Asked by: Fleur Anderson (Labour - Putney)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, how many further pieces of retained EU law his Department plans to add to the retained EU law dashboard in its next update, broken down by Department.
Answered by Dean Russell
Since the publication of the dashboard in June, the Government has continued to develop this authoritative catalog of where EU-derived legislation sits on the UK statute book. Subsequently, we anticipate over 100 additional pieces of legislation will be added to the REUL dashboard.
Government officials are currently working to quality assure this data and any amendments to the data will be reflected in an update of the dashboard this Autumn.
Asked by: Fleur Anderson (Labour - Putney)
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 support households that receive heating from heat networks.
Answered by Graham Stuart
The Government has announced unprecedented support within its Growth Plan to protect households and businesses from high energy prices, which includes those on heat networks. The Government has provided £400 through the Energy Bills Support Scheme, as well the Energy Price Guarantee which will support millions of households and businesses with rising energy costs, and they will continue to do so from now until April next year. This is on top of a further £800 one-off support provided to eight million of the most vulnerable households to help with the cost of living.
The Government will continue to monitor the prices of fuels and will consider further intervention if required to protect UK households from extraordinary fuel prices.
Asked by: Fleur Anderson (Labour - Putney)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, whether he will make it his policy for the UK to re-join Horizon Europe.
Answered by Nusrat Ghani
The EU is in breach of the agreement reached under the TCA for the UK to participate in EU programmes and these unjustified delays are causing uncertainty for our research and business communities. Our preference remains association to the EU programmes as agreed under the Trade and Cooperation Agreement (TCA), including Horizon Europe, and we continue to do everything we can to secure this.
Asked by: Fleur Anderson (Labour - Putney)
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 number and proportion of households that receive their heating from heat network systems in the latest period for which data is available.
Answered by Graham Stuart
The most recently available experimental statistics on heat networks were published in March 2018, when there were 439,549 households that received their heating from heat network systems: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/energy-trends-march-2018-special-feature-article-experimental-statistics-on-heat-networks
ONS statistics showed that there were 27.6 million households in the UK in 2018.
Therefore, in 2018 approximately 1.6% of households received their heating from heat network systems.
Asked by: Fleur Anderson (Labour - Putney)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, if he will make it his policy to ensure that people are able to add funds to their energy top up cards without being required to purchase additional items at top up points.
Answered by Graham Stuart
There is no requirement for shopkeepers to ask customers to purchase additional items when adding credit to their energy top up cards. If this were to happen, then customers are entitled to raise a complaint with their supplier.
Asked by: Fleur Anderson (Labour - Putney)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, whether he plans to bring forward regulations to require new portable electronic devices to use a USB Type-C charger.
Answered by Paul Scully
The Government is aware of the proposal of the EU for a single charging solution for certain electronic devices. There are currently no plans to introduce similar requirements in domestic law, but we will monitor developments in this area.
Asked by: Fleur Anderson (Labour - Putney)
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 number of UK companies that have set up EU businesses and registered for EU VAT numbers in (a) 2022 as of 17 March 2022 and (b) each of the last four years.
Answered by Paul Scully
The Department does not collect this data.
Asked by: Fleur Anderson (Labour - Putney)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what assessment his Department has made of the impact on businesses of Recovery Loan Scheme repayments; and if he will publish the findings of that assessment.
Answered by Paul Scully
The Recovery Loan Scheme (RLS) provides financial support to businesses across the UK as they recover and grow following the coronavirus pandemic. Finance advanced under the Recovery Loan Scheme may be in the form of loans, overdrafts, asset finance or invoice finance. These facilities are supporting growth and investment across the UK.
Borrowing through the Recovery Loan Scheme is subject to a lender’s affordability assessment of the borrower. The checks and approach taken to this assessment may vary between lenders. The business remains 100% liable for repayment of the facility.
An evaluation of the Recovery Loan Scheme will be carried out in due course.
Asked by: Fleur Anderson (Labour - Putney)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, if he will make it his policy to introduce a national minimum wage to help with the cost of living.
Answered by Paul Scully
The Government considers the independent and expert independent advice of the Low Pay Commission (LPC) when setting the NMW rates. The Low Pay Commission conducts extensive consultation, analysis and evidence gathering when recommending the minimum wage rates balancing the requirements between the needs of workers, the affordability for businesses and the impact on the economy.
On 1 April 2022, the Government will increase the National Living Wage (NLW) for over 23s by 6.6% to £9.50. This keeps the Government on track to achieve its manifesto commitment for the NLW to equal two-thirds of median earnings by 2024. This 59p increase is the largest increase to the NLW since its introduction. A full-time worker on the rate will see their annual earnings rise by over £1,000.
All the National Minimum Wage (NMW) rates for younger workers and apprentices will also increase on 1 April 2022. We expect the increases to the NLW and NMW in April 2022 to give a pay rise to around two and a half million workers.