Oral Answers to Questions

Craig Tracey Excerpts

Tuesday 7th June 2022 Commons Chamber

[Julie Marson (Hertford and Stortford) (Con)]

6. What steps he is taking to ensure that UK businesses benefit from the UK leaving the EU.

[Craig Tracey (North Warwickshire) (Con)]

22. What steps he is taking to ensure that UK businesses benefit from the UK leaving the EU.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (Lee Rowley)]

Leaving the European Union gives us a fantastic opportunity, over the long term, to chart a new course to bring further prosperity to the UK. The Government are committed to growing the UK’s economy by making the most of our Brexit freedoms, signing new trade deals, and, over time, lightening the regulatory burden.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lee Rowley]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for her important point. Unlike her, I am not able to make any comparisons with cricket, but we know that unnecessary regulation, where it exists, is a real burden for businesses, and we are committed to reducing it. There is also work under way on data laws, alcohol duty and imperial markings. There is the forthcoming Brexit freedoms Bill, and cross-Government work to look at reducing burdens. All of that should mean positive movement in this important area of policy.

[Craig Tracey]

Our insurance and financial services sector is a great British success story, and it helps to fund our local public services. The majority of employment in the sector is outside London and spread across many of our constituencies. Does the Minister agree that it is vital that we continue to support the growth of this industry, and that there must be a strong competitiveness duty on the regulator, so that we can make the most of opportunities now that we have left the EU?

[Lee Rowley]

I know that my hon. Friend does a huge amount of work in this area as chair of the all-party parliamentary group on insurance and financial services, and he has a background in the sector. Although he is tempting me to make policy that is dealt with by another Department, I know that his point will have been heard by my colleagues in the Treasury.

Oral Answers to Questions

Craig Tracey Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd March 2021 Commons Chamber

[Mrs Pauline Latham (Mid Derbyshire) (Con)]

What steps his Department is taking to support women in business.

[Craig Tracey (North Warwickshire) (Con)]

What steps his Department is taking to support women in business. [R]

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (Amanda Solloway)]

The Government have taken significant steps to support women in businesses. We have launched the Government-backed Women’s Business Council and published the women in finance charter. The recent Rose review and report also shows that good progress is being made to overcome barriers for women entrepreneurs.

[Amanda Solloway]

I thank my hon. Friend for her great support; I know how much she supports women entrepreneurs, especially with Derbys Finest. Since March 2020, the Government have provided an unprecedented package of financial support to businesses, including those in the wedding sector. That package of support is kept under regular review. My colleague the Minister for Small Business regularly meets the industry-led weddings taskforce to understand the impact of covid-19 on businesses in this sector.

[Craig Tracey [V]]

Research clearly shows that gender-diverse boards perform better on every single measure, so it stands to reason that diversity across the workforce can only be a benefit. Will the Minister confirm what steps the Government are taking to encourage more women into business, particularly in areas such as engineering and science, in which they are traditionally under-represented?

Oral Answers to Questions

Craig Tracey Excerpts

Tuesday 17th July 2018 Commons Chamber

[Richard Harrington]

That is not the picture of the oil and gas industry that I know following a visit to Aberdeen, where I saw more investment, more Government support and more support in the area for this Government’s industrial strategy. I am a great admirer of the hon. Gentleman normally, but I think he must have read the wrong script for this question.

[Craig Tracey (North Warwickshire) (Con)]

9. What steps he is taking to support growth in the small business sector.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (Richard Harrington)]

Corporation tax rates will be cut from 19% to 17% in 2020. We have doubled the annual allowance for people investing in knowledge-intensive companies through the enterprise investment scheme, and we are investing over £26 million through Be the Business. The Government’s British Business Bank is supporting over 70,000 smaller businesses to access £4.6 billion of finance.

[Craig Tracey]

Thirty-three jobs have been created and supported in my constituency through the small business loans platform, Funding Circle. What more can we do to encourage small businesses, particularly those that are female-owned, to look at wider ranges of finance options to help them to grow?

[Richard Harrington]

We want to ensure that all businesses get to know how to use the finance they need, including our 1.2 million women-owned businesses. Alongside the online finance finder and the business bank’s finance guide, the business bank is working with partners to understand the representation of women in venture capital firms.

Corporate Governance and Insolvency

Craig Tracey Excerpts

Tuesday 20th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Griffiths]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his detailed and important questions, many of which related to small businesses. As the Minister with responsibility for small businesses, I take those questions extremely seriously. It is not just large corporate collapses, such as that of Carillion, that affect the thousands of small businesses in the supply chain. The collapse of a small business can affect other small businesses as well. We have all seen cases in our constituencies of small businesses losing money because of phoenix businesses that go into liquidation, change their name and reappear. It is the same people selling the same products, fleecing people time and again. We are giving the Insolvency Service the ability in this consultation to investigate companies that have already been dissolved, and that will go a long way towards sending the clear message to directors who think they can get away with fleecing small businesses in that way that the Insolvency Service will come and get them.

The hon. Gentleman talked about pensions. It is important that directors should clearly understand, through this White Paper and through the consultation, as well as through the Department for Work and Pensions White Paper, that there will be consequences if they fleece their pension fund, that there will be fines and penalties and that they could spend time in prison if they have been found to be fleecing their pension fund in an unacceptable way.

The hon. Gentleman also talked about the need for small businesses to be treated in an ethical way. In the spring statement last week, the Chancellor demonstrated a clear recognition and understanding that small businesses were being fleeced, particularly in relation to late payments. He said that he would consult on how we could end the “scourge of late payments”. If we could do that, we would see £14 billion taken from the pockets of big businesses and put into the pockets of small businesses. Also, when insolvencies such as that of Carillion do happen, payments will stay in the bank accounts of the company that had gone bust not for 128 days but for only 30 days.

[Craig Tracey (North Warwickshire) (Con)]

I welcome this announcement. As a former business owner myself, I have seen the impact, particularly on small businesses, of large companies becoming insolvent. Does the Minister agree that it is crucial that we protect the small businesses and employees in the supply chain?

[Andrew Griffiths]

I agree with my hon. Friend. This is why we are specifically consulting, in this document, about what more we can do to protect small businesses. In lots of these failures, we have seen clever directors with clever advisers, clever lawyers and clever tax accountants putting in place a regime that allows them to walk away scot-free while hard-working businessmen and women in our constituencies pay the price. This consultation looks at how we can put an end to that and be on the side of the small guy, not the big guy.

Oral Answers to Questions

Craig Tracey Excerpts

Tuesday 12th December 2017 Commons Chamber

[Margot James]

I am meeting the chief executive of the FCA before Christmas, and I will be raising the issue of unregulated small business lending, which the hon. Gentleman mentions.

[Craig Tracey (North Warwickshire) (Con)]

Does the Secretary of State agree that the key to a successful industrial strategy is that it focuses on all areas of the UK, obviously including North Warwickshire and Bedworth?

[Greg Clark]

I do indeed. One of the features of our industrial strategy, which takes an approach that previous business policies have not taken sufficient account of over many decades, is the importance of the skills and clusters of industries in local places. As my hon. Friend knows, that is very much at the heart of the industrial strategy that we have published.

Taylor Review: Working Practices

Craig Tracey Excerpts

Tuesday 11th July 2017 Commons Chamber

[Margot James]

The whole basis of the report is good work and the aspiration of good work for all, including, I believe, the constituents to whom the hon. Lady refers, but let me reassure her. Two years ago, the Office for National Statistics labour force survey found that nearly 70% of people on zero-hours contracts were content with the hours that they were working. However, that does mean that a third want more hours, which is a finding that we must embrace in the context of some of the changes that Matthew Taylor is recommending to help to achieve the good work and the working hours that the hon. Lady’s constituents want.

[Craig Tracey (North Warwickshire) (Con)]

I, too, welcome the report. Does my hon. Friend agree that flexibility in the labour market benefits workers and employers equally?

[Margot James]

My hon. Friend asks me a difficult question. I do believe—Matthew Taylor’s report bears this out—that flexibility benefits employers and employees, but I am afraid that the evidence given to the inquiry suggested that in too many cases that flexibility is a one-way street, as I said earlier. We must deal with the problem of people who are really at risk and whose employment position is far too insecure.

Oral Answers to Questions

Craig Tracey Excerpts

Tuesday 14th March 2017 Commons Chamber

[Greg Clark]

The hon. Gentleman, who is an assiduous reader of these things, will see that, in the industrial strategy, we propose a commitment to upgrade infrastructure right across the country. I hope he will respond to that so that when we have the Budget later in the year, we will be in a position to make further such announcements.

[Craig Tracey (North Warwickshire) (Con)]

24. What role does my right hon. Friend see the self-employed, particularly those in my constituency, playing as the industrial strategy develops?

[Greg Clark]

The self-employed have an important role to play. One trend that colleagues on both sides of the House will know of is that the development of supply chains is one of the key sources of innovation in many industries. Within that, start-up businesses, including those run by the self-employed, can make a big contribution to making us attractive for jobs and new businesses.