Asked by: Kelly Tolhurst (Conservative - Rochester and Strood)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps her Department will take to increase the rate of processing for asylum seekers.
Answered by Robert Jenrick - Shadow Secretary of State for Justice
The Asylum Transformation programme aims to bring the system back into balance and modernise it. It is focused on increasing productivity by streamlining, simplifying and digitising processes to speed up decision making to increase efficiency and output. This will support us in delivering sustainable changes to decision maker productivity, helping us control the unprecedented volumes of intake to prevent long wait times for customers.
The PACE pilot covers new flow cases (including small boats and those claims which are admitted to the UK asylum process) along with Legacy cases and children casework. The 8-week pilot reduced the time asylum seekers waited for a first interview by 40%. It is being rolled out across the UK at pace to deal with the 100,000 people awaiting a decision on their claim.
We have increased the number of asylum caseworkers by 80%, from 597 staff in 2019/20 to more than 1,000 today. We are on course for a further 500 people by March 2023.
Asked by: Kelly Tolhurst (Conservative - Rochester and Strood)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what progress her Department has made in reducing the backlog of asylum seeker cases.
Answered by Robert Jenrick - Shadow Secretary of State for Justice
The Asylum Transformation programme aims to bring the system back into balance and modernise it. It is focused on increasing productivity by streamlining, simplifying and digitising processes to speed up decision making to increase efficiency and output. This will support us in delivering sustainable changes to decision maker productivity, helping us control the unprecedented volumes of intake to prevent long wait times for customers.
The PACE pilot covers new flow cases (including small boats and those claims which are admitted to the UK asylum process) along with Legacy cases and children casework. The 8-week pilot reduced the time asylum seekers waited for a first interview by 40%. It is being rolled out across the UK at pace to deal with the 100,000 people awaiting a decision on their claim.
We have increased the number of asylum caseworkers by 80%, from 597 staff in 2019/20 to more than 1,000 today. We are on course for a further 500 people by March 2023.
Asked by: Kelly Tolhurst (Conservative - Rochester and Strood)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment criteria her Department use to find asylum seeker centres.
Answered by Robert Jenrick - Shadow Secretary of State for Justice
The Home Office selection criteria includes deliverability, size, location, cost, situation and use.
Asked by: Kelly Tolhurst (Conservative - Rochester and Strood)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what estimate she has made of the number of asylum seekers in Medway.
Answered by Robert Jenrick - Shadow Secretary of State for Justice
The latest published Immigration Statistics detail the number of asylum seekers accommodated in each local authority area. These statistics can be found at https://www.gov.uk/government/statistical-data-sets/asylum-and-resettlement-datasets#asylum-support. Data is published on a quarterly basis, with the latest information published 25 August 2022.
The next quarterly figures are due to be released later this month.
Asked by: Kelly Tolhurst (Conservative - Rochester and Strood)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what steps he is taking to help ensure that banks are passing on the interest rate increase to their customers.
Answered by John Glen
The pricing of financial products is a commercial decision for firms and the Government does not seek to intervene in such decisions.
The independent Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) of the Bank of England makes monetary policy decisions independently of the Government. Therefore, the Government does not comment on the conduct or effectiveness of monetary policy. The MPC sets the base rate of interest, which is known as Bank Rate. This is the rate of interest the Bank of England will pay on reserves held with them by commercial banks. MPC decisions over Bank Rate guide commercial banks’ decisions over retail interest rates, i.e. interest rates they charge on loans and pay on deposits. However, retail banks also make commercial judgements that influence the degree of pass‐through from changes in Bank Rate into retail interest rates, with conditions in financial markets and in the banking sector also influencing interest rates paid on deposits or charged for lending.
Asked by: Kelly Tolhurst (Conservative - Rochester and Strood)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment she has made of the impact of the Points Based Immigration System on the (a) workboat sector and (b) agricultural sector.
Answered by Kevin Foster
The Home Office carefully considered the possible impacts of the new immigration system, making best use of existing evidence and data – this included a review undertaken by the Migration Advisory Committee in the design of the Points Based System.
Prior to the launch of the Skilled Worker route we published a detailed Impact Assessment which set out a range of impacts. The Government continues to monitor the immigration system and the wider UK economy impacts on migration flows and the labour market, and whether this is in line with our detailed planning assumptions. As part of this, the Government regularly engages the MAC for their expert and independent view.
The Points Based System, including the Skilled Worker route, provides for many occupations in the maritime and agricultural sector (which has its own sector specific scheme for horticultural roles), if the requirements of the system are met.
Asked by: Kelly Tolhurst (Conservative - Rochester and Strood)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, if he will make an assessment of the potential merits of reviewing HMRC policy on capital allowances on workboats.
Answered by Lucy Frazer
Capital allowances, including writing down allowances, provide tax relief for businesses' capital expenditure on qualifying plant or machinery.
In 1997 a 6 per cent special rate writing down allowance was introduced for assets with a long life, which is more than 25 years, to align their tax position more closely with the commercial accounts of a business. This compared to a 25 per cent main rate, which is now 18 per cent, for plant and machinery.
HMRC does not classify which assets should be written down at the main or special rate of writing down allowances. Instead, businesses should identify whether an asset they have acquired has a useful economic life of more or less than 25 years when new.
Ships were initially exempted from this change, with owners given 13 years to adjust to the long-life asset rules. Ships are now treated consistently with all other business assets.
The Government keeps all tax reliefs under review.
Asked by: Kelly Tolhurst (Conservative - Rochester and Strood)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, if he will make an assessment of the (a) effectiveness of HMRC's policy on long-life assets and (b) effect of that matter on tug owners.
Answered by Lucy Frazer
Capital allowances, including writing down allowances, provide tax relief for businesses' capital expenditure on qualifying plant or machinery.
In 1997 a 6 per cent special rate writing down allowance was introduced for assets with a long life, which is more than 25 years, to align their tax position more closely with the commercial accounts of a business. This compared to a 25 per cent main rate, which is now 18 per cent, for plant and machinery.
HMRC does not classify which assets should be written down at the main or special rate of writing down allowances. Instead, businesses should identify whether an asset they have acquired has a useful economic life of more or less than 25 years when new.
Ships were initially exempted from this change, with owners given 13 years to adjust to the long-life asset rules. Ships are now treated consistently with all other business assets.
The Government keeps all tax reliefs under review.
Asked by: Kelly Tolhurst (Conservative - Rochester and Strood)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what assessment he has made of the responsibilities of the National House Building Council for UK building safety.
Answered by Stuart Andrew - Shadow Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport
I refer my Hon Friend to my answer to Question UIN 122751 on 21 February 2022.
Asked by: Kelly Tolhurst (Conservative - Rochester and Strood)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what plans the Government has to improve the quality of building safety checks nationally.
Answered by Stuart Andrew - Shadow Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport
The Building Safety Bill currently in the House of Lords marks the next step in the Government’s ongoing reforms to make sure everyone’s home is a place of safety. The Bill is part of a package of legislative changes to move things forward and make sure the problems Dame Judith Hackitt identified with the current building and fire safety regime are rectified. The package includes the measures in the Fire Safety Act 2021 and changes to the Fire Safety Order alongside the current Building Safety Bill.
The new regime established through the Building Safety Bill will:
The Department has also taken steps to ensure that industry takes a proportionate approach in the assessment of the external walls of buildings. The government has supported the development of guidance which aims to provide risk proportionate guidance to competent assessors. This guidance (PAS 9980) provides new advice on how to assess the risk of fire via an external wall of an existing multi-storey, multi-occupied residential building. It sets out steps that can be taken to identify and assess risk factors as well as mitigation measures that might improve the risk rating of a building via a holistic and fact-based assessment of a building’s construction.