Asked by: Lee Anderson (Reform UK - Ashfield)
Question to the Department for Business and Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, what steps his Department is taking to help ensure that residents of Ashfield constituency are able to access essential postal services.
Answered by Gareth Thomas - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade)
The Government provides an annual £50m Network Subsidy funding to support the delivery of a minimum number of Post Office branches and a geographical spread of these branches in line with published access criteria. This requires 99% of the UK population to be within three miles of their nearest Post Office outlet. The Government-set Access Criteria ensures that however the network changes, services remain within local reach of all citizens, including those living in the Ashfield constituency.
Asked by: Lee Anderson (Reform UK - Ashfield)
Question to the Department for Business and Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, what recent discussions he has had with the Post Office on maintaining local post office services.
Answered by Gareth Thomas - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade)
The Secretary of State and I have met with the CEO and Chair of Post Office Limited to ensure that Post Office delivers for postmasters and its communities. We recently met with the Post Office Chair, Nigel Railton, and discussed his proposals for the future of the company before Mr Railton announced Post Office's Transformation Plan on 13th November. While Post Office has the freedom to make commercial decisions regarding the composition of its network, Government sets the parameters for the Post Office to operate in.
Government protects the branch network by setting minimum access criteria which require 99% of the UK population to be within three miles of their nearest Post Office outlet. The access criteria ensure that however the network changes, services remain within local reach of all citizens.
Asked by: Lee Anderson (Reform UK - Ashfield)
Question to the Department for Business and Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, what assessment he has made of the potential impact of increasing the minimum wage on SMEs; and whether she plans to provide additional support to SMEs.
Answered by Gareth Thomas - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade)
This Government remains committed to helping small businesses thrive and will be publishing our Small Business Strategy next year. This will set out our vision for all small businesses, from boosting scale-ups to growing the co-operative economy. It will address key policy areas such as creating thriving high streets, making it easier to access finance, opening overseas and domestic markets, building business capabilities, and providing a strong business environment.
We will publish an Impact Assessment alongside the legislation that implements the increase to the National Living Wage. We estimate that over 3 million workers will receive a pay rise due to the increase in the National Living Wage in April 2025.
Asked by: Lee Anderson (Reform UK - Ashfield)
Question to the Department for Business and Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, with reference to paragraph 5.141 of the Autumn Budget 2024, whether he has made an assessment of the potential impact of increasing the National Living Wage on the economy.
Answered by Justin Madders - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade)
We will publish an Impact Assessment alongside the legislation that implements the increase to the National Minimum Wage and National Living Wage in April 2025.
Asked by: Lee Anderson (Reform UK - Ashfield)
Question to the Department for Business and Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, what steps his Department is taking to help support pubs in Ashfield constituency.
Answered by Gareth Thomas - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade)
Pubs, including those in Ashfield, are at the heart of our communities and vital for economic growth. That is why the Government is creating a fairer business rate system by introducing permanently lower tax rates for retail, hospitality, and leisure businesses from 2026-27 and extending the current relief for 1 year at 40%.
The government is also reducing alcohol duty on qualifying draught products, representing an overall reduction in duty bills of over £85m a year.
We will transform the apprenticeship levy into a more flexible growth and skills levy to better support business and boost opportunity for people to work in Pubs.
Through the Hospitality Sector Council, we are addressing strategic issues for the sector related to high street regeneration, skills, sustainability, and productivity.
Asked by: Lee Anderson (Reform UK - Ashfield)
Question to the Department for Business and Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, what recent progress has been made on negotiating new trade agreements.
Answered by Douglas Alexander - Minister of State (Department for Business and Trade)
Economic Growth is the first priority of this government. To deliver on this, one of our first steps after taking office was to announce that we were resuming Free Trade Agreement negotiations with the Gulf Cooperation Council, India, Israel, South Korea, Switzerland and Turkey. Having carefully reviewed our negotiation objectives we have now started talks with the first of these key partners. This is a first step towards getting businesses access to international markets, boosting jobs, and delivering growth. We are also committed to ensuring UK businesses can take full advantage of CPTPP when it enters into force in December.
Asked by: Lee Anderson (Reform UK - Ashfield)
Question to the Department for Business and Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, whether she is taking steps with Cabinet colleagues to support businesses applying for visas for staff who need to stay in European countries for more than 90 days in any 180-day period.
Answered by Kevin Hollinrake - Shadow Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities
To help businesses navigate the visa and work permit rules of EU countries, the Government has published guidance on GOV.UK on the entry requirements for each EU Member State, as well as for Norway, Iceland, Liechtenstein and Switzerland. The Government is also using the Trade and Cooperation Agreement’s governance structures to ensure the European Union upholds its commitments on business travel.
Asked by: Lee Anderson (Reform UK - Ashfield)
Question to the Department for Business and Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, what steps her Department is taking to support companies that produce high specification machining parts for aeronautics.
Answered by Nusrat Ghani
The Government has been supporting UK aerospace research through the £685m Aerospace Technology Institute programme. Sharing in Growth, an intensive competitiveness improvement programme, has received £86m to support aerospace suppliers. It has created c.2,500 to 3,500 additional jobs and generated a net impact on turnover of £799m to £1,145m across all beneficiaries. The Department is now also working with industry to develop Supply Chain Solutions, an industry funded supplier competitiveness programme.
This support helps attract inward investment into the UK, enables exports and helps secure major contract wins such as the recent Airbus deal with Air India.
Asked by: Lee Anderson (Reform UK - Ashfield)
Question to the Department for Business and Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, what steps her Department is taking to ensure that (a) all regulators and (b) the Gambling Commission act in accordance with the Regulators Code.
Answered by Kevin Hollinrake - Shadow Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities
The Regulators Code is a framework for how regulators should engage with those they regulate. The Legislative and Regulatory Reform Act 2006, requires those regulators covered by its scope, including the Gambling Commission, to have regard to it when setting their policies and operational procedures.
The Office for Product Safety and Standards works to support the effective implementation of the Regulators’ Code.