Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what steps her Department has taken to ensure that people who have (a) uncollected holiday pay and (b) uncollected time off in lieu can access their earnings from (a) Thomas Cook and (b) other organisations that have gone into compulsory liquidation.

In the event an employer becomes insolvent, the Government steps in to offer a level of protection to employees who would otherwise receive nothing from their former employer. Payments, including holiday pay and pay in lieu of notice, are made by the Insolvency Service’s Redundancy Payments Service subject to conditions and statutory limits.

a) In respect of Thomas Cook employees, a specialist team was set up to process the high volume of redundancy related claims from former employees to ensure payments were received as quickly as possible.

b) Where claims are received from former employees of companies in compulsory liquidation, the Redundancy Payments Service pays on average within 14 days of receipt of information.