned evaluation, the Electoral Commission will continue to collect and analyse a wide range of data and information about the pilots, including public opinion surveys, data from polling stations, turnout and postal voting data, and polling station staff surveys. We will continue to work with the Electoral Commission and other partners to ensure that the emerging data gives an accurate picture of how ID pilots were delivered.

The information requested falls within the responsibility of the UK Statistics Authority. I have asked the Authority to reply.

The information requested falls within the responsibility of the UK Statistics Authority. I have asked the Authority to reply.

The information requested falls within the responsibility of the UK Statistics Authority. I have asked the Authority to reply.

The information requested falls within the responsibility of the UK Statistics Authority. I have asked the Authority to reply.

The information requested falls within the responsibility of the UK Statistics Authority. I have asked the Authority to reply.

There is no Government policy on this, it is at the discretion of individual Ministers.

The information requested falls within the responsibility of the UK Statistics Authority. I have asked the Authority to reply.

The information requested falls within the responsibility of the UK Statistics Authority. I have asked the Authority to reply.

The information requested falls within the responsibility of the UK Statistics Authority. I have asked the Authority to reply.

The information requested falls within the responsibility of the UK Statistics Authority. I have asked the Authority to reply.