Asked by: Munira Wilson (Liberal Democrat - Twickenham)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, if she will publish the (a) purpose and (b) remit of the Strategic Asset Review announced in the Autumn Budget 2025.
Answered by James Murray - Chief Secretary to the Treasury
To further improve its management of the public sector balance sheet, at Budget 2025 the Government announced a Strategic Asset Review in support of the new £1 billion asset efficiency target. The Treasury will lead the review, which will be conducted ahead of the next spending review, and will engage with departments in due course.
Asked by: Munira Wilson (Liberal Democrat - Twickenham)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, if she will publish what the new asset efficiency target will be broken down by department.
Answered by James Murray - Chief Secretary to the Treasury
At Budget 2025, the Government announced a £1 billion asset efficiency target for departments to meet by 2030. The target will be met through a combination of asset disposals and new income generated from assets.
The Government announced a Strategic Asset Review in support of this target, which will be conducted ahead of the next spending review.
Asked by: Munira Wilson (Liberal Democrat - Twickenham)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what assessment her Department has made of the potential merits of increasing draft duty relief for (a) consumers, (b) pubs and (c) breweries in Twickenham constituency.
Answered by Dan Tomlinson - Exchequer Secretary (HM Treasury)
The Chancellor’s draught rate cut at Autumn Budget 2024 applied to approximately 60% of the alcoholic drinks sold in pubs. This took a penny of duty off a typical strength pint at a cost to the Exchequer of over £85m a year. Draught beer and cider now pay 13.9% less in duty than their packaged equivalents – an increase of over 50% on the previous draught discount of 9.2%.
The Chancellor makes decisions on tax policy at fiscal events. The Government welcomes representations from the beer and pub sectors in advance of the Budget.
Asked by: Munira Wilson (Liberal Democrat - Twickenham)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, whether funding for climate adaptation will be included in the spending review.
Answered by Darren Jones - Minister for Intergovernmental Relations
The Government recognises that preparing for the future means adapting to the effects of climate change. Without action, flooding, coastal erosion and other climate hazards will pose greater risks to lives, livelihoods and people’s wellbeing.
As set out in the Autumn Budget, the Government is investing in climate adaptation to protect the economy from the impacts of climate change, confirming investment of £2.4 billion over two years to support flood resilience and over £400 million for tree planting and peatland restoration, which will contribute to resilience.
The allocation of funding beyond 2025-26 will be confirmed through Phase 2 of the Spending Review in June.
Asked by: Munira Wilson (Liberal Democrat - Twickenham)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, if she will take steps to support self-employed people who were excluded from financial support during the pandemic.
Answered by James Murray - Chief Secretary to the Treasury
Decisions on eligibility for Covid-19 financial support were taken by the previous government. The previous Government decided to provide support through the Self-Employment Income Support Scheme (SEISS) and Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme (CJRS) based on two principles, a) targeting support at those who needed it most and b), guarding against error, fraud, and abuse, whilst reaching as many individuals as possible. Those ineligible for the schemes may have been eligible for other elements of financial support provided by the previous Government.
The current Government is working to improve living standards for everyone across the country. We are taking immediate action to support individuals, such as committing to no increases in employee National Insurance, Income Tax or VAT as we want to keep taxes low for working people. The Government has put growth as its number one mission, which will help individuals by boosting wages and putting more money in people’s pockets.
Asked by: Munira Wilson (Liberal Democrat - Twickenham)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, pursuant to the Answer of 17 February 2025 to Question 29915 on Parental Pay, how many people were in receipt of (a) Statutory Maternity Pay, (b) Statutory Paternity Pay, (c) Statutory Adoption Pay and (d) Statutory Shared Parental Pay in 2023-24.
Answered by James Murray - Chief Secretary to the Treasury
Counts of employees receiving Statutory Maternity Pay, Statutory Paternity Pay, Statutory Adoption Pay, and Statutory Shared Parental Pay in 2023-24 have been published in response to an earlier Parliamentary Question. They can be found at the following location:
https://questions-statements.parliament.uk/written-questions/detail/2024-12-18/21027
Asked by: Munira Wilson (Liberal Democrat - Twickenham)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, pursuant to the Answer of 8 January 2025 to Question 21417 on Equitable Life Assurance Society: Compensation, whether she has made an assessment of the potential merits of providing full financial redress in cases where the state has accepted responsibility for personal (a) injustice and (b) financial loss.
Answered by Emma Reynolds - Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
In 2010 the government allocated up to £1.5 billon, tax free, for payment to affected policyholders and this decision was in line with the Ombudsman’s report. More detail on the history of the action taken on this issue can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/equitable-life-payment-scheme-final-report.
Since the Scheme closed in 2016, the Government’s position on this issue has been clear, that there are no plans to reopen any decisions relating to the Payment Scheme and this issue is considered closed.
Asked by: Munira Wilson (Liberal Democrat - Twickenham)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what assessment she has made of the potential impact of changes in mortgage interest tax relief on private landlords since the inception of those measures in April 2017.
Answered by James Murray - Chief Secretary to the Treasury
The previous government phased in a set of reforms to restrict finance cost relief to the equivalent of the basic rate of income tax. Before these reforms, it was available at a landlord’s marginal rate.
As a result, all individual landlords now receive the same rate of tax relief on their mortgage interest, whereas previously higher rate taxpayers received more generous relief than those on lower incomes. The reforms have also reduced the disparity in income tax treatment between homeowners and landlords.
Asked by: Munira Wilson (Liberal Democrat - Twickenham)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, how many people were in receipt of (a) Statutory Maternity Pay, (b) Statutory Paternity Pay, (c) Statutory Adoption Pay and (d) Statutory Shared Parental Pay in the (i) 2019-20 (ii) 2020-21 (iii) 2021-22 and (iv) 2022-23 financial year.
Answered by James Murray - Chief Secretary to the Treasury
Data for the number of people in receipt of Statutory Maternity pay, Statutory Paternity Pay, Statutory Adoption Pay, and Statutory Shared Parental Pay is provided in the table below.
| 2019-20 | 2020-21 | 2021-22 | 2022-23 |
Statutory Maternity Pay | 647,800 | 627,200 | 636,000 | 627,500 |
Statutory Paternity Pay | 208,000 | 176,400 | 204,200 | 195,300 |
Statutory Adoption Pay | 4,900 | 4,400 | 4,600 | 4,500 |
Statutory Shared Parental Pay | 13,000 | 11,200 | 13,000 | 14,200 |
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Notes:
1) Data collected using HMRC Real Time Information (RTI) and extracted in December 2024. RTI is subject to revision or updates.
2) Claimants number has been rounded to nearest 100.
Asked by: Munira Wilson (Liberal Democrat - Twickenham)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, with reference to Fairness Foundation and King's College's report Identifying and mitigating the risks of wealth inequality in the UK, published on 26 January 2025, if she will make an assessment of the potential merits of the findings of that report.
Answered by James Murray - Chief Secretary to the Treasury
While income and wealth are not always directly correlated, distributional analysis shows that Government decisions at Autumn Budget 2024 and Spending Review 2025, Phase 1 are progressive and benefit households in the lowest income deciles the most, on average as a percentage of income in 2025-26.
The Government is committed to making sure the wealthiest in our society pay their fair share of tax. That is why the Chancellor announced a series of reforms at Autumn Budget 2024 to help fix the public finances in as fair a way as possible. The increases in tax are concentrated on the highest income households. Overall, on average, all but the richest 10% of households will benefit from policy decisions in 2025-26.