Jack Brereton

Further to the comments on the ceramics industry by my Rt. Hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster made in the House on 19 May 2020, the Government has taken unprecedented action to support businesses, including the ceramics sector, during the outbreak of COVID-19 by introducing a range of initiatives from the opportunity to defer VAT and/or income tax for 3 months to the Job Retention Scheme and access to government-backed financing.

Government departments and executive agencies spend a significant sum on public procurement, and we are aware of the vital role this will play in kick-starting the economy once the pandemic has passed. Contracting Authorities are already required to consider the social and environmental impacts of procurements and we intend to deliver a package of ambitious measures, including launching a new social value model, to support the recovery effort to ensure that Government’s huge purchasing power is used to support communities and the local economy. The model can form a key part of the government’s overall plan for recovery as it enables commercial teams to select policy outcomes to:

• Tackle regional inequality with new jobs and skills, including retraining the unemployed in clean growth sectors, and helping disadvantaged communities recover.

• Promote economic growth and prosperity by supporting SMEs and start-ups to lead or be part of government supply chains.

• Support physical and mental health and ensure those in disadvantaged groups have equal opportunity to become part of a diverse, resilient workforce.

Further to the comments on the ceramics industry by my Rt. Hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster made in the House on 19 May 2020, the Government has taken unprecedented action to support businesses, including the ceramics sector, during the outbreak of COVID-19 by introducing a range of initiatives from the opportunity to defer VAT and/or income tax for 3 months to the Job Retention Scheme and access to government-backed financing.

Government departments and executive agencies spend a significant sum on public procurement, and we are aware of the vital role this will play in kick-starting the economy once the pandemic has passed. Contracting Authorities are already required to consider the social and environmental impacts of procurements and we intend to deliver a package of ambitious measures, including launching a new social value model, to support the recovery effort to ensure that Government’s huge purchasing power is used to support communities and the local economy. The model can form a key part of the government’s overall plan for recovery as it enables commercial teams to select policy outcomes to:

• Tackle regional inequality with new jobs and skills, including retraining the unemployed in clean growth sectors, and helping disadvantaged communities recover.

• Promote economic growth and prosperity by supporting SMEs and start-ups to lead or be part of government supply chains.

• Support physical and mental health and ensure those in disadvantaged groups have equal opportunity to become part of a diverse, resilient workforce.

We have delivered policies that benefit all four nations of the UK, including committing over £2.4 billion to thirteen city and growth deals in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland and spending around £19 billion a year of our defence budget with UK industry, supporting 115,000 jobs across the UK.

As part of the Review of Electricity Market Arrangements (REMA) programme, the Government is considering a range of potential options to shield both domestic and non-domestic consumers from their impacts of potential future commodity price spikes and to ensure they benefit from lower cost renewables.

The CfD scheme already insulates consumers against electricity price spikes. Over time this scheme will reduce dependence on fossil fuelled power generation, lowering consumer exposure to gas prices.

The Energy Bill Relief Scheme review considered qualitative and quantitative evidence, and input from businesses and stakeholders on sectors that may be most affected by rising energy prices based on energy and trade intensity. Eligible sectors have to operate in the top 20% for energy intensity and top 40% for trade intensity. Standard Industrial Classification codes allowed Government to define a sector hierarchy, with energy and trade thresholds set to balance delivering targeted support at lower overall cost, while capturing a broad enough share of affected companies. Energy intensive sectors that are not significantly trade intensive will not be eligible for support.

Some businesses are highly exposed to both energy prices and international competition and are unable to pass through or absorb these costs and without the subsidy there’s likely to be a competitive disadvantage.

The Stoke-on-Trent and Staffordshire Growth Hub has received more than £1m over five years and in the previous financial year supported over 5000 local businesses, including ceramics companies.

Furthermore, £98m of Local Growth Funding is supporting projects across Stoke-on-Trent and Staffordshire such as the Heat Academy at Stoke-on-Trent College to help businesses access the skills they need to compete and grow.

The Government is committed to supporting the growth of the UK’s video games sector and we recognise that video games bring economic, cultural and social benefits across the UK. The video games industry trade body Ukie has estimated the value of the consumer games market at £7.16 billion in 2021, more than doubling in value since 2013.

As part of a wider package to support the growth of the creative industries, the Government is delivering an £8 million expansion of the UK Games Fund. This will provide valuable support to early stage game development businesses and talented graduates throughout the UK. In addition, the Video Games Tax Relief continues to make the UK one of the leading destinations in the world for making video games. The Video Games Tax Relief has supported £5.1 billion of UK expenditure on 1,940 games since its introduction in 2014.

The ICO took advice from the Electoral Commission on the matter of the Liberal Democrats. As a result this case was referred to the Metropolitan Police on 26 October 2018 as the issues fell outside the jurisdiction of the ICO. The Metropolitan Police later confirmed that they were unable to consider the matter any further.

The ICO’s wider investigations of several organisations on both the remain and the leave side of the UK’s referendum about membership of the EU has now concluded. The ICO identified no significant breaches of the privacy and electronic marketing regulations and data protection legislation that met the threshold for formal regulatory action. Where an organisation has continued in operation, the ICO has provided advice and guidance to support better future compliance with the rules.

The ICO will shortly publish a report of audits on the main political parties.

Stoke-on-Trent's bid to be UK City of Culture 2021 was assessed by an independent judging panel, chaired by Phil Redmond, along with the ten other bids to host the title. The bid was assessed as strong and was shortlisted on that basis. The panel reconvened on 6-7 December 2017 for the final stage of the selection process and recommended that Coventry should be awarded the title of UK City of Culture 2021. The unsuccessful bid teams will receive detailed feedback on their bids to help inform and shape their future cultural plans.

Ensuring that vulnerable children remain protected is a top priority for the government.

The multi-agency statutory guidance document ‘Working Together (2018)’ sets out what professionals and organisations need to do to safeguard children, available here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/working-together-to-safeguard-children--2.

Working Together (2018), is clear that practitioners should be proactive in sharing information as early as possible to help identify, assess and respond to risks or concerns about the safety and welfare of children. Practitioners should be alert to sharing important information about any adults with whom that child has contact, which may impact the child’s safety or welfare.

Section 11 of the Children Act, 2004 places duties on a range of organisations, agencies and individuals to ensure their functions, and any services that they contract out to others, are discharged having regard to the need to safeguard and promote the welfare of children. Many of the agencies subject to the section 11 duty are members of the Multi Agency Public Protection Arrangements (MAPPA), including the police, prison and probation services. MAPPA should work together with ‘duty to co-operate agencies’ to manage the risks posed by violent and sexual offenders living in the community in order to protect the public and should work closely with the safeguarding partners over services to commission locally.

The government is introducing measures in the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill, introduced in the House of Commons on 9 March 2021, to clarify the information sharing powers of those agencies subject to the duty to co-operate under MAPPA.

Furthermore, provisions in the landmark Domestic Abuse Bill, currently passing through parliament, will contribute further to the management of offenders. Perpetrators who are subject to a Domestic Abuse Protection Order are required to notify the police of their name and address and any changes to this information. Failure to notify constitutes a breach punishable by up to 5 years’ imprisonment, a fine, or both.

The government has not conducted an assessment of the potential merits of a national database.

As an independent trading nation, we are building strong trading relationships across the world and removing market access barriers for British businesses. We have secured trade agreements with 66 non-EU countries, worth £217bn in 2019. We have formally applied to join the Comprehensive and Progressive Trans-Pacific Partnership, an agreement which removes tariffs on 95% of goods between members and will deepen UK access to key markets around the world, from Mexico to Malaysia.

We are committed to protecting UK industry where it is suffering injury as a result of dumped imports. Secondary legislation will introduce provisions to tackle those cases concerning countries where there are particular market situations. Those situations occur when it is not possible to use the domestic prices in the exporting country to calculate the dumping margin, because prices and input costs do not reflect competitive market conditions. In such cases the Trade Remedies Authority (TRA) will be able to use alternative methodologies. These alternative methodologies will include the use of export prices to an appropriate third country, provided they are representative, and will enable the TRA to construct the prices on the basis of cost of production, selling, general and admin costs and profit. Secondary legislation will also provide that the exporter’s cost data may be adjusted, where justified on a case by case basis, based on among other things prices from a representative country.

We will set out in secondary legislation examples of situations, such as where prices are artificially low, for example as a result of government intervention, where significant barter trade exists, or where non-commercial processing arrangements occur. Other economies, such as the EU and the US, have similar mechanisms in place to protect the domestic industry from unfair trade practices and the UK will be no different.

Alongside government, industry plays an important role in communicating factual information on EVs and charging infrastructure to consumers. That is why in the Plan for Drivers, the Government committed to working with industry to address common misconceptions around electric vehicles (EVs) and communicate the many benefits of transitioning to EVs, both new and used.

In February, the Government published information on EVs, including used vehicles, and EV charging infrastructure. The Government is also taking proactive action to counter inaccurate information presented by the media on the subject of EVs, when this arises.

Work continues to develop the closedown, remediation, and demobilisation plan for Phase 2. A further update will be provided in the next HS2 parliamentary report.

The Department does not hold and is not aware of a value engineering report of the proposed HS2 Handsacre Junction from 2018.

There have been no value engineering reports on Handsacre junction since Network North. Previous decisions to change the design of Handsacre junction were made to reduce costs and disruption for passengers on the West Coast Main Line during construction, which was value for money given the previous plan to deliver Phase 2a on an accelerated timeframe would have resulted in the use of the junction for more than 1 train per hour in each direction only for a very short period.

The procurement, safety risk assessment, and safe operation of the Hitachi AT300 rolling stock is the responsibility of the operator. When running rolling stock procurements, operators take account of factors such as what products are available to the market, reliability, operating cost, passenger capacity, comfort and environmental performance. Network Rail is currently upgrading infrastructure on parts of the West Coast Main Line to allow higher speed running with non-tilting trains. The Office of Rail and Road is responsible for ensuring the new trains meet rail safety regulatory requirements before they can operate on the mainline.

The Department is looking forward to the introduction of Avanti West Coast's brand new Hitachi rolling stock later this year which will replace its current diesel fleet in line with the Department's goal to run a more sustainable railway, resulting in a 61 per cent cut in carbon emissions, as well as offering more space and a quieter journey for passengers.

Universal Credit (UC) is a £2bn infrastructure project. This will deliver £8bn worth of economic growth. A whole new benefit system is likely to require a similar level of investment as UC.

The Department for Business and Trade has not conducted assessments on these specific goods. The Government has established strategic partnerships with industry to maintain security of vaccine supply in the event of a pandemic. This includes our partnership with Moderna which is building an innovation and technology centre with capacity from 2025 to produce up to 250 million doses of mRNA vaccines annually onshore in the United Kingdom.

The UK Health Security Agency has also agreed an advanced purchase agreement with Seqirus UK Limited to access 100 million vaccines if a future influenza pandemic is declared. The manufacturing process will be based entirely in the UK, giving better security of access if global demand ever outweighs supply. As part of these contracts, the Government regularly assesses risks that may impact the performance of the contract.

It has not proved possible to respond to the hon. Member in the time available before Prorogation.

Implantable cardiac monitors are used successfully by patients across England and within the Stoke-on-Trent South constituency. The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence published guidance in September 2020 on the use of implantable cardiac monitors. National Health Service trusts are currently using such devices in stroke prevention throughout England. It is for local integrated care systems to determine the appropriate cardiac monitoring devices for their populations’ commissioners.

Implantable cardiac monitors are used successfully by patients across England and within the Stoke-on-Trent South constituency. The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence published guidance in September 2020 on the use of implantable cardiac monitors. National Health Service trusts are currently using such devices in stroke prevention throughout England. It is for local integrated care systems to determine the appropriate cardiac monitoring devices for their populations’ commissioners.

Implantable cardiac monitors are used successfully by patients across England and within the Stoke-on-Trent South constituency. The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence published guidance in September 2020 on the use of implantable cardiac monitors. National Health Service trusts are currently using such devices in stroke prevention throughout England. It is for local integrated care systems to determine the appropriate cardiac monitoring devices for their populations’ commissioners.

We support the opposition’s struggle to seek a democratic future for all Belarusians through peaceful means. We strongly condemn the ongoing repression and human rights violations committed by the Lukashenko regime. The Government has increased financial support to civil society organisations and independent media. We have provided over £1m in 2020, and an additional £1.8m this financial year to support civil society and media freedom in Belarus. We have imposed over 90 sanctions designations in response to the fraudulent elections and human rights violations in Belarus and we are actively considering further designations. Following the FR4978 flight, the UK took clear decisive action:

• We suspended the operating permit of Belavia airlines.

• We banned Belarusian airlines from UK airspace without prior authorisation

• We have advised all UK airlines to avoid flying over Belarus.

The Foreign Secretary discussed the political situation in Belarus and further measures the UK might take with the opposition leader in exile, Svetlana Tikhanovskaya 2 June. The UK pressed for a fact finding investigation by ICAO, the international organisation responsible for civil aviation, which was established on 27 May.

As with all taxes, the Government keeps the Expensive Car Supplement under review, and any changes will be announced at a future fiscal event.

The Government recognises the valuable economic and cultural contribution of the video games industry. The Video Games Tax Relief (VGTR) has supported £5.1 billion of UK expenditure on 1,940 games since its introduction in 2014.

The Government keeps all tax reliefs under review.  Any externally commissioned evaluation will be published in the usual way, in line with the Government Social Research Publication Protocol.

The Government regularly receives proposals for changes to tax reliefs. When considering changes, the Government must ensure they provide support to businesses in a fair way and that taxpayer money is effectively targeted. An uplift in the rate of VGTR is not currently under consideration.

Round 5 of the Safer Streets Fund was formally announced via a Written Ministerial Statement by the Home Secretary on the 6^th July.

We have a duty both to protect our borders and prevent loss of life. That’s why we are doing everything we can to stop these dangerous Channel crossings and bring to justice the criminals behind this evil trade.

No one should be making these dangerous and illegally-facilitated crossings. France is a safe country with a well-run asylum system.

The National Crime Agency, Immigration Enforcement, Border Force and UK Police are working closely with French authorities to stop ruthless criminals who facilitate the crossings, putting lives at risk. A UK-France Coordination and Information Centre was opened in Calais in November 2018 to co-ordinate law enforcement activity.

The coronation was the largest military ceremonial operation for 70 years and involved around 7,000 Armed Forces personnel from the Royal Navy, Army and Royal Air Force. They were supported by thousands more service personnel and Defence civil servants behind the scenes to deliver a complex plan executed with impressive skill and style. In addition, more than 400 personnel from 33 Commonwealth nations and six British Overseas Territories took part in the procession, in a demonstration of the United Kingdom’s close links with its allies and partners around the world.

I refer the my Hon Friend to my answer to Question UIN 129836 on 26 January 2023 and to the published prioritisation of places methodology note and index update note published on gov.uk, which outline the metrics and methodology used in the Levelling Up Fund's Index of Priority Places.

The published Explanatory Note for LUF round 1 sets out the approach to assessment and decision making for round 1.

Councils are on the front line as we tackle this pandemic, and we have now made £3.2 billion available to local authorities through an un-ringfenced grant so they can address pressures in response to COVID-19.

It is important that we carefully monitor the pressures councils are facing. We have now carried out three rounds of the COVID-19 financial monitoring survey and received data for every single authority in the latest round. We are currently analysing the results from the third round and we will publish the data in due course.

We are extremely grateful for the continued collaboration from councils, which enables us to understand pressures at a national and local level. A summary of the data provided to us by councils in England from the first two rounds of monitoring can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/local-authority-covid-19-financial-impact-monitoring-information . We are not currently publishing LA-level data, but are keeping this approach under review.

We know from the first two rounds of monitoring that the majority of the money is being allocated to supporting those most vulnerable in society, as we would expect. Other service areas that money is being allocated to environmental costs (which includes death management) and housing which includes homelessness and rough sleeping.

Councils are on the front line as we tackle this pandemic, and we have now made £3.2 billion available to local authorities through an un-ringfenced grant so they can address pressures in response to Covid-19.

It is important that we carefully monitor the pressures they are facing. Across both rounds of our Covid-19 financial monitoring survey we received data from every single authority asked. We are extremely grateful for their continued collaboration, which enables us to understand pressures at a national and local level. A summary of the data provided to us by councils in England will be available in due course.

We know from the first two rounds of monitoring that the majority of the money is being allocated to supporting those most vulnerable in society, as we would expect. Other service areas that money is being allocated to environmental costs (which includes death management) and housing which includes homelessness and rough sleeping.

Bringing brownfield land back into use is a priority, which is why every local authority is now required to publish and maintain a register of brownfield land, containing up-to-date information on brownfield suitable for housing in the area.

While it is for local authorities to plan and bring forward suitable land, our funding programmes, delivered through Homes England, are also supporting brownfield land being brought forward. As at the end of March 2019, £909 million of the Home Building Fund Long Term Fund (74 per cent of total spend) had been spent on contracted schemes which will lead to 70,062 housing units (61 per cent of unlocked units) being developed on brownfield land. Other funds will also help to bring forward new housing on brownfield sites, such as our £450 million Accelerated Construction programme and our £5.5 billion Housing Infrastructure Fund.

Whilst this funding is available to all areas of the country, all applications undergo an assessment of their value for money for the taxpayer.