Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, whether the new lower employers' National Insurance threshold applies to retained fire crews.

To repair the public finances and help raise the revenue required to increase funding for public services, the government has taken the difficult decision to increase employer National Insurance.

The rate of employer NICs will increase from 13.8% to 15% and the per-employee threshold at which employers start to pay National Insurance (the Secondary Threshold) will be reduced to £5,000.

At the provisional Local Government Finance Settlement, the government announced an additional £515 million of support for local government to manage the impact of changes to employer NICs announced at the Autumn Budget.

Fire and rescue authorities will receive a share of the overall funding provided to local government.

Payments will be unringfenced to allow funding to be used across direct, commissioned, and externally provided local services.