Lord Risby

Primary legislation states that the elections will go ahead in May 2021.

We continue to work closely with the electoral and public health bodies to resolve challenges and ensure everyone will be able to cast their vote safely and securely - and in a way of their choosing.

The Government is also bringing forward additional measures to extend the ability to appoint a proxy, so that those that are affected by Covid-19 in the days before the poll are still able to make their voice heard.

Guidance will be published in good time ahead of the polls and this matter will be kept under review. The House will be kept updated.

The information requested falls under the remit of the UK Statistics Authority. I have therefore asked the Authority to respond.

Dear Lord Risby,

As National Statistician and Chief Executive of the UK Statistics Authority, I am responding to your Parliamentary Questions asking about imports and exports between the UK and South Africa, and the UK and India, in each of the last five years (HL7881; HL7882).

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) publishes data on goods and services exports for the UK with South Africa and India[1], which can be found in table 1 below. Please note that data are in current prices and, as such, include the effect of inflation. We do not have total trade data, split by country, on a volume basis (with the effect of inflation removed) at present.

Table 1: UK total trade (goods and services) with South Africa and India, in £ million, non-seasonally adjusted

Source: ONS

Yours sincerely,

Professor Sir Ian Diamond

[1]https://www.ons.gov.uk/businessindustryandtrade/internationaltrade/datasets/uktotaltradeallcountriesnonseasonallyadjusted

The information requested falls under the remit of the UK Statistics Authority. I have therefore asked the Authority to respond.

Dear Lord Risby,

As National Statistician and Chief Executive of the UK Statistics Authority, I am responding to your Parliamentary Questions asking about imports and exports between the UK and South Africa, and the UK and India, in each of the last five years (HL7881; HL7882).

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) publishes data on goods and services exports for the UK with South Africa and India[1], which can be found in table 1 below. Please note that data are in current prices and, as such, include the effect of inflation. We do not have total trade data, split by country, on a volume basis (with the effect of inflation removed) at present.

Table 1: UK total trade (goods and services) with South Africa and India, in £ million, non-seasonally adjusted

Source: ONS

Yours sincerely,

Professor Sir Ian Diamond

[1]https://www.ons.gov.uk/businessindustryandtrade/internationaltrade/datasets/uktotaltradeallcountriesnonseasonallyadjusted

The Government recognises the importance of digitalisation amongst small and medium enterprises, and has a number of programmes which support this. Within BEIS, the Small Business Leadership Programme and Peer-to-Peer networks promote the acquisition of digital skills, whilst the Business Basics programme has provided valuable insights and evidence as to both the practical barriers and opportunities for small and medium enterprises in the adoption of productivity-enhancing technologies. The Made Smarter pilot scheme in the North West has supported manufacturing companies to adopt new Industry 4.0 technologies, both through matched grant funding and independent, expert advice.

Further initiatives focussed on digitalisation are led or supported by other government departments. These include Digital Boost, a platform which matches organisations with digital experts offering free advice, supported by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport. In addition, the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government announced £20m in July 2020 to help small and medium-sized businesses acquire new technology and seek advice on digital adoption in order to continue or diversify their business activities in light of the pandemic. This is provided through grants of between £1000 and £5000, and is fully funded by the Government with no obligation for businesses themselves to contribute financially.

Although the Government does not support sporting boycotts, athlete participation in the Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games is a decision for the British Olympic and British Paralympic Associations, who operate independently of the Government.

The security and resilience of the UK’s telecoms networks is of paramount importance. The government will publish its targeted diversification strategy focused on rebalancing the telecommunications supply chain in the coming weeks alongside the Telecoms Security Bill. As part of this, we are exploring ways to incentivise research and development in the UK telecoms sector, such as alternative 5G deployment models, and accelerating the development of ‘interoperable’ equipment - kit which can be used by multiple vendors - and making it standard across the sector.

The government has established a Diversification Taskforce - chaired by Lord Livingston of Parkhead - which will provide independent and expert advice to the Government, supporting the development of the strategy and ensuring that our measures are ambitious and effective.

At the end of the transition period, the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018 (EUWA) will retain the General Data Protection Regulation in UK domestic law.

We have made Regulations (The Data Protection, Privacy and Electronic Communications (Amendments etc)(EU Exit) Regulations 2019) under the EUWA to make necessary and appropriate changes to the retained legislation so that the UK’s data protection law continues to function effectively after the transition period. For example, the Regulations rename the GDPR as the ‘UK GDPR’, repatriate certain powers from the EU Commission to the Secretary of State and replace European terminology with UK equivalents.

At the end of the transition period, the UK will recognise EEA countries and EU institutions as continuing to be adequate for the purpose of the UK GDPR, so data can continue to flow from the UK to the EEA without further safeguards needing to be implemented.

In order for the free flow of data from the EEA to the UK to continue at the end of the transition period, we are seeking adequacy decisions from the EU under both the GDPR and the LED.

The number of export licences granted by the Art Council’s Export Licensing Unit in a particular year is published and laid before Parliament in the annual report of the Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art and Objects of Cultural Interest. The Committee’s Report for 2018-19 is expected to be published shortly. Figures for 2019-20 are not yet available. The earlier reports can be found here, and are attached:

https://www.artscouncil.org.uk/supporting-collections-and-cultural-property/rcewa-annual-reports

Technology in education has been essential for continuing to teach remotely during the COVID-19 outbreak and subsequent school and college closures. In the long term, it also has the potential to support teacher workload reductions, flexible working, cost savings, inclusive teaching practice and improved pupil outcomes.

A number of programmes which have been in place across the COVID-19 outbreak are providing valuable intelligence as to the most impactful uses of online learning.

The EdTech Demonstrator programme, which supports schools and colleges to use technology to strengthen remote education arrangements and secure a longer-term strategy, will provide an important evaluation on the extent to which this sector-led approach can impact on the positive use of technology and help other institutions address a broad range of challenges they face both now and in the future.

The department’s digital platforms offer allows schools to provide remote online teaching, as well as develop approaches for the longer term.

In addition, Ofsted conducted monitoring visits to schools in the Autumn Term, looking at remote education practice, and publishing a guide to what works well: https://www.gov.uk/government/news/ofsted-publishes-short-guide-to-what-works-well-in-remote-education.

Moving additional freight by water or rail can provide a number of benefits over transporting that freight by road, in particular environmental gains, but can also a decrease in congestion. The Department will continue to consider waterborne freight in future transport policy, including the Future of UK Freight strategy and when looking at transport decarbonisation options.

In terms of current measures, the Department offers Mode Shift Revenue Support (MSRS) to assist companies with the operating costs associated with running inland water (or rail) freight transport instead of road, where this is more expensive than road. A similar scheme, Waterborne Freight Grant, is available to help with the additional operating costs of a new coastal or short sea shipping service.

The number of fatalities and reported personal injury road accidents where a police officer attended the scene of the accident and allocated the contributory factor “Driver/Rider impaired by drugs (illicit or medicinal)” in Great Britain for the last 5 years can be found in the table below.

The Department is working closely with Public Health England and NHS England and NHS Improvement to provide authoritative information to the public and urge everyone to seek National Health Service advice, so they have the right information to make an informed choice about getting vaccinated. We are also working with the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport to help social media platforms identify and act against incorrect claims about the virus in line with their terms and conditions. This includes anti-vaccination narratives that could endanger people’s health.

The UK takes talk of secession, and other threats to undo the progress of the last twenty-six years in Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) very seriously. We have called on those responsible to cease this destabilising and divisive rhetoric. As a UN Security Council and Peace Implementation Council Steering Board member, the UK is committed to upholding the Dayton Agreement in BiH. The UK, along with our allies, is offering visible and practical support to BiH's territorial integrity, and to maintain the EU military mission (EUFOR) and the Office of the High Representative in BiH. We will continue to help the people of BiH in building a better future in a stable and prosperous State with strong, functioning institutions. Ultimately, the authorities in BiH themselves must make necessary reforms for the good of all citizens, and we call on them to meet their obligations to those who elected them.

There are no plans to record vaccinations given to UK nationals abroad.

The UK Government has undertaken a major operation to support the Overseas Territories (OTs) in dealing with COVID-19. Support has been sent to all of the inhabited OTs with the exception of Pitcairn. UK support has enabled seven OTs to start testing for the virus and the others to continue testing when supply routes were cut. Supplies of PPE were sent to ensure no OT ran out. Medical equipment was sent to ensure hospitals could cope when each island was cut off from their usual medical evacuation routes by providing field hospital equipment, medicines, ventilators, CPAPS and other equipment. Expert support was provided in the form of advice from PHE, deployments of medical staff and a remote telemedicine service providing OT clinicians with remote access to clinical advice in the treatment of COVID-19 and other critical conditions. Military teams were deployed to the Cayman Islands and Turks and Caicos Islands to support with logistics and border security. Flights were arranged by the FCDO to repatriate British nationals to and from the OTs. Emergency budgetary support has been provided to Montserrat, St Helena and Anguilla to keep essential public services running and ensure these OTs can respond to the impacts of the pandemic.

The UK Government has worked closely with the governments of the Crown Dependencies throughout the COVID-19 pandemic. While the Crown Dependencies are responsible for their own emergency planning, response and recovery, the UK has engaged at working and political level with these jurisdictions to support their own efforts to combat COVID-19 and mitigate against its spread on the islands. This has included ensuring that the Crown Dependencies can access UK supply chains for key medicines and medical devices, including PPE and ventilators. The UK will maintain this engagement over the coming months to ensure that the UK can continue to offer support to Crown Dependency governments.

Through the Vaccine Task Force, the UK Government is procuring vaccines on behalf of the Crown Dependencies and OTs, and is working with them to ensure the smooth deployment of a COVID-19 vaccine once a safe and effective one is available.

In response to the Beirut Port explosion on 4 August 2020, the UK announced a £25 million package of humanitarian assistance to help support Lebanon in its time of urgent need. This makes us one of the biggest international donors to the crisis.

Of this assistance, £20 million is allocated to the UN World Food Programme in Lebanon and will go directly to help vulnerable families by covering their essential survival needs, and will provide support for cash, vouchers, or in-kind support. £3 million will go to the British Red Cross for emergency support to respond to the explosion.

We rapidly deployed UK experts to Beirut to advise and assist with the response and undertake longer term planning. This has included:

• Specialist medics from the UK's Emergency Medical Team to assess health needs on the ground;
• Humanitarian, logistics and military experts supporting the rapid assessment of damaged critical infrastructure, working with other humanitarian partners to scope needs;
• Specialist teams and equipment on HMS Enterprise to assess the damage to the port - which is a lifeline for Lebanon and for aid transported to neighbouring countries including Syria.

HMRC publish information regarding the total amount of Inheritance Tax (IHT) receipts received in each tax year annually in their ‘Inheritance Tax Statistics’ publication.

The latest statistics were published on 30 July 2020. The amount of revenue raised from IHT, irrespective of when the charge to tax arose, is reproduced in the table below, for each of the last five years.

Source: Table 12.1 Inheritance Tax: Analysis of Receipts. Available online on the GOV.UK website. These figures include both cash and non-cash receipts.

The table below contains estimates of additional rate taxpayer numbers and liabilities taxed at the additional rate for the 2019-20 financial year:

1. Taxpayer numbers and liabilities are rounded to three significant figures. Figures may not sum due to rounding.
2. The figures are based on outturn data derived from the 2017-18 Survey of Personal Incomes (SPI) and projected using economic assumptions consistent with the Office for Budget Responsibility’s March 2020 Economic and Fiscal Outlook.

The estimated number of income tax payers, and liabilities by tax band are published in HMRC’s Income Tax Liabilities Statistics publication.

On 22 July, the Government announced a two-part review into the role of Police and Crime Commissioners (PCCs). Part-one of the review, which is internal, is underway and focused on strengthening the accountability of PCCs in line with the Government’s manifesto commitment.

Part-two of the review will commence after the PCC elections in May 2021. It will focus on longer-term reforms to the governance model, including the role PCCs play in tackling reoffending to help reduce crime.

The number of unaccompanied children who make asylum claims is published in the quarterly immigration statistics. The latest statistics can be found at the following link: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/immigration-statistics-year-ending-june-2020/how-many-people-do-we-grant-asylum-or-protection-to

We are very grateful to local authorities who have pledged places to support the National Transfer Scheme (NTS) and we need more to come forward and do their bit for vulnerable children.

We recognise a need to achieve a more equitable distribution of unaccompanied asylum-seeking children (UASC) and have therefore worked with local government partners to develop proposals to further improve the scheme which we have recently consulted on. We are grateful to local authorities for their responses to that consultation which we are carefully considering in order to develop a more sustainable long-term future model for the NTS. The consultation also sought views on a potential mandatory approach should participation in the voluntary scheme not achieve a more proportionate distribution of UASC.

This Government is determined to crack down on the county lines gangs who are exploiting our children and have a devastating impact on our communities.

That is why we are investing £25m to boost law enforcement efforts to put a stop to these ruthless gangs – this includes funding to tackle activity on the road and rail network, expand the National County Lines Co-ordination Centre (NCLCC), boost operational activity in the three major exporting force areas (the Metropolitan Police, Merseyside, West Midlands), and increase support for victims.

We know that the transport network is used to facilitate county lines, and our £25m investment has enabled the British Transport Police (BTP) to establish a County Lines Taskforce which works with police forces and rail industry partners to deliver targeted activity on the rail network. This investment has also continued to improve availability and standardise the use of Automatic Number Plate Recognition (ANPR) data, allowing for further additional support to county lines investigations.

Our investment is already delivering results: as a result of the £5m we invested in 2019-2020, pilot forces and British Transport Police have closed nearly 140 deal lines, seized cash and drugs with a total value of over £3 million, and made over 100 weapons seizures between November 2019 and March 2020.

In addition, a recent county lines ‘week of intensification’ co-ordinated by NCLCC in September and involving all police forces, including BTP, resulted in over 1,000 arrests, drugs worth more than £1m seized and over 1,500 vulnerable individuals safeguarded.