Asked by: Lord Field of Birkenhead (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what estimate he has made of the cost to the public purse of child benefit paid for children who do not reside in the UK; how many such children there were; and in which countries those children resided in the most recent financial year for which data are available.
Answered by Mel Stride - Secretary of State for Work and Pensions
Total Child Benefit payments in 2018-19 amounted to £11.6 billion. It is estimated that approximately £15 million was paid for children resident in another EEA country or Switzerland. The number of children these payments relate to, broken down by the country they reside in, is provided in Table 1 below.
Table 1: Estimated number of children for whom Child Benefit is received where European Community regulations apply, as at February 2019
|
|
Country | Number of children |
Austria | 10 |
Belgium | 40 |
Bulgaria | 415 |
Croatia | 45 |
Cyprus | 40 |
Czech Republic | 165 |
Denmark | 20 |
Estonia | 35 |
Finland | 25 |
France | 605 |
Germany | 165 |
Greece | 55 |
Hungary | 150 |
Iceland | 5 |
Italy | 170 |
Latvia | 700 |
Liechtenstein | - |
Lithuania | 790 |
Luxembourg | 10 |
Malta | 25 |
Norway | 40 |
Poland | 10,975 |
Portugal | 230 |
Republic of Ireland | 1,945 |
Romania | 1,000 |
Slovakia | 575 |
Slovenia | - |
Spain | 625 |
Sweden | 30 |
Switzerland | 20 |
The Netherlands | 215 |
Total | 19,120 |
Footnote: Figures have been rounded to the nearest 5. Figures under 5 have been suppressed and shown as ‘-’.
Asked by: Lord Field of Birkenhead (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, when the Government expects to publish its policy paper on free ports.
Answered by Mel Stride - Secretary of State for Work and Pensions
The Government receives a wide range of representations from stakeholders on all matters of fiscal policy, including free ports. We consider all of them in the normal process at fiscal events.
Asked by: Lord Field of Birkenhead (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what steps the Government is taking to encourage more (a) food retailers and (b) food manufacturers to claim tax relief on donating trading stock to charity.
Answered by Mel Stride - Secretary of State for Work and Pensions
Companies can claim relief for the cost of donating their trading stock to charities, including food banks, from their taxable profits. The Government promotes awareness and understanding of the relief available for corporate charitable donations through publishing guidance on GOV.UK and actively engages with businesses and charities to ensure the tax code is supporting them to meet their charitable objectives.
Asked by: Lord Field of Birkenhead (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what estimate he has made of (a) the number of businesses that have claimed tax relief on donating food stock to charity and (b) the total value of tax relief granted for this purpose, in each of the most recent five years for which data is available.
Answered by Mel Stride - Secretary of State for Work and Pensions
The Government does not have this information available. If a company donates its trading stock to a charity, it does not have to include anything in its sales income for the value of the gift.
Asked by: Lord Field of Birkenhead (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what recent assessment he has made of the potential merits of maintaining majority ownership of Royal Bank of Scotland.
Answered by John Glen - Paymaster General and Minister for the Cabinet Office
The Government believes that, as a matter of principle, firms best succeed under private ownership. Returning RBS to the private sector is the right policy for taxpayers, customers, and the wider economy.
The Government intervened in RBS to maintain stability at the height of the financial crisis. RBS was never a speculative investment made to generate a profit, and it is right that private investors, not taxpayers, should bear the risk of companies such as RBS.
The Government’s policy remains to return the financial sector assets acquired during the crisis to private ownership, when it represents value for money to do so, and market conditions allow.
Asked by: Lord Field of Birkenhead (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, how much funding has been allocated to the provision of interest-free loans as announced in Budget 2018; and when the first such loans will be made available.
Answered by John Glen - Paymaster General and Minister for the Cabinet Office
At Budget 2018, the Government announced that it will carry out a study into the feasibility of establishing a no-interest loans scheme in the UK, and design a pilot.
The feasibility study, which will be launched this year, will examine issues such as access, eligibility and funding models and help to determine how a pilot could work.
Asked by: Lord Field of Birkenhead (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, if he will make an assessment of the potential merits of including debts which can be deducted directly from universal credit in the statutory Breathing Space scheme.
Answered by John Glen - Paymaster General and Minister for the Cabinet Office
The Government published a consultation on a single policy proposal for the breathing space scheme in October 2018. The consultation proposed that the widest range of an individual’s personal debts as possible would be included in the scheme.
The consultation closed on 29 January and the Government intends to confirm its approach to these aspects of the scheme in its response.
Asked by: Lord Field of Birkenhead (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what steps the Government is taking to ensure all unpaid debts to Equitable Life pensioners are settled as quickly as possible.
Answered by John Glen - Paymaster General and Minister for the Cabinet Office
Since 2010, we have taken more action than any previous government to resolve this issue by allocating up to £1.5bn, tax free, for payment to affected policyholders. There are no plans to allocate any further funds to the Equitable Life Payment Scheme.
Asked by: Lord Field of Birkenhead (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, if he will place in the Library the minutes of each meeting of the Financial Inclusion Policy Forum since its creation.
Answered by John Glen - Paymaster General and Minister for the Cabinet Office
The Government publishes a summary of each Financial Inclusion Policy Forum meeting on the gov.uk website to enable those outside the Forum to understand the Forum’s interests and direction of travel. The detailed minutes of each meeting are also recorded and distributed to Forum members. The Government decided not to publish the minutes of each meeting to ensure all members feel able to have a full and frank conversation at meetings.
The summaries of the first two Forum meetings are available here:
Asked by: Lord Field of Birkenhead (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, how many times HMRC was taken to an employment tribunal for disability discrimination in 2017-18.
Answered by Mel Stride - Secretary of State for Work and Pensions
During the period 2017-18, there were 40 instances of HMRC being taken to an employment tribunal for disability discrimination.
Of these, 15 cases are still ongoing with the outcome of the remaining 25:
Dismissed 3
Settled 8
Struck Out 3
Withdrawn 9
Won 2
HMRC has welcomed Laura Whyte’s Respect at Work report and has accepted all its recommendations. We will with immediate effect review our policies, processes and standards to ensure we foster a positive working environment for everyone, and a culture that meets our values.