Asked by: John Glen (Conservative - Salisbury)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what steps her Department is taking to ensure that the UK remains an (a) attractive investment environment and (b) listing venue for small and mid-sized quoted companies.
Answered by Lucy Rigby - Economic Secretary (HM Treasury)
The government has delivered an ambitious programme of reforms to boost the competitiveness of UK markets, including for small and mid-sized quoted companies. This includes overhauling the Prospectus regime and Listing Rules, providing more flexibility to firms and founders raising capital on UK markets and reducing reporting requirements for the smallest companies.
At Mansion House 2025, the government published its Financial Services Growth and Competitiveness Strategy, setting out our ten-year plan for the UK to be the world’s centre of choice for financial services investment now and in 2035, with capital markets a core pillar of the strategy.
Asked by: John Glen (Conservative - Salisbury)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what steps her Department is taking to help improve (a) public and (b) investor confidence in small and mid-sized quoted companies listed in the UK.
Answered by Lucy Rigby - Economic Secretary (HM Treasury)
The government has delivered an ambitious programme of reforms to boost the competitiveness of UK markets, including for small and mid-sized quoted companies. This includes overhauling the Prospectus regime and Listing Rules, providing more flexibility to firms and founders raising capital on UK markets and reducing reporting requirements for the smallest companies.
At Mansion House 2025, the government published its Financial Services Growth and Competitiveness Strategy, setting out our ten-year plan for the UK to be the world’s centre of choice for financial services investment now and in 2035, with capital markets a core pillar of the strategy.
Asked by: John Glen (Conservative - Salisbury)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what plans her Department has to improve access to finance for small and mid-sized quoted companies.
Answered by Lucy Rigby - Economic Secretary (HM Treasury)
The government has delivered an ambitious programme of reforms to boost the competitiveness of UK markets, including for small and mid-sized quoted companies. This includes overhauling the Prospectus regime and Listing Rules, providing more flexibility to firms and founders raising capital on UK markets and reducing reporting requirements for the smallest companies.
At Mansion House 2025, the government published its Financial Services Growth and Competitiveness Strategy, setting out our ten-year plan for the UK to be the world’s centre of choice for financial services investment now and in 2035, with capital markets a core pillar of the strategy.
Asked by: John Glen (Conservative - Salisbury)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, with reference to the British Business Bank's publication Small Business Equity Tracker 2024, if she will make a comparative assessment of (a) venture capital investment in the life sciences in the UK and the US and (b) the implications for companies in each jurisdiction seeking to scale-up.
Answered by Emma Reynolds - Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
The UK remains Europe’s leading destination for life sciences venture capital (VC) investment, according to the British Business Bank’s Small Business Equity Tracker 2024.
The US market is larger in scale, supporting late-stage growth with deeper capital pools and larger fund sizes. While the UK VC market is competitive with the US at the seed stage, UK companies face a widening funding gap as they scale.
At the recent Spending Review, the Government increased the British Business Bank’s financial capacity to £25.6 billion, a two-thirds increase in investment activity. Alongside reforms to give the British Business Bank greater flexibility to deploy funding responsively, this expanded capacity will enable more substantial support for SMEs and scale-ups, including life sciences companies, and move the UK market closer to the scale of late-stage financing seen in the US.
Asked by: John Glen (Conservative - Salisbury)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, with reference to the Spending Review 2025, published on 11 June 2025, how much and what proportion of the additional British Business Bank funding will be allocated to the life sciences sector.
Answered by Emma Reynolds - Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
This Government is committed to ensuring high-potential life sciences businesses can access the finance they need to innovate, grow, and boost the UK economy.
As part of the Industrial Strategy, the British Business Bank will invest £4 billion across key sectors, including life sciences, supporting both the expansion of the Life Sciences Investment Programme and direct investment in R&D-intensive companies.
This funding is not hypothecated by sector, allowing the Bank to back the most promising opportunities, including through specialist fund managers.
The percentage of Bank supported deals in life sciences was 7.2%, compared to 4.9% for the overall equity market and 6.1% for the wider PE/VC market from 2022-2024.
Asked by: John Glen (Conservative - Salisbury)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what steps her Department is taking to ensure that consumers are made aware that some forms of buy now, pay later will remain unregulated when BNPL regulation is in force.
Answered by Emma Reynolds - Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
Regulating the Buy-Now, Pay-Later (BNPL) sector is a government priority. On 19 May, the government introduced legislation to bring BNPL products into regulation. Our legislative approach will disapply the elements of the consumer credit regulatory regime that were originally designed for interest-bearing loans. This will enable the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) to create a proportionate information disclosure regime tailored specifically to BNPL products.
At this stage, the government considers that BNPL agreements provided directly by merchants should remain exempt from regulation. Including merchant-provided BNPL in the regime would disproportionately impact small businesses offering low-risk agreements such as gym memberships and instalment plans for invoices.
Consumers using merchant-provided BNPL will remain protected by wider consumer protection laws, including strict rules on advertising and financial promotions; and the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations, which prohibit unfair commercial practices such as misleading consumers.
The government has not seen evidence that merchants are seeking to offer BNPL agreements on a scale similar to third-party lenders. However, my officials and I will continue to monitor the merchant-provided BNPL market closely, working with the FCA and industry. If we see clear evidence of significant market expansion or large-scale consumer harm, we will intervene swiftly to address these risks.
Asked by: John Glen (Conservative - Salisbury)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, whether her Department plans to require merchants that might offer unregulated Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL) once BNPL regulation is in force to provide clear information to consumers to make it clear that certain consumer protections will not apply to their credit agreements.
Answered by Emma Reynolds - Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
Regulating the Buy-Now, Pay-Later (BNPL) sector is a government priority. On 19 May, the government introduced legislation to bring BNPL products into regulation. Our legislative approach will disapply the elements of the consumer credit regulatory regime that were originally designed for interest-bearing loans. This will enable the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) to create a proportionate information disclosure regime tailored specifically to BNPL products.
At this stage, the government considers that BNPL agreements provided directly by merchants should remain exempt from regulation. Including merchant-provided BNPL in the regime would disproportionately impact small businesses offering low-risk agreements such as gym memberships and instalment plans for invoices.
Consumers using merchant-provided BNPL will remain protected by wider consumer protection laws, including strict rules on advertising and financial promotions; and the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations, which prohibit unfair commercial practices such as misleading consumers.
The government has not seen evidence that merchants are seeking to offer BNPL agreements on a scale similar to third-party lenders. However, my officials and I will continue to monitor the merchant-provided BNPL market closely, working with the FCA and industry. If we see clear evidence of significant market expansion or large-scale consumer harm, we will intervene swiftly to address these risks.
Asked by: John Glen (Conservative - Salisbury)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what steps her Department is taking to ensure that the Financial Conduct Authority is able to deliver final rules for Buy Now, Pay Later regulation that are proportionate to the product.
Answered by Emma Reynolds - Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
Regulating the Buy-Now, Pay-Later (BNPL) sector is a government priority. On 19 May, the government introduced legislation to bring BNPL products into regulation. Our legislative approach will disapply the elements of the consumer credit regulatory regime that were originally designed for interest-bearing loans. This will enable the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) to create a proportionate information disclosure regime tailored specifically to BNPL products.
At this stage, the government considers that BNPL agreements provided directly by merchants should remain exempt from regulation. Including merchant-provided BNPL in the regime would disproportionately impact small businesses offering low-risk agreements such as gym memberships and instalment plans for invoices.
Consumers using merchant-provided BNPL will remain protected by wider consumer protection laws, including strict rules on advertising and financial promotions; and the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations, which prohibit unfair commercial practices such as misleading consumers.
The government has not seen evidence that merchants are seeking to offer BNPL agreements on a scale similar to third-party lenders. However, my officials and I will continue to monitor the merchant-provided BNPL market closely, working with the FCA and industry. If we see clear evidence of significant market expansion or large-scale consumer harm, we will intervene swiftly to address these risks.
Asked by: John Glen (Conservative - Salisbury)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, pursuant to the Answer of 9 April 2025 to Question 43043 on Environment Protection: Finance, if she will make it her policy to remove the provisions in the (a) UK Climate Transition Benchmarks and (b) UK Paris-aligned Benchmarks on the requirements affecting UK weapons manufacturers.
Answered by Emma Reynolds - Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
I refer the Honourable Member to the answers given to his questions in PQ UIN 48396 on 1 May 2025, PQ UIN 43043 and 43449 on 9 April 2025, PQ UIN 47194 on 28 April, and PQ 47196 on 30 April 2025.
Asked by: John Glen (Conservative - Salisbury)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, pursuant to the answer of 4 March 2025 to Question 33375 on Environment Protection: Finance, whether the defence sector will be included in the UK Green Taxonomy.
Answered by Emma Reynolds - Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
The government has set out its ambition for the UK to be the world leader in sustainable finance. This includes delivering a regulatory framework to support sustainable growth and enable the private sector to realise the opportunities of the transition. Through the consultation, the government was keen to explore whether a UK Green Taxonomy can be a useful tool in contributing to this ambition.
The government is reviewing and analysing the consultation responses, this includes considering the potential costs and how it fits in with existing regulation and regimes. We will publish a formal consultation response in due course which will set out next steps.
At this stage in the consultation process, the government was not seeking feedback on the detail of the sectors for inclusion. Instead, the government are focused on the bigger picture of whether and how this can be a useful tool for companies and investors. Therefore, at this stage issues around activities and sectors, such as defence, are out of scope.