Oral Answers to Questions

Richard Graham Excerpts

Thursday 11th September 2014 Commons Chamber

[Richard Graham (Gloucester) (Con)]

2. What steps he is taking to reduce regulation on businesses.

[The Minister for Culture and the Digital Economy (Mr Edward Vaizey)]

I am delighted to say that we are the first Government in modern history to reduce the overall burden of domestic regulation on business. Our one-in, two-out approach has cut the annual cost of regulation for businesses by £1.5 billion so far, and the red tape challenge has identified more than 3,000 regulations that we are planning to scrap or improve.

[Richard Graham]

One of the Government’s most encouraging steps has been to speed up payments by Government to suppliers that are small and medium-sized enterprises, but the Federation of Small Businesses and others estimate that the problem of late payment by businesses to businesses has increased significantly. Will my hon. Friend therefore work with business groups, such as the CBI, to encourage all their members to settle within 30 days, and will he consider establishing a kitemark for businesses that live up to that?

[Mr Vaizey]

I agree with my hon. Friend. We really need much greater openness about the payment practices of businesses. Knowing who are good payers and bad payers is essential in deciding with whom to trade. We will therefore bring forward legislation to require large and listed companies to publish their payment practices and performance. We will also work with business groups to strengthen the prompt payment code.

--- Later in debate ---

[George Freeman]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. As a Minister in the Department of Health and in BIS, it is my job to make sure that we are building a landscape in which the UK is the best place to get quick access to patients, tissues, data and trials. Unless we can get innovations to patients more quickly, not only will we let them down, but, more importantly, we will not attract the investment into 21st century health technologies that we and our patients need.

[Richard Graham (Gloucester) (Con)]

The Secretary of State rightly highlighted the importance of re-shoring to revitalising our manufacturing and rebalancing our economy. Innovative companies such as Gloucestershire’s Future Advanced Manufacture Ltd discussed with aerospace customers how to manufacture locally parts previously made in the far east, and has done this with success. Does he think that there are more opportunities, with his Department leading, to discuss with the aerospace industry how the big contractors can look at their supply chains and consider re-shoring opportunities through small and medium-sized enterprises?

[Vince Cable]

The hon. Gentleman is right to say that the aerospace industry is one in which the British supply chain had been badly depleted over the years, and it is now being rebuilt. When I was last in India on a departmental trip I did visit an Indian aerospace company that was relocating to the UK, so this does happen. Through the aerospace growth partnership, which is a key element of the industrial strategy, re-shoring and building up the supply chain is a key element in the long-term planning of the sector.