Asked by: Wendy Chamberlain (Liberal Democrat - North East Fife)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what assessment she has made of the potential impact of removing VAT from children's bikes on levels of take up of cycling among children and young people.
Answered by James Murray - Exchequer Secretary (HM Treasury)
VAT is a broad-based tax on consumption and the 20 per cent standard rate applies to most goods and services. Taxation is a vital source of revenue that helps to fund vital public services.
Evidence suggests that businesses only partially pass on any savings from lower VAT rates. In some cases, reliefs do not represent good value for money, as there is no guarantee that savings will be passed on to consumers.
The Government has no plans to remove VAT on children’s bikes.
Asked by: Wendy Chamberlain (Liberal Democrat - North East Fife)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what steps she is taking to support (a) credit unions and (b) other responsible lenders.
Answered by Emma Reynolds - Economic Secretary (HM Treasury)
The Government has made clear its strong support for the credit union sector, recognising the value that credit unions bring to their members in local communities across the country in providing products and affordable credit. In her Mansion House speech on 14 November, the Chancellor announced new measures to support the growth of the credit union and mutuals sector. This included publishing a call for evidence on the potential to reform common bonds for credit unions in Great Britain, asking the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) and Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA) to produce a report on the mutuals landscape by the end of 2025, and welcoming the establishment of an industry-led Mutual and Co-operative Business Council.
The Government recognises that credit, when provided responsibly, can be crucial for people facing unexpected expenses or managing their cash flow. Alongside continuing to engage with the banking and mutuals sector, HM Treasury is considering access to affordable credit more broadly as part of the financial inclusion strategy work announced last year.
Additionally, Community Development Finance Institutions (CDFIs) play an important role in the provision of credit to SMEs and individuals, promoting access to finance, and offering an alternative to mainstream lenders. The Government has a renewed commitment to the CDFI sector and launched the Community ENABLE Funding programme through the British Business Bank in November 2024. This has the overall purpose of increasing the supply of debt finance to smaller businesses by supporting CDFIs.
Asked by: Wendy Chamberlain (Liberal Democrat - North East Fife)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, pursuant to the Answer of 18 November 2024 to Question 13623 on Agriculture: Inheritance Tax, whether she has made a comparative assessment of the potential impact of (a) agricultural property relief and (b) business property relief on tenant farmers in Scotland compared to the rest of the UK.
Answered by James Murray - Exchequer Secretary (HM Treasury)
The Government published information about the reforms to agricultural property relief and business property relief at www.gov.uk/government/publications/agricultural-property-relief-and-business-property-relief-reforms.
It is expected that up to around 2,000 estates will be affected by the changes to APR and BPR in 2026-27, with around half of those being claims that involve AIM shares. Almost three-quarters of estates claiming agricultural property relief (or those claiming agricultural property relief and business property relief together) are expected to be unaffected by these reforms.
In accordance with standard practice, a tax information and impact note will be published alongside the draft legislation before the relevant Finance Bill.
Asked by: Wendy Chamberlain (Liberal Democrat - North East Fife)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what assessment she has made of the adequacy of the Institute of International Finance and OECD's debt transparency initiative; and whether she has had discussions with relevant stakeholders on the adequacy of the information on lending activities provided by private creditors to that Initiative.
Answered by Tulip Siddiq
The UK is a strong advocate for enhancing debt transparency including for private sector debt. As part of this, we supported the Institute of International Finance (IIF) and OECD Debt Transparency Initiative, set up in 2021, and the IIF’s Voluntary Principles for Debt Transparency, which underpinned it. The UK has taken a lead in ensuring its own lending is transparent and meets G20 best practice, publishing details of all new direct lending quarterly and the stock of debt owed to the UK annually.
The UK continues to engage closely with the private sector and other relevant stakeholders through international fora, such as the Global Sovereign Debt Roundtable, to promote the importance of transparency, and to explore ways to build on and improve existing efforts.
Asked by: Wendy Chamberlain (Liberal Democrat - North East Fife)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what the average waiting time was for processing a new application for Child Benefit in the latest period for which data is available.
Answered by Nigel Huddleston
In May 2023 HMRC launched a new digital service for child benefit claims.
The details requested by the Hon. Member are published by HMRC at: https://committees.parliament.uk/publications/42980/documents/213810/default/
Asked by: Wendy Chamberlain (Liberal Democrat - North East Fife)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what recent estimate he has made of when the online system for (a) checking the completeness of National Insurance records and (b) paying top ups will be launched.
Answered by Nigel Huddleston
After a period of internal testing, we launched the service in private beta on 22nd April 24 to a small number of users. Over the period 22nd April 24 until the 29th April 24 we have gradually increased number of users in private beta. We made the service available to everyone in a public beta on 29th April 2024.
Asked by: Wendy Chamberlain (Liberal Democrat - North East Fife)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what recent estimate he has made of the overpayment of tax credits in the (a) 2022-23 and (b) 2023-24 financial years.
Answered by Nigel Huddleston
Estimates for the overpayments of tax credits in financial years 2022-23 and 2023-24 are not available. The latest statistics on the overpayments of tax credits on a financial year basis are for 2021-22 and are published here: Child and Working Tax Credits statistics: supplement on payments - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk).
Statistics for 2022-23 are due to be published by HMRC in September 2024.
Asked by: Wendy Chamberlain (Liberal Democrat - North East Fife)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what steps his Department is taking to protect vulnerable tax credit claimants who have accrued overpayment debt through no fault of their own.
Answered by Nigel Huddleston
The Government takes a considered and balanced approach to the recovery of benefit debt and HMRC has strong processes in place to support those that may be struggling to pay back tax credits overpayments with manageable recovery plans.
HMRC calculates tax credit awards across the financial year to ensure customers receive regular and consistent financial support. Customers are required to tell us of any change in circumstances and when they do, awards are recalculated and balanced across the remainder of the period. Customers are made aware of any overpayment that is generated as a result and the process to challenge the overpayment if they do not agree it is correct.
HMRC has a well-established approach to help tax credit customers who are having difficulty repaying a debt and require extra support, including offering its customers debt advice referral to the Money and Pensions Service Money Adviser Network for a free bespoke independent debt service.
HMRC will work with customers and can agree a temporary reduction in the rate of repayment based on their financial circumstances. In some cases, recovery of the debt can be paused. When customers and their tax credit debt move to Universal Credit, they can continue to access support through DWP.
Asked by: Wendy Chamberlain (Liberal Democrat - North East Fife)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, how many additional staff he has (a) recruited and (b) transferred from other roles in order to process additional changes to National Insurance records arising from (i) the HMRC exercise to correct errors in records relating to Home Responsibilities Protection and (ii) the forthcoming online service on payment of voluntary NI contributions.
Answered by Nigel Huddleston
HMRC has recruited 42 FTE (Admin Officers) to support the 18 months Home Responsibilities Protection (HRP) exercise, adding to the small core team in situ, there has been no transfer of operational resource to HRP. The forthcoming online service for the payment of voluntary NI contributions, will allow HMRC to see a reduction in the operational resource supporting the current route. In April 2023 we deployed an additional 200 FTE to support the payment of voluntary National Insurance in a telephony/post capacity.
Asked by: Wendy Chamberlain (Liberal Democrat - North East Fife)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, how many (a) letters have been issued to people who are likely to have been underpaid their state pension as a result of their national insurance record not including the correct entitlement of home responsibilities protection, (b) responses have been received and (c) people have had their state pension increased as a result; and how much has been paid in arrears as of 30 January 2024.
Answered by Nigel Huddleston
The main corrections exercise for the historic Home Responsibilities Protection issue began in Autumn 2023. HMRC and DWP are currently working through the initial responses at this early stage in the exercise.
The Government will publish key management information on the exercise, established between the HMRC and DWP regularly, beginning in the coming months.