Asked by: Catherine McKinnell (Labour - Newcastle upon Tyne North)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what steps he is taking to close the employment rate gap between the North East of England and the rest of the UK.
Answered by Kelly Tolhurst
The North East LEP Growth Deal is providing £379m to the North East LEP, to support the delivery of their Strategic Economic Plan, with its focus on more and better jobs. This has resulted in 67,000 more people in employment in the area than in 2010, and unemployment is at its lowest level for 20 years. We continue to work with the LEP in the development of an ambitious Local Industrial Strategy, designed to increase both the quantity and quality of jobs in the North East.
Asked by: Catherine McKinnell (Labour - Newcastle upon Tyne North)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what estimate he has made of the effect of the UK leaving the EU on the number of skilled workers in the UK manufacturing sector.
Answered by Lord Harrington of Watford
The Government has been clear that safeguarding the rights of EU citizens living and working in the UK has been a priority during its negotiations. The agreement reached and set out in the Withdrawal Agreement text will provide them with certainty about their rights going forward. It will allow EU citizens in the UK to continue living their lives broadly as they do now.
Government recognises the vital role the manufacturing sector plays in the economy and to local places. Through our Industrial Strategy, we are committed to making the UK the best place in Europe to own and grow a manufacturing business. We are working closely with industry to secure a strong future for UK manufacturers and their employees, including through major new investment in research and significant reforms in education and skills.
Asked by: Catherine McKinnell (Labour - Newcastle upon Tyne North)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what estimate the Government has made of the proportion of the manufacturing workforce in (a) the UK and (b) the North East which is made up of non-UK EU nationals.
Answered by Lord Harrington of Watford
The Office for National Statistics has published estimates of the number of UK nationals, EU and non-EU nationals working in each industrial sector in the UK, broken down by region for the period April 2017 to March 2018 and these are available here: ONS stats.
Asked by: Catherine McKinnell (Labour - Newcastle upon Tyne North)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what assessment he has made of the potential benefits of a rail sector deal to the North East.
Answered by Lord Harrington of Watford
Sector Deals are a challenge to sectors to come together under clear leadership and make a clear and compelling case to government for a Deal. The Industrial Strategy set out six expectations government has of a Deal. These include ensuring that the breadth of the sector is clearly represented in any deal, explicitly including local areas with an interest in the success of the sector, and that any specific proposals clearly articulate the impact they have on specific parts of the country.
The Government would expect these expectations to be fully met in any potential future Sector deal with the Rail sector.
Asked by: Catherine McKinnell (Labour - Newcastle upon Tyne North)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what the policy framework will be for small and medium sized renewables after the scheduled closure of the Feed-In Tariff next year.
Answered by Claire Perry
We are considering options for low-carbon generation, currently eligible for the Feed-In Tariff, beyond 2019, and a consultation on the Feed-in Tariff scheme will be published in due course.
Asked by: Catherine McKinnell (Labour - Newcastle upon Tyne North)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what plans he has to regulate the activities of energy brokers in the commercial energy market.
Answered by Claire Perry
The independent regulator, Ofgem has powers under the Business Protection from Misleading Marketing Regulations to investigate energy brokers and other organisations who are suspected of marketing energy products and services to business customers in a misleading way. Ofgem can seek undertakings to stop the misleading market activity or apply to the courts for an injunction to ensure they are complying with the legislation.
Energy broker fees are recovered in various ways, for example they can form part of the rate businesses are charged for their energy tariff. So, it is important for business customers to know how much energy brokers charge before agreeing to use their services and report it when they are not treated fairly.
Asked by: Catherine McKinnell (Labour - Newcastle upon Tyne North)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what steps his Department is taking to protect small and medium enterprises from excessive energy charges by brokers in the energy market.
Answered by Claire Perry
The independent regulator, Ofgem has powers under the Business Protection from Misleading Marketing Regulations to investigate energy brokers and other organisations who are suspected of marketing energy products and services to business customers in a misleading way. Ofgem can seek undertakings to stop the misleading market activity or apply to the courts for an injunction to ensure they are complying with the legislation.
Energy broker fees are recovered in various ways, for example they can form part of the rate businesses are charged for their energy tariff. So, it is important for business customers to know how much energy brokers charge before agreeing to use their services and report it when they are not treated fairly.
Asked by: Catherine McKinnell (Labour - Newcastle upon Tyne North)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what steps his Department is taking to support economic growth in the construction industry.
Answered by Lord Harrington of Watford
The wider construction sector, including products manufacturing and associated professional services, had a turnover of £370 billion, generating 9% of UK Gross Value Added. It also accounts for around 9% of all employment in the UK. To improve productivity and support growth in the sector, the Government will invest £170m from the Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund in the Transforming Construction programme, which will be matched by significant industry funding. Two competitions were launched in March, to create an integrated innovation hub to develop and commercialise digital and manufacturing technologies for the construction sector, and to create an active building centre that will develop new energy generation and storage technologies for use in buildings. These competitions will conclude in June. The Transforming Construction programme will also support a range of other R&D and demonstration projects.
In addition, Government has published the National Infrastructure & Construction Pipeline, setting out planned investments in infrastructure and construction over the next ten years, to provide the industry with certainty about levels of investment, and to encourage it to invest in skills and new technologies to meet this. Further support for the modernisation of the industry will be provided by the presumption of offsite from 2019 adopted by 5 Government Departments. The Government and the construction sector are also working to develop a Sector Deal for construction, which will also support this objective. We aim to publish the Sector Deal this year.