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Written Question
National Insurance Contributions: Coronavirus
Tuesday 7th July 2020

Asked by: Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Conservative - Life peer)

Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask Her Majesty's Government, further to the research paper by the Taxpayers' Alliance Tax reforms to secure a recovery from coronavirus, published on 3 June, what assessment they have made of the impact of employers’ national insurance contributions on the sustainability of supply chains; and what plans they have, if any, (1) to abolish the requirement for employers to contribute to national insurance, and (2) to replace those contributions with a payroll tax of 10 per cent on wages above £4,500 per annum.

Answered by Lord Agnew of Oulton

The Government considers all aspects of its support to businesses together and has therefore made no specific assessment of the impact of employers’ national insurance contributions on the sustainability of supply chains.

The Government has provided unprecedented levels of support to businesses during the Covid-19 pandemic, including the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme, the Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme, tax deferrals, a business rates holiday, and other business support grants.

While the Government keeps all taxes under review, there are no current plans to abolish employer national insurance contributions and to replace them with a payroll tax.


Written Question
Taxation: Self-assessment
Thursday 14th February 2019

Asked by: Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Conservative - Life peer)

Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask Her Majesty's Government what steps first-time self-assessed taxpayers must take, including by what date they would need to begin the process, to ensure that they are able to file their tax return by 31 January; and what the penalty is for late submission due to a new applicant’s request for a Unique Taxpayers Reference not being processed in time.

Answered by Lord Bates

Customers can register to submit a self-assessment return in several ways, including online at Gov.uk, or by phoning HMRC on 03000 200 3500. After registering, the customer will receive a letter containing their 10 digit Unique Taxpayer Reference (UTR) and information on what they need to do next; this letter can take up to 10 working days to arrive.

If the only reason for a customer filing late is that they are awaiting their UTR then, as long as they file their return within a reasonable time of receiving it, they will not have to pay a penalty.


Written Question
Public Sector Debt
Tuesday 31st July 2018

Asked by: Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Conservative - Life peer)

Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask Her Majesty's Government what is their calculation of what the cumulative cost of debt interest would be by 2045/46 if they only balanced the current budget.

Answered by Lord Bates

The Managing Fiscal Risks document, published by the Treasury on the 17th July, projects that if the government only balanced the Current Budget every year from 2021-22, then after taking account of economic shocks, annual debt interest costs in 2045-46 would rise to 4.3% of Gross Domestic Product.

The cumulative cost of these interest payments from the current financial year to 2045-46 is projected to be £3.7 trillion.


Written Question
Employees' Contributions: Young People
Thursday 2nd November 2017

Asked by: Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Conservative - Life peer)

Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask Her Majesty's Government what the cost would be of removing the payment of employee national insurance by people under 26.

Answered by Lord Bates

The information requested is not readily available and could be provided only at disproportionate cost.

HMRC does not hold an estimate of the cost of making this policy change. In order to do so would require the modelling of the cost in pre-behaviour terms as well as a number of behavioral adjustments to the costing driven by the differential NICs rates on different income streams this policy would create for those under 26.


Written Question
Students: Loans
Wednesday 1st November 2017

Asked by: Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Conservative - Life peer)

Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask Her Majesty's Government what is the cost to the Exchequer of the recently announced changes to student loan repayments.

Answered by Lord Bates

The government will set out the cost to the Exchequer of the recently announced changes to the repayment threshold for Plan 2 students in England next month.


Written Question
Pay
Monday 24th July 2017

Asked by: Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Conservative - Life peer)

Question to the HM Treasury:

Her Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of comparative public and private sector pay, including the value of pensions, for the years for which this information is available.

Answered by Lord Bates

Analysis conducted by HM Treasury shows that on average, when including employer pension contributions, there is a premium of about 10%. Details can be found in the table below:

Year

Total Pay and Employer Pension Contributions – Differential between Public and Private Sector (%)

2005

8.39

2006

7.97

2007

7.54

2008

8.8

2009

11.8

2010

14.73

2011

12.78

2012

11.88

2013

11.65

2014

9.33

2015

10.42

2016

9.12

Technical notes to the table:

This analysis was conducted by HM Treasury based on data from the ONS’s Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings and compares public and private sector earnings when including employer pension contributions.

The differential obtained shows the percentage hourly compensation from working in the public sector above that of the private sector after accounting for differences in composition between the two. To factor in these compositional differences, the analysis accounts for differences in age, gender, job type (full- or part-time, permanent or temporary), occupation category, region, and tenure.