Asked by: James Frith (Labour - Bury North)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, what monitoring processes the Government uses to check that main contractors pay sub-contractors within 30 days.
Answered by Oliver Dowden - Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster
The Public Contract Regulations require public sector buyers to pay their suppliers within 30 days and require these payment terms to be passed down the supply chain. Should circumstances of non-compliance arise, we encourage sub-contractors to contact the Public Procurement Review Service in the Cabinet Office who will investigate. The service has helped suppliers reclaim over £5 million in late payments.
A new prompt payment initiative to ensure all Government suppliers and subcontractors benefit from being paid on time, will come into force in Autumn 2019. Companies who fail to demonstrate prompt payment to their suppliers face being prevented from winning government contracts. This move will promote a healthy and diverse marketplace of companies providing public services.
Asked by: James Frith (Labour - Bury North)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, when he plans to publish the results of his May 2018 consultation on whether Government suppliers with a poor payment record should be excluded from Government procurement contracts in future.
Answered by Oliver Dowden - Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster
On November 29, I announced a new prompt payment initiative to ensure all Government suppliers and subcontractors benefit from being paid on time. For the first time, failure of companies to demonstrate prompt payment to their suppliers could result in them being prevented from winning government contracts.
Coming into force on 1 September 2019, this will ensure the government only does business with companies who pay their suppliers on time, many of which are small businesses. The move will promote a healthy and diverse marketplace of companies providing public services.
Asked by: James Frith (Labour - Bury North)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, how many Government departments use Project Bank Accounts when issuing contracts; and how use of those accounts is monitored.
Answered by Oliver Dowden - Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster
Government contracts make provision for the use of Project Bank Accounts (PBAs) and departments have committed to use PBAs on their construction projects unless there are compelling reasons not to. The greatest use of PBAs is in DfT within Highways England and through Defra in the Environment Agency.
It is for individual departments to monitor the PBA as appropriate to their contracts
Asked by: James Frith (Labour - Bury North)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, whether he is taking steps to ensure that existing Carillion project sub-contractors are given priority consideration when tenders are being reissued.
Answered by Oliver Dowden - Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster
It is illegal to favour specific suppliers in public tendering exercises. Subcontractors are appointed by prime contractors, and Government has no involvement with the allocation of sub-contractors for public contracts.
The Official Receiver is the official contact for subcontractors who worked on Carillion projects.
Asked by: James Frith (Labour - Bury North)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, how many and what proportion of businesses delivering public procurement projects in England are SMEs.
Answered by Oliver Dowden - Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster
This information is not centrally held, as each department is responsible for its own procurement.
Since January 2011, details of central government contracts above the value of £10,000 are published on Contracts Finder. Contracts published prior to 26 February 2015 can be viewed at: https://data.gov.uk/data/contracts-finder-archive. Those published after 26 February 2015 can be viewed at: https://www.contractsfinder.service.gov.uk/Search
As of the end of May there are 40,797 individual users from 26,242 organisations registered on Contracts Finder, 17,727 of these (68%) are SMEs.
Asked by: James Frith (Labour - Bury North)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, whether his Department has made an assessment of the effect of the provisions of the Public Contracts Regulations 2015 which impose a 30-day payment term duty on public bodies on improving payment behaviours in the construction industry.
Answered by Oliver Dowden - Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster
Through the Public Contract Regulations 2015, public sector buyers must include 30-day payment terms in new public sector contracts; and require that this payment term be passed down the supply chain. Public sector buyers must also publish annually on their payment performance on GOV.UK.
We strongly encourage businesses to report poor payment practice and instances of late payment, including late payment through the supply chain, in public sector contracts to our Mystery Shopper service to investigate.
We are also working with public sector construction procurers to drive the use of Project Banks Accounts (PBAs) to facilitate faster, more transparent and certain payments in the construction supply chain. This eases cash flow through the system and supports closer working within the supply chain.
Asked by: James Frith (Labour - Bury North)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, what the annual birth rate has been since 2003.
Answered by Chloe Smith
The information requested falls within the responsibility of the UK Statistics Authority. I have asked the Authority to reply.
Asked by: James Frith (Labour - Bury North)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, how many complaints from sub-contractors in respect of slow and poor payment practices have been (a) received since the Mystery Shopper service was established by year and (b) followed up by visits by year; and whether any such complaints were received from a company linked by contract to Carillion.
Answered by Oliver Dowden - Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster
The Mystery Shopper Service publishes results of the investigations into the cases received on a quarterly basis:
https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/mystery-shopper-results
Asked by: James Frith (Labour - Bury North)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Prime Minister, what assessment she has made of the potential merits of creating at Cabinet level a Minister for older citizens .
Answered by Theresa May
The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, the right hon. Member for Tatton (Esther McVey) and the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, the right hon. Member for South West Surrey (Jeremy Hunt), are responsible for a wide range of issues affecting older people.
Asked by: James Frith (Labour - Bury North)
Question to the Cabinet Office:
To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, what recent estimate he has made of the number of people eligible for enrollment on the electoral register who are not on the register in (a) Bury North (b) Bury and (c) Greater Manchester.
Answered by Chloe Smith
The Cabinet Office does not hold information on the numbers of eligible electors. Local authority registration statistics are accessible from the Office for National Statistics website (www.ons.gov.uk).
The Electoral Commission occasionally publishes estimates of the number of eligible people not included on electoral registers, but not at sub-regional level. The latest report on register completeness and accuracy was produced by the Electoral Commission in 2016 and is available online (www.electoralcommission.org.uk ).