Andrea Leadsom
Main Page: Andrea Leadsom (Conservative - South Northamptonshire)Department Debates - View all Andrea Leadsom's debates with the HM Treasury
(9 years, 7 months ago)
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Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab)
9. What recent representations he has made to institutions of the EU on the cap on bank bonuses.
The Economic Secretary to the Treasury (Andrea Leadsom)
The Government are challenging the bank bonus cap provisions under EU capital requirements directive IV. We think that those rules will undermine the progress that we have made to make sure that bankers’ pay is aligned with long-term performance and that there are no rewards for failure or wrongdoing.
Nick Smith
The Chancellor was much too complacent earlier. Youth unemployment in Blaenau Gwent is still way too high. Why do the Government refuse to repeat the tax on bank bonuses? That could fund guaranteed jobs for young people throughout the UK.
Andrea Leadsom
As the hon. Gentleman will know, the Government have instead introduced a permanent bank levy on bankers’ balance sheets, which, according to the Office for Budget Responsibility, will raise £8 billion during the life of this Parliament, and up to £18 billion by 2018-19, so they are paying a fair share towards our economic recovery.
Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)
10. What recent estimate he has made of the difference between the rate of inflation and the rate of growth in average earnings since May 2010.
Mike Kane (Wythenshawe and Sale East) (Lab)
13. What recent assessment he has made of the level of bank lending to businesses since May 2010.
The Economic Secretary to the Treasury (Andrea Leadsom)
Net bank lending to business in the UK fell sharply following the financial crisis. The Government have acted decisively to stimulate lending, introducing schemes such as funding for lending and the British business bank. Against that backdrop, the picture has now begun to improve and the most recent figures from the Bank of England show that gross lending to small businesses has increased steadily since 2012.
Mike Kane
Those were not the figures released last week, which show that net lending to small businesses in Britain fell by £435 million between April and June. That followed a decline of £720 million in the first quarter. Two years on, has not the funding for lending scheme failed Britain’s small businesses?
Andrea Leadsom
No. The hon. Gentleman is completely wrong. The funding for lending scheme has undoubtedly made more credit available than would otherwise have been the case. As I have said, gross lending to businesses has improved and the Federation of Small Businesses has said that the outlook for small and medium-sized enterprises is now better than it has been before. I remind the hon. Gentleman that the peak-to-trough drop in GDP between 2008 and 2009 was 7.2%. That is the cause of the disastrous drop in the availability of bank funding to businesses in this country.
Simon Kirby (Brighton, Kemptown) (Con)
Bank lending is particularly important for new businesses. Will my hon. Friend join me in congratulating the record number of business start-ups—a staggering 1,965—in Brighton and Hove last year?
Andrea Leadsom
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his announcement of what is going on in his constituency. It is fantastic news that so many new businesses are starting up. As we know, that is creating millions of new private sector jobs, and that, of course, is the way for our economy to recover.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
19. I hate to contradict the Minister, but Ministers from the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills tell me that they do not think that banks are lending to small business. Could the Minister do even more—I know the Chancellor has done something on this—to encourage crowdfunding as a method of getting more money to start-ups countrywide?
Andrea Leadsom
The hon. Gentleman is quite right: more needs to be done. The problem is not solved. This Government are doing a great number of things to try to help facilitate not only bank lending, but crowdfunding and peer-to-peer lending. We are putting crowdfunding possibilities into individual savings accounts, as the Chancellor announced at Budget time. We are also taking great steps to improve the availability of new challenger banks, to ensure that banks provide postcode-level lending data so that new challengers can look for new opportunities and to ensure that banks share credit histories via credit reference agencies. All those measures are being taken to try to improve the availability of funding to small businesses. There is certainly more to be done and I would be happy to hear any ideas the hon. Gentleman has.
Sir Peter Luff (Mid Worcestershire) (Con)
15. What estimate he has made of the potential effect of a rise in national insurance on employment rates and take-home pay.
Nigel Adams (Selby and Ainsty) (Con)
Constituents of mine have been targeted by phone fraudsters calling them at home pretending to be from their bank, and several have had their bank accounts emptied, leaving them devastated. Will the Minister meet me and other hon. Members whose constituents might have been affected to discuss a way forward to ensure that banks have in place proper, robust security measures to prevent that from happening again?
The Economic Secretary to the Treasury (Andrea Leadsom)
Yes, I would be happy to meet my hon. Friend to discuss that issue. I have been made aware of such cases. Of course, banks try to ensure that they have robust processes in place, but if anything else can be done, we are happy to look at it.
Julie Hilling (Bolton West) (Lab)
We now know that the Chancellor has had a letter from the head of the UK Statistics Authority, so when will he correct the record and apologise for giving the House—obviously inadvertently—incorrect information which inflated the success of his tax avoidance programme?