Asked by: Lord Bradshaw (Liberal Democrat - Life peer)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they take to ensure that small businesses offering personal services advertising as cash only pay all their taxes and charges and are not avenues for money laundering.
Answered by Baroness Vere of Norbiton - Parliamentary Secretary (HM Treasury)
The Government is committed to creating a level playing field for all sectors by ensuring that everyone pays the right amount of tax at the right time. Like all other businesses, those which exclusively accept cash must meet their tax obligations.
HMRC’s approach to tax evasion aims to tackle current non-compliance and change future behaviours. Their activities include national campaigns and specialist task forces that incorporate intensive bursts of activity in targeted high risk trade sectors (including the retail and service industry) and locations across the UK. HMRC also works with customer groups and third parties, such as other local and central Government agencies, to reduce error and fraud within these sectors. This includes providing customer education highlighting the importance of keeping accurate records.
HMRC uses a range of data and intelligence sources, including compliance visits, when necessary, to ensure businesses are complying with their tax obligations but also aren’t engaged in any other illicit activity like money laundering. If suspicions of money laundering are identified, and it is appropriate for HMRC to investigate, the department works with the appropriate prosecuting authority to pursue a criminal prosecution for money laundering.
HMRC take any report of suspected tax evasion seriously and operate a confidential Fraud Telephone Hotline and an online reporting tool available on GOV.UK.
Asked by: Lord Bradshaw (Liberal Democrat - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Baroness Vere of Norbiton on 27 September (HL10352), what plans they have in concluding future negotiations with train providers to bear a proportion of the costs that train operators face as a consequence of failing to provide quality service to rail customers.
Answered by Baroness Vere of Norbiton - Parliamentary Secretary (HM Treasury)
There are currently no plans to negotiate any variations to the Intercity Express Programme’s contracts with Agility to extend the incentive regime. The contracted arrangements for instances where full service provision is not offered are contained in the existing contracts, as articulated in previous responses.
Asked by: Lord Bradshaw (Liberal Democrat - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the usage figures for Worcestershire Parkway station, published on 8 September, which showed that despite the COVID-19 pandemic a volume of journeys from the station had been reached that was not expected to have been achieved for another 11 years, what assessment they have made of the continued need for the Department for Transport to use Transport Analysis Guidance monitoring systems for assessing the likely value of new railway stations.
Answered by Baroness Vere of Norbiton - Parliamentary Secretary (HM Treasury)
The business case for Worcestershire Parkway forecasted a range of demand scenarios to account for uncertainty around the modelling. These included different assumptions on external events, expectations for housing growth and level of abstraction from surrounding stations. We are due to receive a report on the station’s performance from Worcester County Council. We will work through the findings on the differences between the forecasted demand and actual performance and use this to help inform future stations appraisals.
The Transport Analysis Guidance continues to be recommended best practice for transport appraisal. We recognise the analytical challenges associated with forecasting demand for new stations, and valuing the benefits they bring. Following research carried out by Leeds ITS for Rail Safety and Standards Board (RSSB), published on their websites research catalogue as "Rail Openings Appraisal (COF-ECO-ROA)", we are reviewing our guidance in this area and plan to bring forward improvements to it in future.
Asked by: Lord Bradshaw (Liberal Democrat - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether they have any plans to introduce a pilot scheme to abolish peak-time railway fares, similar to that introduced by ScotRail with funding from the Scottish Government.
Answered by Baroness Vere of Norbiton - Parliamentary Secretary (HM Treasury)
There are no current plans to introduce a pilot scheme to abolish peak time railway fares in England. Peak and off-peak fares are an important tool to manage demand and alleviate crowding on peak time services by encouraging those who can travel off-peak to do so.
In recent years, we have introduced several initiatives to support passengers and improve affordability of rail. We have successfully launched flexible season tickets to support commuters’ return to the rail following the pandemic. We have also saved a generation of passengers a third off their fares through the 16-17 and 26-30 Railcards and went even further in November 2020 by extending these savings to former servicemen and women through a new Veterans Railcard.
We are now rolling out single leg pricing to most of London North Eastern Railway’s (LNER’s) network following a successful trial. We will carefully consider the impacts of expanding single leg pricing to most of LNER’s network before taking decisions on any wider extension.