Asked by: Alistair Carmichael (Liberal Democrat - Orkney and Shetland)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, whether the Government has made an assessment of the potential implications for national security of UK Universities undertaking research either funded by or in partnership with the Chinese-state linked company Beijing Genomics Institute (BGI).
Answered by George Freeman
The UK’s research sector is independent and free to make decisions on research collaborations. However, university due diligence processes should consider reputational, ethical and security risks and collaborations must remain within the limits of the law. The Government reserves the right to intervene, where we judge that collaborations are not in the national interest or breach domestic or international law.
The Government supports the sector to make informed decisions on international research collaboration through the Trusted Research campaign and supported Universities UK to develop guidelines, published in October 2020, to help universities tackle security risks related to international collaboration.
Additionally, BEIS is establishing a Research Collaboration Advice Team which will work directly with institutions to help embed best practice.
Asked by: Alistair Carmichael (Liberal Democrat - Orkney and Shetland)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what steps he is taking to improve his Department's response times to correspondence from members of the public.
Answered by George Freeman
The department is committed to responding to all enquiries in a timely manner.
Asked by: Alistair Carmichael (Liberal Democrat - Orkney and Shetland)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, how many officials in his and the predecessor Department worked on the Government’s national minimum wage application and enforcement policies in each year from 2010-11 to 2017-18; and what the current staffing level of that policy area is.
Answered by Lord Harrington of Watford
The number of departmental officials who work on either National Minimum Wage policy or on enforcement policy has been approximately ten full time equivalent (FTE) members of staff in each of the years from 2010-11 to 2017-18. This an estimated figure based on the average across the calendar year.
Furthermore, we are committed to cracking down on employers who break the National Minimum Wage law. This is why this Government continues to invest heavily in minimum wage enforcement, increasing the budget to £26.3 million for 2018/19, up from £13 million in 2015/16.
Asked by: Alistair Carmichael (Liberal Democrat - Orkney and Shetland)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what proportion of households in fuel poverty have (a) no connection to the gas grid, (b) at least one prepayment meter installed and (c) electric central heating.
Answered by Claire Perry
Fuel poverty is a devolved issue, each nation in the UK has its own fuel poverty definition, targets and policies to tackle the issue.
In 2015, the proportion of fuel poor households in England with no connection to the gas grid was estimated to be 18.5% (463,000 households).
The proportion of fuel poor households in England with at least one prepayment meter was estimated to be 32.9% (823,000 households).
The proportion of fuel poor households in England using electric central heating was 8.2% (204,000 households).
The latest fuel poverty detailed tables for England can be found at the following link:
https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/fuel-poverty-detailed-tables-2017
Note that the latest fuel poverty annual statistics for England are due to be published on the 26th of June, 2018.
Asked by: Alistair Carmichael (Liberal Democrat - Orkney and Shetland)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, how many households in fuel poverty have a home that is rated (a) band C, (b) band D, (c) band E and (d) lower than band E for energy efficiency.
Answered by Claire Perry
Fuel poverty is a devolved matter, each nation in the UK has its own fuel poverty definition, targets and policies to tackle the issue.
Between 2010 and 2015, the number of households in fuel poverty in England was estimated to be as follows:
SAP bands | Number of households (thousands) | |||||
| 2010 | 2011 | 2012 | 2013 | 2014 | 2015 |
A/B/C | * | 68 | 104 | 104 | 135 | 151 |
D | 694 | 772 | 893 | 1055 | 1199 | 1337 |
E | 1227 | 1146 | 1015 | 875 | 758 | 736 |
F and G | 531 | 447 | 348 | 313 | 287 | 278 |
* Figures have been suppressed due to small sample size
Source: BEIS data https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/fuel-poverty-trends-2017
Asked by: Alistair Carmichael (Liberal Democrat - Orkney and Shetland)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, how many households in fuel poverty have had their homes upgraded since January 2015 to band (a) C, (b) D and (c) E for energy efficiency.
Answered by Claire Perry
The Department does not hold the number of households in fuel poverty that have had their homes upgraded since January 2015.
Due to the nature of the survey, on which the fuel poverty statistics are based, the department cannot track when an energy efficiency measure is installed in a property and the resulting change in efficiency rating.
The fuel poverty trends tables estimate the number of households in each energy efficiency band between 2003 and 2015, these tables can be found here:
https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/fuel-poverty-trends-2017.
Asked by: Alistair Carmichael (Liberal Democrat - Orkney and Shetland)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, how many households have been connected to the gas grid under the fuel poor network extension scheme since 1 April 2014.
Answered by Claire Perry
According to Ofgem statistics, between 1 April 2014 and 31 March 2017, the Gas Distribution Networks in Great Britain made 37,597 connections under the Fuel Poor Network Extension Scheme.
Asked by: Alistair Carmichael (Liberal Democrat - Orkney and Shetland)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, with reference to paragraph 3.32 of his Department's consultation document entitled Maritime 2050: Call for evidence, published on 27 March 2018, what assessment he has made of the changes required to his Department’s service level agreement with HMRC for national minimum wage enforcement to (a) apply and (b) enforce entitlement to national minimum wage rates of pay to all merchant seafarers working on commercial vessels in UK territorial waters and on one port voyages to offshore energy installations.
Answered by Andrew Griffiths
The Department for Transport’s Maritime 2050: Call for evidence consultation document sought views on a long term maritime strategy. Under the ‘people’ theme the document aims to identify issues that are relevant to the nation’s needs on skills, training and employment in 2050.
A legal working group has been considering the current application of the National Minimum Wage (NMW) to seafarers working in the UK and whether legislative changes are necessary. The Minister for Maritime has received recommendations from the group concerning the extension of the NMW and the Government is reviewing these proposals.
Asked by: Alistair Carmichael (Liberal Democrat - Orkney and Shetland)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, with reference to paragraph 3.32 of his Department's consultation document entitled Maritime 2050: Call for evidence, published on 27 March 2018, what assessment he has made of the changes required to the legislative framework to (a) apply and (b) enforce entitlement to national minimum wage rates of pay for all merchant seafarers working on commercial vessels in UK territorial waters and on one port voyages to offshore energy installations.
Answered by Andrew Griffiths
The Department for Transport’s Maritime 2050: Call for evidence consultation document sought views on a long term maritime strategy. Under the ‘people’ theme the document aims to identify issues that are relevant to the nation’s needs on skills, training and employment in 2050.
A legal working group has been considering the current application of the National Minimum Wage (NMW) to seafarers working in the UK and whether legislative changes are necessary. The Minister for Maritime has received recommendations from the group concerning the extension of the NMW and the Government is reviewing these proposals.
Asked by: Alistair Carmichael (Liberal Democrat - Orkney and Shetland)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, with reference to paragraph 3.32 of his Department's consultation document entitled Maritime 2050: Call for evidence, published on 27 March 2018, what assessment he has made of the changes required to the legislative framework to extend entitlement to national minimum wage rates of pay to all merchant seafarers working on commercial vessels in UK territorial waters and on one port voyages to offshore energy installations.
Answered by Andrew Griffiths
The Department for Transport’s Maritime 2050: Call for evidence consultation document sought views on a long term maritime strategy. Under the ‘people’ theme the document aims to identify issues that are relevant to the nation’s needs on skills, training and employment in 2050.
A legal working group has been considering the current application of the National Minimum Wage (NMW) to seafarers working in the UK and whether legislative changes are necessary. The Minister for Maritime has received recommendations from the group concerning the extension of the NMW and the Government is reviewing these proposals.