Asked by: Harriett Baldwin (Conservative - West Worcestershire)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
What steps his Department is taking to support the renewable energy sector.
Answered by Greg Hands - Minister of State (Department for Business and Trade)
The UK is a major global market for renewables. Last week we confirmed that this year’s Contracts for Difference round will be our largest renewables auction ever with a draft budget of £265 million. We are also spending £160 million to support ports and manufacturing infrastructure for offshore wind – securing local jobs and benefits.
Asked by: Harriett Baldwin (Conservative - West Worcestershire)
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 include carbon emissions from imports and exports in UK carbon budgets.
Answered by Kwasi Kwarteng
Measuring emissions associated with the production of goods and services consumed by the UK provides valuable insights, particularly in relation to policy on resource efficiency, and helpfully supplements the measurement of emissions generated within the UK’s borders. However, we do not plan to move to a system primarily based on consumption emissions as there is no internationally agreed approach to measuring these emissions. Estimates of imported emissions are associated with greater levels of uncertainty than estimates of UK-based territorial emissions.
The UK is at the forefront of measuring consumption emissions and developing policies to reduce them. Emissions on a consumption basis (including embedded in imports) fell by 21 per cent between 2007 and 2017. In addition, we believe that high standards of climate protection should be at the heart of global production and trade, and are committed to upholding our environmental standards and supporting global decarbonisation accordingly.
We constantly keep our policies under review. For example, the Government's Resources and Waste Strategy for England sets out its ambition to move from a make, take, use, throw linear economic model to a more circular economy which will reduce our carbon footprint from imported emissions through increasing repair, reuse, remanufacture and other waste prevention activities.
The Environment Bill includes measures that will help consumers to make purchasing decisions that support the market for more sustainable products. It contains powers to introduce clear product labelling, which will enable consumers to identify products that are more durable, reparable and recyclable and will inform them on how to dispose of used products.
Asked by: Harriett Baldwin (Conservative - West Worcestershire)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, whether emissions from goods produced abroad that are consumed within the UK will be included in the UK's net zero carbon emissions target.
Answered by Kwasi Kwarteng
Measuring emissions associated with the production of goods and services consumed by the UK provides valuable insights, particularly in relation to policy on resource efficiency, and helpfully supplements the measurement of emissions generated within the UK’s borders. However, we do not plan to move to a system?primarily?based on?consumption?emissions as there is no internationally agreed approach to measuring these emissions. Estimates of imported emissions are associated with greater levels of uncertainty than estimates of UK-based territorial emissions.
The UK is at the forefront of measuring consumption emissions and developing policies to reduce them. Emissions on a consumption basis (including embedded in imports) fell by 21 per cent between 2007 and 2017. In addition, we believe that high standards of climate protection should be at the heart of global production and trade, and are committed to upholding our environmental standards and supporting global decarbonisation accordingly.
We constantly keep our policies under review. For example, the Government's Resources and Waste Strategy for England sets out its ambition to move from a make, take, use, throw linear economic model to a more circular economy which will reduce our carbon footprint from imported emissions through increasing repair, reuse, remanufacture and other waste prevention activities.
The Environment Bill includes measures that will help consumers to make purchasing decisions that support the market for more sustainable products. It contains powers to introduce clear product labelling, which will enable consumers to identify products that are more durable, reparable and recyclable and will inform them on how to dispose of used products.
Asked by: Harriett Baldwin (Conservative - West Worcestershire)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
What plans he has to enable high street shops to set their opening hours.
Answered by Paul Scully
Most shops are not constrained in their choices of opening hours.
In England and Wales large shops may only open for six consecutive hours between 10am and 6pm on a Sunday. They may not open on Easter Sunday or Christmas Day.
We have no plans to change these rules.
Asked by: Harriett Baldwin (Conservative - West Worcestershire)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, if she will make representations to Post Office Limited to ensure that Tenbury Wells Post Office is open for the peak Christmas period; and if she will make a statement.
Answered by Kelly Tolhurst
The Government recognises the critical role that post offices play in communities and for small businesses across the UK. This is why the Government committed to safeguard the post office network and protect existing rural services. The overall number of post offices across the UK remains at its most stable in decades with over 11,500 branches thanks to significant Government investment of over £2 billion since 2010.
While the Government sets the strategic direction for the Post Office, it allows the company the commercial freedom to deliver this strategy as an independent business. The opening of the Tenbury Well Post Office is an operational matter for Post Office Limited. I have therefore asked Nick Read, the Group Chief Executive of Post Office Limited, to write to the hon Member on this matter. A copy of his reply will be placed in the Libraries of the House.
Asked by: Harriett Baldwin (Conservative - West Worcestershire)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what recent assessment he has made of the reasons for the national gender gap among entrepreneurs.
Answered by Kelly Tolhurst
The Alison Rose Review of Female Entrepreneurship, published in March, identified key barriers that lead to lower rates of entrepreneurship among women, including low access to finance, and lack of mentoring and networks.
In response, Government has set the goal to increase the number of female entrepreneurs by half by 2030, equivalent to nearly 600,000 new entrepreneurs.