Asked by: Sarah Owen (Labour - Luton North)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what steps the Government is taking to improve consumer protections for customers in the event that merchants use a third party payment handler.
Answered by John Glen
Payments in the UK have seen rapid change over recent years. These changes offer exciting opportunities for UK businesses and consumers, with many making payments faster and cheaper. However, and as will always be the case with a rapidly changing technological landscape, they also present new challenges and risks.
Given the pace of change, the Government is leading a review of the payments landscape to ensure the right policy approach to these challenges and opportunities. The Government published a Payments Landscape Review Call for Evidence in 2020, setting out and seeking views on its aims and actions for UK payments. The Government’s primary aims include ensuring that UK payments networks operate to the benefit of end users, including consumers. The Government will publish a response to its Call for Evidence shortly, setting out next steps and the long-term vision for UK payments.
Asked by: Sarah Owen (Labour - Luton North)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, if he will introduce legislation to protect free access to cash for people in (a) the Luton North constituency and (b) the UK.
Answered by John Glen
The Government recognises that cash is important to the daily lives of millions of people across the UK, and has committed to legislating to protect access to cash for those who need it and ensuring that the UK's cash infrastructure is sustainable for the long term.
In line with this commitment, the Government published a Call for Evidence last year, which sought views on the key considerations associated with cash access, including deposit and withdrawal facilities, cash acceptance, and regulatory oversight of the cash system.
Since then, the Government has made legislative changes to support the widespread offering of cashback without a purchase by shops and other businesses as part of the Financial Services Act 2021. These changes will come into effect in late June of this year. The Government’s view is that cashback without a purchase has the potential to be a valuable facility to cash users, and to play an important role in the UK’s cash infrastructure.
In addition, the Government has recently announced that it will consult this summer on further legislative proposals for protecting cash for the long term.
Research from Social Enterprise UK indicates that about one in five social enterprises may use the tax relief to help access capital in the wake of covid-19, but that 40% are unlikely to do so in the next two years. We need to give investors time to raise and deploy …
..."Asked by: Sarah Owen (Labour - Luton North)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, if he will publish an evaluation of the (a) financial and (b) public health effects in the Luton North constituency of the Eat Out to Help Out scheme.
Answered by Kemi Badenoch - Leader of HM Official Opposition
HMRC published official statistics on the Eat Out to Help Out scheme on 25th November 2020. Regional statistics will be published in due course.
The scheme was designed in a safe and responsible manner to aid business owners who worked hard to implement the social distancing guidelines and make their premises safe. The scheme was designed to boost demand when it is typically lowest – during the week, Monday-Wednesday – rather than at the weekend when some restaurants will face excess demand. It did not include spend on alcohol due to its public health impact, which has significant economic and social costs.
The Government considers the effect of all measures in aggregate, based on a range of epidemiological evidence and the expert advice of SAGE. Public Health England’s National COVID-19 Surveillance Reports over August and the early part of September showed that only a small fraction of incidents investigated were linked to restaurant settings. These reports are available on the Government’s website.