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Written Question
Equitable Life Assurance Society: Compensation
Monday 19th February 2024

Asked by: Rosena Allin-Khan (Labour - Tooting)

Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, how much his Department has paid in compensation to affected Equitable Life policyholders as of 8 February 2024.

Answered by Bim Afolami - Economic Secretary (HM Treasury)

The Government allocated £1.5 billion to the Equitable Life Payment Scheme. Before it ceased operations in 2016, the Scheme issued £1.12 billion in tax-free payments to nearly 933,000 policyholders. The remainder of the £1.5 billion has been set aside for future payments to the With-Profits Annuitants. Further information is available in the Final Report on the Scheme. (https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/equitable-life-payment-scheme-final-report).

At 31 December 2023, the total value of payments made by the Equitable Life Payment Scheme was £1,330,835,466.52.


Written Question
Equitable Life Assurance Society
Monday 19th February 2024

Asked by: Rosena Allin-Khan (Labour - Tooting)

Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, how many times officials in his Department have met affected Equitable Life policyholders in the last 12 months.

Answered by Bim Afolami - Economic Secretary (HM Treasury)

The Government allocated £1.5 billion to the Equitable Life Payment Scheme. Before it ceased operations in 2016, the Scheme issued £1.12 billion in tax-free payments to nearly 933,000 policyholders. The remainder of the £1.5 billion has been set aside for future payments to the With-Profits Annuitants. Further information is available in the Final Report on the Scheme. (https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/equitable-life-payment-scheme-final-report).

At 31 December 2023, the total value of payments made by the Equitable Life Payment Scheme was £1,330,835,466.52.


Written Question
Development Aid
Monday 4th December 2023

Asked by: Rosena Allin-Khan (Labour - Tooting)

Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what his Department's planned timescale is for returning to spending 0.7% of Gross National Income on Official Development Assistance.

Answered by Laura Trott - Chief Secretary to the Treasury

The Government remains committed to returning to a target of spending 0.7% of GNI on ODA when, on a sustainable basis, the government is not borrowing for day-to-day spending and underlying debt is falling.


Written Question
Employment Schemes: Disability
Monday 20th March 2023

Asked by: Rosena Allin-Khan (Labour - Tooting)

Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, if he will publish a breakdown of the specific spending on the plan to increase the availability of mental health and musculoskeletal resources and expand the Individual Placement and Support scheme.

Answered by John Glen - Paymaster General and Minister for the Cabinet Office

The breakdown of spending on mental health and musculoskeletal resources, and employment advisors in health settings, including expansion of Individual Placement and Support, announced at Spring Budget 2023 is set out in the Budget document which is available here: Spring Budget 2023 (publishing.service.gov.uk) (lines 12 and 13, Table 4.1 on page 76). The figures in the table have been adjusted to include Barnett consequentials.


Written Question
Debt Respite Scheme
Thursday 7th July 2022

Asked by: Rosena Allin-Khan (Labour - Tooting)

Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, with reference to the Mental Health Breathing Space Scheme, how many people (a) have accessed that scheme in each year to 30 June 2022 and (b) are estimated to access that scheme in the next 12 months.

Answered by Lucy Frazer - Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport

The Insolvency Service publishes official statistics on the breathing space scheme as part of its Monthly Insolvency Statistics series, available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/monthly-insolvency-statistics.

In the period from 4 May 2021 (when the scheme started) to 31 May 2022, there were 1,123 mental health breathing space registrations.

Data for June 2022 will be published in mid-July.

HM Treasury has not produced up-to-date estimates for the number of mental health breathing space registrations expected in the next 12 months.


Written Question
Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme
Tuesday 19th January 2021

Asked by: Rosena Allin-Khan (Labour - Tooting)

Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, for what reason furlough pay for people who were originally furloughed in March 2020 and have retained their job is determined solely by their pre-pandemic earnings, including in circumstances where those people went on to work more hours in the months between the March and November 2020 covid-19 lockdowns.

Answered by Jesse Norman

The Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme (CJRS) was designed to operate at significant scale to sustain individuals at 80% of their pre-coronavirus income, up to a maximum grant of £2,500 per month. It was therefore right that the default reference pay period to calculate CJRS was that of the pre-coronavirus period for those claiming prior to 31 October.

For the extended scheme from 1 November, the Government appreciates that a minority of employees may have seen an increase in earnings during the pandemic, but others have not, and therefore to be fair to all claimants the default reference pay period for those employees in continuous employment since claiming has remained at the pre-coronavirus period.

For newer employees, it was simply not possible to refer to a pre-coronavirus period, and therefore the reference pay period is necessarily different for this group.

Using the pre-coronavirus reference pay period to calculate the CJRS grant means that it is not necessary to recalculate the basis of the claim for the greatest number of employees and employers.

While a decision for employers to make alone, the terms of the scheme do allow for employers to make a top-up payment should they deem this affordable and appropriate.


Written Question
Self-employment Income Support Scheme
Tuesday 28th April 2020

Asked by: Rosena Allin-Khan (Labour - Tooting)

Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what steps he is taking to ensure that self-employed people who have recently taken (a) maternity leave and (b) extended sick leave and make a claim for support through the Self-employment Income Support Scheme do not have their average earnings calculated in a way that will disadvantage their payment.

Answered by Jesse Norman

The new Self-Employment Income Support Scheme (SEISS) will help those with lost trading profits due to COVID-19. It means the UK will have one of the most generous self-employed COVID-19 support schemes in the world.

The new scheme will allow eligible individuals to claim a taxable grant worth 80% of their trading profits up to a maximum of £2,500 per month for 3 months. Self-employed individuals, including members of partnerships, are eligible if they have submitted their Income Tax Self Assessment tax return for the tax year 2018-19, continued to trade and have lost trading/partnership trading profits due to COVID-19.

Taking maternity leave, paternity leave, or sick leave does not mean that the trade has ceased and therefore should not affect a person’s eligibility for the SEISS as long as the individual intends to return to the trade after the period of leave.

To qualify for the SEISS, an individual’s self-employed trading profits must be less than £50,000, with more than half of their income from self-employment. Delivering a scheme for the self-employed is a very difficult operational challenge, particularly in the time available. There is no way for HM Revenue & Customs to know the reasons why an individual’s profits may have dropped in earlier years from Self Assessment returns.

However, to help those with volatile income in 2018-19 for whatever reason, an individual is eligible for the SEISS if their trading profits are no more than £50,000 and at least half of their total income, for either the tax year 2018-19 or the average of the tax years 2016-17, 2017-18, and 2018-19. If eligible, they will receive a taxable grant based on their average trading profit over the three tax years, including in years where their trading profits were less than half their total income.


Written Question
Brexit
Monday 9th September 2019

Asked by: Rosena Allin-Khan (Labour - Tooting)

Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what comparative forecast the Government has made of (a) GDP, (b) inflation, (c) foreign direct investment and (d) the UK's balance of trade for the next five years in scenarios in which (i) the UK does not leave the EU, (ii) the UK leaves the EU without deal and (iii) the UK leaves the EU with a deal.

Answered by John Glen - Paymaster General and Minister for the Cabinet Office

HM Treasury does not produce economic forecasts. The independent Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) is responsible for producing forecasts for the UK economy and public finances. In line with its remit, the OBR’s forecasts include the economic and fiscal impact of government policy on EU exit where the effects can be quantified with reasonable accuracy. The OBR has said that it will adjust its Brexit assumptions when more detail is available on the future trade and migration relationship between the UK and EU.


Written Question
Brexit
Monday 9th September 2019

Asked by: Rosena Allin-Khan (Labour - Tooting)

Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what effect the process of the UK leaving the EU had on (a) GDP growth, (b) inflation and (c) foreign direct investment between 23 June 2016 and 23 July 2019.

Answered by John Glen - Paymaster General and Minister for the Cabinet Office

The fundamentals of our economy are strong: wages are growing, employment is at a record high and the unemployment rate is at a historic low. The economy has grown every year since 2010 and the IMF forecast that it will grow faster than Germany, Italy and Japan this year, and as fast as France.

It is vital that we bring certainty and that's why we must leave on 31 October under any circumstances.


Written Question
Brexit
Monday 9th September 2019

Asked by: Rosena Allin-Khan (Labour - Tooting)

Question to the HM Treasury:

To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what estimate the Government has made of the cost of maintaining the frictionless border between Ireland and Northern Ireland after the UK leaves the EU (a) with and (b) without a deal; what meetings he has held in the last six months on the (i) hardware and (ii) software infrastructure required to maintain the frictionless border; and what estimate his Department has made of the (A) type and (B) quantities of equipment required to maintain the frictionless border.

Answered by Jesse Norman

The Government remains steadfast in its commitment to do everything in its power to preserve an open border in Northern Ireland. One of the many dividends of peace in Northern Ireland and the vast reduction of the security threat is the absence of a visible border. Under no circumstances will the Government put in place infrastructure, checks, or controls at the border between Northern Ireland and Ireland.

As the Prime Minister recently wrote in his letter to Donald Tusk, we must also respect the aim to find flexible and creative solutions to the unique circumstances on the island of Ireland. That means that a range of alternative methods of managing any customs and regulatory differences continue to be developed, including through discussions with officials and stakeholders.

In March the Government set out the unilateral approach to checks, processes and tariffs in Northern Ireland it will take in the event that the UK leaves the EU without a deal. This avoids the need for checks at the border between Northern Ireland and Ireland.