(3 years, 6 months ago)
Commons ChamberMy Department has delivered a wide range of measures as part of the Government’s unprecedented support package. That includes £11 billion in grants supporting almost 900,000 business premises and over £57 billion in loan guarantees to over 1 million businesses across the UK. We have also extended the deadline for the loan schemes to the end of November, ensuring that there is further support for those who need it.
I thank the Secretary of State for that answer and for the support to date. When we emerge from the current crisis, we must build back in an environmentally sustainable way and ensure that we are on track to meet our net zero target. What is he doing to deliver carbon capture and storage across the UK, to ensure that manufacturing and agricultural businesses have certainty, with net zero in mind?
I agree with my hon. Friend: we need to build back better and build back greener. CCS will be an essential part of the transformation to a low-carbon economy, and it presents an opportunity for the creation of high-value jobs, which we want to see in our country. We have already announced a CCS infrastructure fund of £800 million to deploy carbon capture and storage in at least two industrial clusters over the next decade.
(3 years, 8 months ago)
Commons ChamberPerhaps I can clarify once more, in case it has not been clear enough, that there is no power grab; this is a power surge. We are ensuring that all devolved policy areas stay devolved, and additional powers are returning to the devolved Administrations.
I thank my right hon. Friend for his statement and welcome the White Paper. Like thousands of my constituents, my dad and brother work in the building sector and travel to their jobs in England every day. I implore my right hon. Friend to ignore the attempts by the Welsh Labour Government to hold our Union and constitution to hostage over political points, and to crack on with building the single market that is essential to my Welsh constituency.
My hon. Friend speaks a great deal of sense. As I said at the start of the statement, I want to work co-operatively with colleagues across the devolved Administrations. That is precisely what we have been seeking to do over the past period, and we will continue to do that. I look forward to their representations as part of the consultation.
(3 years, 11 months ago)
Commons ChamberMy hon. Friend raises an incredibly important point. We are absolutely committed to working with international partners in tackling the pandemic, ensuring the UK is contributing to, and indeed benefiting from, efforts around the globe. At the global coronavirus response summit, which the UK is co-hosting, my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has today confirmed the £388 million from the UK towards the global £8 billion target for research and development into covid-19.
I thank my hon. Friend for his question. We are engaging with businesses, business representative organisations and unions to get a shared view on how workplaces are made as safe as possible for when people return to work. We will work with industry and other key Administrations to help develop an understanding of how business can adapt to a world where restrictions may last for some time.
I welcome my hon. Friend to her place. I want to ask particularly about tourism and hospitality, as Montgomeryshire is a rural, countryside constituency. It is built for socially distanced tourism, but the industry, including our pubs, our hotels and our countryside pursuits, will need some support in putting together the new normal and the new way of working. What work are the Government doing to get the sector deal on its feet?
As the Prime Minister said, we want to get the economy moving as fast as we can, but we refuse to throw away all the effort and sacrifice of the British people and risk another major outbreak. We will be relying on science to inform us, as we have from the beginning. We will also be reaching out to build the biggest possible consensus across business, industry and all parts of the United Kingdom.