Fiona Bruce

I refer My hon. Friend, the Member for Congleton to the Written Ministerial Statement made by My Rt hon. Friend, the Secretary of State for Education and Minister for Women and Equalities on 23 October 2017. The statement is attached.

The judgement in June 2017, in the case of R (on the application of A and B) v Secretary of State for Health, confirmed My Rt hon. Friend, the Secretary of State's powers to extend equal access to women from Northern Ireland. There was no legal requirement to consult on this specific aspect of the scheme and no formal consultation took place.

The provision of financial support for people in Northern Ireland is a devolved issue and therefore a matter for the Northern Ireland Government.

Guidance to departments on the application of the Family Test to domestic policy was published on 31 October 2014.

The criteria for assessing policies, including those which require primary legislation, are set out in the guidance. Policy is to be assessed against the Family Test questions if it has a demonstrable impact on family relationships and functions, and if the impact is not small, indirect or temporary.

Legislation introduced by the Government Equalities Office since August 2014 includes: The Equality Act 2010 (Equal Pay Audits) Regulations 2014, The Equality Act 2010 (Gender Pay Gap Information) Regulations 2017 and The Equality Act 2010 (Specific Duties and Public Authorities) Regulations 2017.

The family test was not formally applied for any of these regulations as they do not have a direct or demonstrable impact on family relationships.

The Government Equalities Office wants to increase gender equality, including within families. That is why the government has introduced Shared Parental Leave, in order to provide parents with more choice and flexibility in how they divide care between them in the first year of their child’s life. Working parents can share up to 37 weeks of pay and 50 weeks of leave.

The Government does not maintain a database of UK businesses operating in or contracting with the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.

Data on the value of trade between UK businesses and the Democratic People's Republic of Korea is published by HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC). Information on the number of UK businesses exporting goods to, and importing goods from, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea are collected by HMRC. Specific information relating to individual businesses cannot be published due to legislation protecting business confidentiality and in line with statistical disclosure control.

The figures requested are in the following table:

Notes:

(a) The information in the table is derived from annual returns received during 2013-14, the majority which relate to the year ending December 2012.

(b) The increase in the number of UNISON members contributing to the political fund over the number recorded in preceding years is attributable to the amended way of reporting members of the UNISON general political fund.

Issues on matters of conscience have, by tradition, been the subject of a free vote in the House of Commons.

Issues on matters of conscience have, by tradition, been the subject of a free vote in the House of Commons.

The Department for Business, Innovation and Skills provides support to businesses across a wide variety of policy areas, and progress continues to be made across each of these.

Through industrial strategy, the whole of government is taking a long-term strategic approach to working in partnership with businesses to increase global competitiveness, support innovation and maximise export potential.

99.9% of UK businesses are small and medium sized businesses so we are taking specific steps to help them, and they are reaping the benefits.

The right tax environment is vital to help businesses flourish so we have cut the main rate of Corporation Tax from 28% to 21% and announced further cuts to 20% by 2015 – the joint lowest rate in the G20 major economies. We have also helped businesses with the cost of hiring staff by introducing a new Employer Allowance which cuts £2,000 from the National Insurance bills of small firms.

More businesses are getting access to the finance they need to start up and grow with Start-Up Loans offered to over 25,000 businesses; so far lending over £129 million. The British Business Bank has facilitated £890m of new lending and investment to over 21,000 small businesses in the year to the end of September 2014. And we have facilitated over £1.67 billion of lending to over 16,000 small businesses since May 2010, through our Enterprise Finance Guarantee scheme.

We have brought together all Government advice and support in one place at GREATbusiness.gov.uk, where the ‘My Business Support Tool’ helps businesses find the support they need quickly, and businesses can speak to or webchat with a helpline adviser direct using the Business Support helpline. Businesses can also access our new Business Growth Service on the website, which brings together expert advice to improve and grow in one place, including GrowthAccelerator, the Manufacturing Advisory Service, and export advice and finance.

Small businesses have less regulation to follow with a £10 billion cumulative net saving to businesses as a result of our deregulation work. Through the Red Tape Challenge, we have reviewed over 5,600 regulations and identified 3,000 to scrap or improve. We are on track to surpass our target of saving business £850 million per year.

Furthermore, around 48,000 businesses have been helped by our UK Trade and Investment support – of which 90% were small businesses. This support helped generate additional sales of over £49 billion and created or safeguarded over 220,000 jobs over the last year.

The goods produced in the Kaesong Industrial complex are not included in the EU-Republic of Korea FTA and therefore there are no implications for that agreement of the findings of the March 2014 report by the US-Korea Institute at SAIS on the wages of North Korean workers at that complex.

The Department for Business, Innovation and Skills does not hold any information on the number of businesses operating in, or contracting with, the Democratic People's Republic of North Korea.