Asked by: Lucy Powell (Labour (Co-op) - Manchester Central)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, whether people employed by (a) business conference centres, (b) exhibition centres, (c) sports stadia, (d) live music venues, (e) theatres, (d) cinemas and (e) events companies are eligible for the Job Support Scheme; and when his Department plans to publish further detail on eligibility for that scheme.
Answered by Jesse Norman - Shadow Leader of the House of Commons
To support individuals and businesses to deal with the challenges created by coronavirus during this winter, the Government is providing additional support to help employers retain their employees through the Job Support Scheme. The scheme will open on 1 November 2020 and run for 6 months, until April 2021. Employers will be able to make a claim online through GOV.UK from December 2020. They will be paid on a monthly basis.
Businesses which can continue to operate safely but are facing reduced demand will have access to JSS-Open, where the government grant will cover a portion of wages for non-worked hours.
Businesses are eligible to claim JSS-Closed if their business has been legally required to close as a direct result of COVID-19 restrictions set by one or more of the four governments of the UK. This includes premises restricted to delivery or collection only services from their premises.
Further guidance will be issued shortly to set out the complete list of conditions for eligibility for the Job Support Scheme.
Asked by: Lucy Powell (Labour (Co-op) - Manchester Central)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what plans he has to introduce a surcharge on purchases of property in the UK for overseas buyers.
Answered by Jesse Norman - Shadow Leader of the House of Commons
The Government is committed to introducing a new Stamp Duty Land Tax (SDLT) surcharge on non-UK residents purchasing residential property in England and Northern Ireland. The surcharge will help control house price growth and therefore help those residents in the UK to get on to the housing ladder. The revenue raised by the surcharge will be used to tackle rough sleeping.
The Government will announce further updates on all tax measures at the Budget, which the Chancellor has announced will be held on 11 March.
Asked by: Lucy Powell (Labour (Co-op) - Manchester Central)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, when the next Spending Review will be (a) launched and (b) completed.
Answered by Rishi Sunak
The next multi-year Spending Review will be carried out in 2020. The dates will be announced in due course.
Asked by: Lucy Powell (Labour (Co-op) - Manchester Central)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, how much funding his Department has allocated to the marriage allowance; and how many (a) married couples and (b) couples in civil partnerships received that allowance in each year since it was introduced.
Answered by Mel Stride - Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer
There is no specific funding allocated to this relief, and therefore no under-spend. Anyone who is eligible for the Marriage Allowance (MA) will receive it if they apply.
Estimates of the number of couples who have benefitted from MA are being updated following the end of 2018-19 tax year.
Asked by: Lucy Powell (Labour (Co-op) - Manchester Central)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what the value was of the under-spend in the marriage allowance budget in each year since it was introduced.
Answered by Mel Stride - Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer
There is no specific funding allocated to this relief, and therefore no under-spend. Anyone who is eligible for the Marriage Allowance (MA) will receive it if they apply.
Estimates of the number of couples who have benefitted from MA are being updated following the end of 2018-19 tax year.
Asked by: Lucy Powell (Labour (Co-op) - Manchester Central)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what estimate he has made of the level of funding allocated to the married couples allowance in each year up to 2025.
Answered by Mel Stride - Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer
There is no specific funding allocated to this relief, anyone who is eligible for Married Couples Allowance will receive it if they apply.
HMRC publishes the estimated cost of the Married Couples Allowance (MCA) for the years up to the current tax year in their “Estimated costs of principal tax reliefs” publication, available here:
https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/main-tax-expenditures-and-structural-reliefs
The estimated cost of the MCA is:
£m | |||||
2013-14 | 2014-15 | 2015-16 | 2016-17 | 2017-18 | 2018-19 |
345 | 330 | 290 | 240 | 195 | 165 |
Estimated costs beyond 2018-19 have been modelled based on projections using economic assumptions consistent with the Office for Budget Responsibility’s October 2018 Economic and Fiscal Outlook. These extend as far as the tax year 2023-24, so this is the final year for which figures are provided.
£m | ||||
2019-20 | 2020-21 | 2021-22 | 2022-23 | 2023-24 |
130 | 105 | 85 | 65 | 55 |
All estimates are based on the 2015-16 Survey of Personal Incomes projected using economic assumptions consistent with the OBR’s October 2018 Economic and Fiscal Outlook.
Asked by: Lucy Powell (Labour (Co-op) - Manchester Central)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what estimate he has made of the cost of administering the tax-free childcare scheme.
Answered by Elizabeth Truss
HMRC administer Tax-Free Childcare and 30 hours free childcare through the childcare service. The average annual operating cost for the childcare service over the five years to 2021/22 is estimated as £34.1m.
Details on Tax-Free Childcare usage up to December 2018 can be found in the official statistics publication (https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/tax-free-childcare-statistics-december-2018).
Details on 30 hours free childcare usage is published by the Department for Education (https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/30-hours-free-childcare-eligibility-codes-issued-and-validated)
Asked by: Lucy Powell (Labour (Co-op) - Manchester Central)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, how many families have a tax-free childcare account; and what proportion of those families have received financial assistance through the tax-free childcare scheme.
Answered by Elizabeth Truss
The forecasts for spending on Tax-Free Childcare can be found in table 4.17 of the OBR’s Economic & Fiscal Outlook (https://cdn.obr.uk/March-2019_EFO_Web-Accessible.pdf) and are contained in table 1 below, along with forecasts of the number of families and the proportion of eligible families using Tax-Free Childcare.
Table 1
| Outturn | Forecast | |||||
2017/18 | 2018/19 | 2019/20 | 2020/21 | 2021/22 | 2022/23 | 2023/24 | |
TFC Spending | £32m | £0.1bn | £0.3bn | £0.4bn | £0.6bn | £0.8bn | £1.0bn |
Number of Families Using TFC (at year end) | 47,000 | 0.1m | 0.3m | 0.4m | 0.5m | 0.6m | 0.8m |
Proportion of Eligible Families Using TFC | 3% | 8% | 16% | 24% | 32% | 41% | 49% |
Details on Tax-Free Childcare usage up to December 2018 can be found in the official statistics publication (https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/tax-free-childcare-statistics-december-2018).
The statistics show that 90,800 families used Tax-Free Childcare in December 2018. This represents around 5.8 per cent of eligible families.
The statistics also show that 256,900 families had an open Tax-Free Childcare account in December 2018, and that 35 per cent of these had been used during the month.