Gregory Campbell

The £10 million already deployed is solely from the fund, private sector investment is in addition to that. The fund expects to deploy the £70m over 5 years, until November 2028.

The Investment Fund for Northern Ireland was launched in November 2023 with the aim to deliver a £70 million commitment to smaller businesses in Northern Ireland, alongside investment from the private sector. Since its launch, the fund has deployed almost £10 million in debt funding and equity investment to local businesses at differing stages of their growth journey.

UK Export Finance (UKEF) produces audited details of businesses supported each financial year as part of its transparency protocols.

Details of all UKEF support for businesses for 2023/24 and previous years can be found online at: www.gov.uk/government/collections/uk-export-finance-business-supported

The corresponding return of all businesses supported during financial year 2024/25 will be published in the summer.

UKEF does not publish a breakdown by UK nations and regions.

UKEF offers its full range of products and services to exporters across the UK, including Northern Ireland. Full details of the UKEF’s product and support offering can be found online at: www.ukexportfinance.gov.uk/products-and-services/.

UKEF also has a network of Export Finance Managers across the UK who are valuable points of contact for local businesses and can provide information on the range of support available. Contact details for the EFMs can be found at: www.gov.uk/government/publications/find-an-export-finance-manager.

The UK’s accession to the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) is expected to support jobs and create opportunities for business growth in every part of the UK. An impact assessment was published regarding the UK's accession to CPTPP and the potential long-run economic impact of the agreement. The analysis detailed the prospective impacts on all the UK’s regions and nations and demonstrated that UK GDP could increase by £2.0 billion every year in the long run.

The Department for Business and Trade works closely with businesses in a range of sectors, including manufacturing, construction, aerospace, and automotive sectors, and will continue to.

Each Government department engages with relevant sectors where appropriate.

The department will publish a comprehensive impact assessment on the impacts of the 2025 National Minimum Wage uprating in line with the requirements of the Better Regulation Framework shortly. However, this will not provide an estimate of the number of National Living Wage earners who will become income taxpayers from April 2025.

The Department produces National Minimum Wage Impact Assessments in line with the requirements of the Better Regulation Framework. Previous Impact Assessments are available via Legislation.gov.uk.

The Impact Assessment that will be published alongside the legislation for the 2025 rates will not provide an estimate of the number of National Living Wage earners who will become income tax payers from April 2025.

We continue to support businesses in ensuring a smooth flow of goods between Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK, including through regular engagement with online suppliers and platforms.

DBT regularly talks to online suppliers and platforms, and works with the NI Department for the Economy to support people in Northern Ireland.

The Government publishes an Impact Assessment each year alongside the legislation that implements the increases to the National Living Wage and National Minimum Wage rates. The legislation for the 2025 rates is expected to be laid in Parliament early in the new year, with debates in both Houses expected in February or March, subject to Parliamentary timetable.

Guidance for businesses on the new General Product Safety Regulation was published last week on 3rd December and has been shared with the business community in Great Britain and Northern Ireland through existing channels. My officials will keep the guidance under review to ensure we are supporting businesses to trade freely across the UK.

This will be included in the Impact Assessment that we plan to publish alongside the legislation that implements the increase to the National Living Wage in 2025.

The Low Pay Commission (LPC) estimate that 2.9% of full-time employee jobs and 12.0% of part-time employee jobs were covered by the relevant National Minimum Wage and National Living Wage rate in 2023. The LPC will publish updated analysis in early 2025.

The current National Living Wage (NLW) is set at £11.44 per hour. This means for a full-time worker on the NLW working 35 hours each week, their gross annual earnings are £20,821. This will increase to £22,222 after the new NLW rate of £12.21 is applied from 1st April 2025.

Each worker's take home salary will vary as this will depend on a range of factors, including total hours worked, taxes and other lawful deductions, and additional benefits.

(a) The number of active employees attached to the Trade and Investment Hub in Northern Ireland during the previous 12 months is shown on Table 1. This is representative of active employees who are based in Norther Ireland and work for the Trade and Investment Hub, Northern Ireland. There are also employees in other teams and locations that indirectly support Trade and Investment in Northern Ireland.

DBT defines “staff employed” as Civil Servants on payroll with an active payroll assignment.

(b) All active employee records attached to the Trade and Investment Hub in Northern Ireland recorded the same job type, International Trade. This was not amended throughout the reporting period 1^st December 2023 – 1^st November 2024.

Table 1

No decisions to close any or all of the remaining Directly Managed Branches have been taken.

The Post Office will continue to deliver on the 11,500 minimum branch requirement set by Government. Longer term, Government has set out our plan to publish a Green Paper to consult with the public on the long-term future of the Post Office. This Green Paper will help inform what customers, communities and postmasters would like to see from a modern Post Office network.

We estimate that over 3 million workers will receive a pay rise due to the increase in the National Living Wage in April 2025. The number of workers paid at the National Living Wage in April 2025 is expected to be lower as some of these workers will receive a further indirect pay rise as employers decide to pay above the minimum.

We will publish an Impact Assessment alongside the legislation that implements the increase to the National Living Wage.

At the International Investment Summit we announced a total of £63 billion of investment with nearly 38,000 jobs to be created across the UK. DBT is committed to building on the success of the summit and continuing to attract and retain investment across the whole of the UK. We also announced we will be expanding the Office for Investment to become the UK's investment promotion function. The Office for Investment will work across government and UK nations and regions to drive inward investment and deliver on our collective mission to drive growth across the UK.

The United Kingdom as a whole will accede to the CPTPP, and every nation and region of the UK is expected to benefit from the agreement, which is expected to increase GDP by £2 billion a year in the long run as published in the Department’s Impact Assessment (https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/cptpp-impact-assessment). Northern Ireland’s gross value added (GVA) is estimated to increase by around £70 million from UK accession to the CPTPP (relative to 2019 values).

The Department has started hosting a series of events leading up to entry into force to ensure businesses are aware of, and know how to take advantage of, the opportunities CPTPP will present. This activity is spread across the UK, including events across the Nations and Regions of the UK, and will increase in the run-up to and beyond entry into force of CPTPP.