Asked by: Darren Jones (Labour - Bristol North West)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, how many recovery loans have been agreed between companies and their lenders supported by Government guarantees since the launch of the Recovery Loan Scheme; and how much has been lent under that scheme to date.
Answered by Paul Scully
The British Business Bank intends to publish data on usage of the scheme in due course.
Asked by: Darren Jones (Labour - Bristol North West)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what the total sum is of (a) premiums accepted from insurers under the Trade Credit Reinsurance Scheme up to 30 June 2021 and (b) any financial windfall or retained monies received by the Government with specific reference to that scheme.
Answered by Paul Scully
The Trade Credit Reinsurance Scheme has benefitted over half a million businesses, providing certainty for firms across the UK and safeguarding jobs. It has protected more than an estimated £600 billion of business turnover through providing around £210 billion in insurance cover.
As the scheme remains open to receive claims, it would not be appropriate to disclose information on the financial performance of the scheme at this point.
Asked by: Darren Jones (Labour - Bristol North West)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, pursuant to the Answer of 9 October 2020 to Question 98272, when he plans to publish the (a) names of the beneficiaries and (b) amounts of the loans with a nominal value of over €100,000 provided under the (i) Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme and (ii) Coronavirus Large Business Interruption Loan Scheme.
Answered by Paul Scully
Details of facilities made available under the Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme and the Coronavirus Large Business Interruption Loan Scheme will be published where required by the European Commission’s Transparency Aid Module in due course.
Our priority is to ensure borrowers are given notice before information about their loans is shared with the European Commission; we are working with lenders and the British Business Bank to facilitate this. A rolling programme of reporting will then publish details of aid granted within the preceding 12 months.
Asked by: Darren Jones (Labour - Bristol North West)
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 (a) his private office and (b) the wider Department have been allocated to the production and promotion of online content for use on social media in (a) 2018-19, (b) 2019-20 and (c) 2020-21.
Answered by Amanda Solloway - Government Whip, Lord Commissioner of HM Treasury
The Digital Communications Team has included approximately 14 members of staff responsible for producing and promoting social media content between 2018 and 2021. We cannot quantify how many other staff in the wider Communications Directorate or wider department as it’s something that many people do as a smaller part of their role.
The Cabinet Office is continuously tracking and reviewing spending on cross-government campaigns, including Covid-19, to ensure our communications are efficient. We will not spend more than is needed to be effective.
The Cabinet Office publishes expenditure, including on public information campaigns, on a rolling monthly basis on gov.uk as part of routine government transparency arrangements.
Asked by: Darren Jones (Labour - Bristol North West)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what his Department's planned timescale is for concluding work on the Industrial Strategy review.
Answered by Amanda Solloway - Government Whip, Lord Commissioner of HM Treasury
The majority of the 142 policy commitments from the 2017 Industrial Strategy are now in delivery, with around £45 billion of funding assigned to initiatives. These initiatives have strengthened the foundations of productivity, by investing in transport, housing, digital infrastructure, and skills. The Grand Challenges and missions have strengthened the UK’s standing as a global leader in AI, clean growth, healthy ageing, and future transport technology – preparing the UK for a resilient, future economy.
However, the 2017 Industrial Strategy was developed in a pre-COVID-19, pre-Brexit world and the coming decade poses new challenges. The Government is, and will continue to be, a champion of the needs of business and industry as we build back better from the pandemic. We will be laying out our plans to drive growth and support jobs across the UK in due course, and existing work will continue where appropriate.
Asked by: Darren Jones (Labour - Bristol North West)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what estimate his Department made of the number of Green Homes Grant scheme applications it would receive by the end of January 2021 in the initial design of the Green Homes Grant programme.
Answered by Anne-Marie Trevelyan - Minister of State (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
The Green Homes Grant Voucher scheme has faced a number of delivery challenges, as many new mechanisms do. This has been exacerbated by the understandable impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the willingness of householders to welcome tradespeople into their homes.
Different levels of lower than anticipated uptake were considered. However, given the uncertainties surrounding potential take-up, and delivery pathways, no specific forecast was made for the end of January.
Asked by: Darren Jones (Labour - Bristol North West)
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 their Department were dedicated to their Department's responsibilities associated with the delivery of the Industrial Strategy in (a) 2017, (b) 2018, (c) 2019, (d) 2020 and (e) 2021.
Answered by Amanda Solloway - Government Whip, Lord Commissioner of HM Treasury
The total number of dedicated full-time equivalent officials within the Industrial Strategy (IS) Directorate for the following years, is as follows:
2017: 15*
2018: 21
2019: 41
2020: 51
2021: 50
The Industrial Strategy is a cross-government policy which comprises and drives a significant number of initiatives. These span a wide array of policy areas across 20 government departments and arm’s-length bodies.
Given the breadth of the delivery work, it is difficult to obtain accurate figures for resource associated with the Industrial Strategy in other teams within BEIS. This information is unlikely to be retrievable at this point in time and could only be obtained at disproportionate cost.
Asked by: Darren Jones (Labour - Bristol North West)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, when his Department plans to bring forward legislative proposals on the regulation of tips given to hospitality workers.
Answered by Paul Scully
Some employers in the hospitality sector have recently improved their tipping practices and are now passing 100 per cent of tips to their staff.
When Parliamentary time allows, we will bring forward legislation to create a clear legislative framework for employers which handle tips. This will ensure hospitality workers are properly rewarded for their efforts, and protect the vast majority of hospitality businesses who do the right thing from being undercut by a small minority shirking their responsibilities.
Asked by: Darren Jones (Labour - Bristol North West)
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 the letter on Climate Assembly UK he received from six select committee Chairs dated 10 September 2020, whether he plans to publish a response before Christmas 2020 to the recommendations of Climate Assembly UK’s report entitled, The Path to Net Zero, published on 10 September 2020.
Answered by Kwasi Kwarteng
My Rt. Hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy spoke at the launch event of the Climate Assembly UK report on 10 September and welcomed its findings. My Rt. Hon. Friend the Prime Minister responded to both the interim and the final Climate Assembly UK reports via letters to the six select committees.
We are working closely with Climate Assembly UK to ensure that government departments are familiar with their findings. We invited the Climate Assembly UK’s expert leads to present the recommendations via seven briefings for officials from across government that took place between 14 and 24 September and covered all the policy areas discussed in the report.
The report’s recommendations are an important part of the evidence base for developing the Government’s Net Zero Strategy, which will be published in 2021.
Asked by: Darren Jones (Labour - Bristol North West)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, how long on average Future Fund applications have taken to process.
Answered by Paul Scully
The average time taken to process Future Fund applications is shown in the table below.
The number of days starts when matched funding was approved and finishes when the convertible loan was executed. The elapsed time depends on the actions of companies and investors as well as the managers of the Future Fund. The quickest application to date was completed in 9 days.
Month | Number of applications | Average time taken (days) |
May | 464 | 39 |
June | 229 | 34 |
July | 145 | 32 |
August | 120 | 30 |
September | 224 | 25 |
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To note, averages for October and November are not yet available.