Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, for what purposes the Valuation Office Agency has used artificial intelligence in the last 12 months.
Answered by James Murray - Exchequer Secretary (HM Treasury)
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is at the heart of the Government’s plan to kickstart an era of economic growth, transform how we deliver public services, and boost living standards for working people across the country.
The VOA is conducting initial discovery work to identify where Generative AI tools might improve productivity and quality, including through trialling Microsoft’s Copilot tools.
Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, for what purposes the Government Internal Audit Agency has used artificial intelligence in the last 12 months.
Answered by James Murray - Exchequer Secretary (HM Treasury)
The Government Internal Audit Agency has made advancements with the development of three innovative AI-powered engines: the Writing Engine, Risk Engine, and Insights Engine. These engines have been utilised to draft audit reports, identify and express potential risks, and analyse document collections to perceive themes within the collection. The systems have been crucial in significantly reducing the time spent on planning and researching audit activities and writing reports. The Writing Engine has reduced the time taken to produce a first draft from two days to 20 seconds.
Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, for what purposes the UK Debt Management Office has used artificial intelligence in the last 12 months.
Answered by Emma Reynolds - Economic Secretary (HM Treasury)
The UK Debt Management Office (“DMO”) has not used artificial intelligence (“AI”) functionality in the past 12 months. However, the DMO continues to explore the potential use of AI to support its core objectives, whilst taking account of issues including its security and resilience, as well as its overall suitability to support aspects of the DMO’s critical mission to deliver government financing.
Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, for what purposes the National Infrastructure Commission has used artificial intelligence in the last 12 months.
Answered by James Murray - Exchequer Secretary (HM Treasury)
The National Infrastructure Commission have used AI as a tool to improve the efficiency of their analysis and modelling, which has reduced the need for external contractors.
Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, for what purposes HM Revenue and Customs has used artificial intelligence in the last 12 months.
Answered by James Murray - Exchequer Secretary (HM Treasury)
As a department, over the last 12 months, HMRC has made use of more ‘traditional’ AI techniques to improve operations and drive productivity.
HMRC’s current applications of the technology can be divided broadly into supporting compliance, customer service and wider operations:
Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, if she will make an assessment of the potential impact of the closure of bank branches on rural communities in (a) towns and (b) villages.
Answered by Emma Reynolds - Economic Secretary (HM Treasury)
The Government understands the impact of bank branch closures on rural communities and the importance of face-to-face banking and is committed to championing sufficient access for all as a priority. This is why the Government is working closely with industry to roll out 350 banking hubs across the UK. The UK banking sector has committed to deliver these hubs by the end of this parliament. Over 200 hubs have been announced so far, and over 100 are already open.
Furthermore, FCA guidance expects firms to carefully consider the impact of planned branch closures on their customers’ everyday banking and cash access needs and put in place alternatives where reasonable. As well as banking hubs, alternative options to access everyday banking services can be via telephone banking, through digital means such as mobile or online banking and via the Post Office.
Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, for what purposes (a) Ministers and (b) officials in her Department have used AI in the last 12 months.
Answered by James Murray - Exchequer Secretary (HM Treasury)
AI has transformative potential, with the ability to drive growth, raise living standards, transform public services, and improve the lives of working people across the UK.
In HM Treasury, we are using AI to build tools that support policy makers, including our bespoke HMT-GPT system and email triaging solution for managing correspondence.
The award-winning Hawkeye service enables the Treasury to automatically combine key data on the UK economy and provide valuable insights for analysts.
We are also adopting this modern, digital approach for the upcoming Spending Review.
Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, how many farms were subject to inheritance tax in South Holland and the Deepings constituency in the last five financial years.
Answered by James Murray - Exchequer Secretary (HM Treasury)
I refer the Honourable Member to the PQ referenced 17853 published on 12th December 2024 at https://questions-statements.parliament.uk/written-questions/detail/2024-12-04/17853.
Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what assessment her Department has made of the potential impact of increases in employer National Insurance contributions on agricultural businesses.
Answered by James Murray - Exchequer Secretary (HM Treasury)
A Tax Information and Impact Note (TIIN) was published alongside the introduction of Bill containing the changes to employer NICs. The TIIN sets out the impact of the policy on the exchequer; the economic impacts of the policy; and the impacts on individuals, businesses, civil society organisations and an overview of the equality impacts.
The Chancellor has decided to protect the smallest employers by increasing the Employment Allowance to £10,500, and removing the £100,000 eligibility threshold, meaning all eligible employers benefit. This means that next year, 865,000 employers – including small farms who employ staff - will pay no NICs at all. More than half of employers will see no change or will gain overall from this package.
Asked by: John Hayes (Conservative - South Holland and The Deepings)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, if she will introduce an exemption from changes to employer National Insurance contributions for (a) small and (b) local charities.
Answered by James Murray - Exchequer Secretary (HM Treasury)
The Government has protected the smallest businesses and charities from the impact of the increase to Employer National Insurance by increasing the Employment Allowance from £5,000 to £10,500, which means that 865,000 employers will pay no NICs at all next year, more than half of employers will see no change or will gain overall from this package, and all eligible employers will be able to employ up to four full-time workers on the National Living Wage and pay no employer NICs. All charities are eligible for the Employment Allowance, even if they are wholly or mainly carrying out functions of a public nature.
The UK tax regime for charities, including an exemption from paying business rates, is among the most generous of anywhere in the world with tax reliefs for charities and their donors, worth just over £6 billion for the tax year to April 2024.