Asked by: Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what is their assessment of the report by Deloitte concerning the level of return from research and development among the biggest drug companies.
Answered by Baroness Neville-Rolfe - Minister of State (Cabinet Office)
We are aware of the trend in the decline in research and development returns reported by Deloitte in its report “Measuring the return from pharmaceutical innovation 2016”. This is part of an established trend.
Working with industry through the Life Sciences Strategy we want to make sure the UK is the best place in the world to develop and launch new medicines.
Government is already taking action in key areas that will benefit the life sciences sector, such as the recent announcement of an extra £2bn a year for R&D by the end of this Parliament including a new Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund. We are also providing £100m of funding to extend and enhance the Biomedical Catalyst, supporting innovative life science companies to translate cutting-edge medical technologies into commercial success.
Asked by: Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what action are they taking to stop counterfeit electrical goods being sold online.
Answered by Baroness Neville-Rolfe - Minister of State (Cabinet Office)
The Government takes the issue of IP infringement seriously, including counterfeit electrical goods, and is working with industry and law enforcement agencies on a number of initiatives to tackle this issue.
The Police IP Crime Unit, launched in September 2013, has had a significant impact having arrested over 70 people and suspended over 11,000 internet domains. In 2014/15 Border Force detained over 1.6 Million IP infringing items, if genuine the retail value would have been in excess of £56 million. Ongoing enforcement initiatives include Operation Jasper, which is addressing the use of social media to sell counterfeit items and work by National Trading Standards and the IPO Intelligence Hub to deal with the risks posed by ‘fulfilment houses’ that supply many counterfeit items purchased online.
Officials have also met online retailers to discuss the availability of counterfeits on their platforms and to help co-ordinate law enforcement action against sellers.
Asked by: Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment have they made of the adequacy of the powers of trading standards officers.
Answered by Baroness Neville-Rolfe - Minister of State (Cabinet Office)
The Consumer Rights Act (CRA) came into force 1st October 2015. The act has given Trading Standards Officers (TSOs) greater flexibility to respond to breaches of consumer law, such as seeking redress for consumers who have suffered harm.
TSOs have a range of additional powers dependent upon the legislation they are enforcing. These include the power to require traders to produce documents relating to their business and powers to seize and detain goods and documents in certain circumstances.
Following responses to a Call for Evidence run in spring 2016 on Terms and Conditions and Civil Enforcement, the Department is considereing the strength of Local Authority Trading Standards Services’ powers in enforcing consumer protection law such as that on unfair contract terms. The department will publish their response to this Call for Evidence in due course.
Asked by: Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the London Fire Brigade's proposal for a single, publicly accessible UK register of product recalls.
Answered by Baroness Neville-Rolfe - Minister of State (Cabinet Office)
We want to ensure consumers have easy access to information on product recalls. We have already asked an industry led Recall Review Steering Group to explore how a single source of information on product recalls can be delivered for business and consumers. We will be discussing proposals on this with them shortly. The London Fire Brigade are represented on the Recall Review Steering Group by the Chief Fire Officers Association.
Asked by: Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what plans they have to require manufacturers of household appliances to make publicly available the risk assessments they carry out on their appliances.
Answered by Baroness Neville-Rolfe - Minister of State (Cabinet Office)
We have no plans to do so.
Asked by: Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the case for reviewing the legislation concerning the safe use of electrical products at home.
Answered by Baroness Neville-Rolfe - Minister of State (Cabinet Office)
The Government takes consumer safety extremely seriously. This country has some of the most robust product safety legislation in the world. We cannot be complacent. We have the legislation in place to protect consumers, but we do sometimes see unsafe products on the market. That is why in November 2014 the Government announced an Independent Review of the Product Recall System.
Following this review we invited a team of industry experts to form a Steering Group to consider how the review’s recommendations might be implemented. The Steering Group has set itself a timeframe of 2 years in which to complete its work.
Asked by: Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the case for requiring manufacturers of all domestic white goods to put fire-proof markings on them, including the manufacturer, model and serial number, so that they can be identified more easily if they are damaged after causing a fire.
Answered by Baroness Neville-Rolfe - Minister of State (Cabinet Office)
Under existing legislation, electrical products must be labelled with the manufacturer’s name and address, and a serial number or other identification mark.
The Association of Manufacturers of Domestic Appliances and the London Fire Brigade are in discussion over whether there is any further requirement for fire-proof markings.
Asked by: Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment have they made of the case for removing the Lesser Duty Rule.
Answered by Baroness Neville-Rolfe - Minister of State (Cabinet Office)
The Government believes that effective trade defence measures should be proportionate, not protectionist, and strike a balance between removing the injury to producers caused by unfair trade, and avoiding imposing unnecessary costs on user industries, retailers, consumers and the rest of the economy.
The evidence we have shows that duties that have been imposed under the Lesser Duty Rule on imports of Chinese steel into the EU have been effective in delivering rapid, substantial and sustained reductions in imports. For example, imports of wire rod, organic coated steel and stainless steel flat products are down by more than 90%. We have said we would look at evidence that others might provide.
There are a number of examples where the Lesser Duty Rule has avoided unnecessary costs to the rest of the economy. In the case of solar panels for example, the removal of the Lesser Duty Rule could have cost the downstream UK solar sector around £500m in one year.
We support looking at the methodology under which injury is calculated. Where the European Commission has set duties that we believe to be too low to remove the injury caused to EU industry by unfair trade, we will push for them to be increased, as we have done in the reinforcing bar and cold rolled flat products cases.
Asked by: Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the future contribution of tidal lagoons to meeting the UK's energy requirements and decarbonisation targets.
Answered by Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth
The Government recognises the potential that could exist in harnessing tidal energy around the coastline of the UK. That is why we have commissioned an independent strategic review to assess the case for tidal lagoons and consider whether they could represent value for money for the consumer. Charles Hendry will lead the independent review.
The review is underway and the Government will carefully consider the recommendations from the review before making decisions on future development of tidal lagoons.