Asked by: Ian Lavery (Labour - Blyth and Ashington)
Question to the Department for Business and Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, whether her Department has made an estimate of the number of permanent jobs that will be created by the data centre at Cambois.
Answered by Alan Mak
My Department has not made an estimate of the number of permanent jobs that will be created, but I note that Northumberland County Council expect it to deliver over 1,600 direct jobs, including 1,200 long-term construction jobs, and over 2,700 indirect and induced jobs over the course of the development.
Infrastructure upgrades needed to support the site are a commercial negotiation between investors and infrastructure providers.
The Department does not hold information on the projected pay bands of the jobs created by this proposed investment.
Asked by: Ian Lavery (Labour - Blyth and Ashington)
Question to the Department for Business and Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, what infrastructure upgrades are required for the proposed Data Centre in Cambois.
Answered by Alan Mak
My Department has not made an estimate of the number of permanent jobs that will be created, but I note that Northumberland County Council expect it to deliver over 1,600 direct jobs, including 1,200 long-term construction jobs, and over 2,700 indirect and induced jobs over the course of the development.
Infrastructure upgrades needed to support the site are a commercial negotiation between investors and infrastructure providers.
The Department does not hold information on the projected pay bands of the jobs created by this proposed investment.
Asked by: Ian Lavery (Labour - Blyth and Ashington)
Question to the Department for Business and Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, whether her Department has made a recent assessment of the adequacy of the remaining industrial land at the Cambois site for a gigafactory.
Answered by Alan Mak
There are a number of factors that investors take into account when deciding on the location of a gigafactory, but ultimately this remains a commercial matter.
It would not be appropriate to comment further as we do not comment on private commercial matters or speculation.
Asked by: Ian Lavery (Labour - Blyth and Ashington)
Question to the Department for Business and Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, if she will take legislative steps to enable subsidies equivalent to those from the US and EU to help attract manufacturers to build gigafactories in the UK.
Answered by Alan Mak
We continue to work with industry via the Automotive Transformation Fund (ATF) to support the creation of an internationally competitive zero emission vehicle supply chain in the UK, including gigafactories.
As part of the Advanced Manufacturing Plan, we have announced over £2bn of capital and R&D funding over five years to 2030 in zero emission vehicles, batteries and the wider supply chain, boosting the UK’s competitiveness and unlocking strategic investments in our automotive industry.
In the last year we have seen high levels of committed investment by our vehicle and EV battery producers, including JLR, Nissan and BMW Mini.
Asked by: Ian Lavery (Labour - Blyth and Ashington)
Question to the Department for Business and Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, with reference to her Department's Inward investment results 2022 to 2023, published on 27 June 2023, what the value of the 67 foreign direct investments into renewable energy were, by technology type.
Answered by Nusrat Ghani
The Department for Business and Trade does not publish value and type information in the annual foreign direct investment publication at sector level due to data availability and confidentiality issues.
As there are gaps in the completeness of the value information across projects across sectors, DBT excludes value information to the publication. The impact of these gaps is greater when the data is divided into specific sector areas. However, at an aggregate level it is possible to add value related data.
Additional breakdowns describing the type or nature of an investment increase the opportunity to identify individual companies, to which DBT offer full confidentiality.
Asked by: Ian Lavery (Labour - Blyth and Ashington)
Question to the Department for Business and Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, with reference to her Department's statistics entitled DBT inward investment results 2022 to 2023, published on 27 June 2023, if she will list the 67 Foreign Direct Investment renewable energy projects by value.
Answered by Nusrat Ghani
The Department for Business and Trade does not publish value and type information in the annual foreign direct investment publication at sector level due to data availability and confidentiality issues.
As there are gaps in the completeness of the value information across projects across sectors, DBT excludes value information to the publication. The impact of these gaps is greater when the data is divided into specific sector areas. However, at an aggregate level it is possible to add value related data.
Additional breakdowns describing the type or nature of an investment increase the opportunity to identify individual companies, to which DBT offer full confidentiality.
Asked by: Ian Lavery (Labour - Blyth and Ashington)
Question to the Department for Business and Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, with reference to her Department's statistics entitled DBT inward investment results 2022 to 2023, published on 27 June 2023, if she will publish a breakdown by technology of the 67 Foreign Direct Investment renewable energy projects.
Answered by Nusrat Ghani
The Department for Business and Trade does not publish value and type information in the annual foreign direct investment publication at sector level due to data availability and confidentiality issues.
As there are gaps in the completeness of the value information across projects across sectors, DBT excludes value information to the publication. The impact of these gaps is greater when the data is divided into specific sector areas. However, at an aggregate level it is possible to add value related data.
Additional breakdowns describing the type or nature of an investment increase the opportunity to identify individual companies, to which DBT offer full confidentiality.
Asked by: Ian Lavery (Labour - Blyth and Ashington)
Question to the Department for Business and Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, what recent progress the Insolvency Service has made on its civil investigation of P&O Ferries' dismissal of 786 employees on 17 March 2022.
Answered by Kevin Hollinrake - Shadow Minister without Portfolio
The Insolvency Service’s civil investigation into the circumstances surrounding the redundancies made by P&O Ferries remains ongoing. As such no further comment or information can be provided at this time.
Asked by: Ian Lavery (Labour - Blyth and Ashington)
Question to the Department for Business and Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, how many of Royal Mail's delivery routes have changed as a result of the adoption of electric vehicles.
Answered by Kevin Hollinrake - Shadow Minister without Portfolio
Royal Mail is a private company, and the Government does not have a role in its operational decisions including the deployment of electric vehicles and administration of delivery routes.
Asked by: Ian Lavery (Labour - Blyth and Ashington)
Question to the Department for Business and Trade:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, what discussions she has had with (a) businesses, (b) devolved administrations and (c) Trade Union Congress on methods to reduce the number of workers on zero-hour contracts.
Answered by Kevin Hollinrake - Shadow Minister without Portfolio
Zero hours contracts are an important part of the UK’s flexible labour market, they are useful where there is not a constant demand for staff, allowing flexibility for both employers and individuals – like carers, people studying, or retirees. For this small group, a zero hours contract may be the type of contract which works best for them.
Research from CIPD found that 62% of zero hours contract workers are satisfied or very satisfied with their jobs, which is similar to the proportion of employees as a whole (66%)
(2022).