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61271

	registered interest
	date	10/06/2014
	answering body	Department for Business, Innovation and Skills
	answering dept id	26
	answering dept short name	Business, Innovation and Skills
	answering dept sort name	Business, Innovation and Skills
	hansard heading	Minimum Wage
	house id	2
	legislature	25277 pref label House of Lords
	question text	To ask Her Majesty's Government under what circumstances employers are legally allowed to pay workers less than the national minimum wage.
	tabling member printed	Lord Roberts of Llandudno
	uin	HL231
	answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 24/06/2014 answer text <p> </p><p>There are no circumstances where if a worker is entitled to the National Minimum Wage that an employer can pay less than the National Minimum Wage. However, under the legislation certain types of workers are not entitled to the minimum wage. These are:</p><p> </p><ul><li><a href="https://www.gov.uk/employment-status/selfemployed" target="_blank">self-employed people</a> running their own business</li><li><a href="https://www.gov.uk/employment-status/director" target="_blank">company directors</a></li><li><a href="https://www.gov.uk/volunteering/pay-and-expenses" target="_blank">volunteers</a> or voluntary workers</li><li>workers on a government employment programme, eg the Work Programme</li><li>family members of the employer living in the employer's home</li><li>non-family members living in the employer's home who share in the work and leisure activities, are treated as one of the family and aren't charged for meals or accommodation (eg au pairs)</li><li>workers younger than school leaving age (usually 16)</li><li>higher and further education students on a work placement up to 1 year</li><li>workers on government pre-apprenticeships schemes</li><li>people on the following European Union programmes: Leonardo da Vinci, Youth in Action, Erasmus, Comenius</li><li>people working on a Jobcentre Plus Work trial for 6 weeks</li><li>members of the armed forces</li><li>share fishermen</li><li>prisoners</li><li>people living and working in a religious community</li></ul><p> </p><p>Additionally, people carrying out work experience and internships will not get the minimum wage if they are:</p><p> </p><ul><li>a student doing work experience as part of a higher or further education course</li><li>of <a href="https://www.gov.uk/know-when-you-can-leave-school" target="_blank">compulsory school age</a></li><li>a <a href="https://www.gov.uk/volunteering/pay-and-expenses" target="_blank">volunteer</a> or doing voluntary work</li><li>on a government or European programme</li><li>work shadowing</li></ul><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p>Employers and workers with queries about the application of the National Minimum Wage can access free and confidential advice through the Pay and Work Rights Helpline on 0800 917 2368.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p> answering member printed Viscount Younger of Leckie question first answered 24/06/2014 11:15:33 answering member 4169 label Biography information for Viscount Younger of Leckie
	tabling member	3691 label Biography information for Lord Roberts of Llandudno

61475

	registered interest
	date	11/06/2014
	answering body	Department for Business, Innovation and Skills
	answering dept id	26
	answering dept short name	Business, Innovation and Skills
	answering dept sort name	Business, Innovation and Skills
	hansard heading	Housing: Construction
	house id	2
	legislature	25277 pref label House of Lords
	question text	To ask Her Majesty's Government, in the light of their stated intention of building more houses, what is their assessment of the availability of skilled personnel to carry out the building work necessary; and what measures they are taking to train sufficient numbers to ensure the success of the house building programme.
	tabling member printed	Lord Jones of Cheltenham
	uin	HL253
	answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 24/06/2014 answer text <p> </p><p>There has been no specific assessment of the availability of skilled personnel for the home building sector. The Construction Industry Training Board's (CITB) latest Construction Skills Network Report forecasts an annual recruitment requirement for the construction sector, including home building, of 36,400 a year for the 2013 – 2018 period.</p><p> </p><p>Under the auspices of the Construction Leadership Council, the house building industry is developing an action plan to address two immediate priorities: improving the image of house building and attracting back experienced workers who left during the recession, and other workers with relevant skills. More widely, the Government is making a number of reforms to the skills system to improve skills supply, putting employers in the driving seat and making providers more responsive to their needs.</p><p> </p><p>The Government is also currently undertaking a triennial review of the way the CITB operates and challenging it on the service it delivers to the sector.</p><p> </p> answering member printed Viscount Younger of Leckie question first answered 24/06/2014 16:22:41 answering member 4169 label Biography information for Viscount Younger of Leckie
	tabling member	248 label Biography information for Lord Jones of Cheltenham

61476

	registered interest
	date	11/06/2014
	answering body	Department for Business, Innovation and Skills
	answering dept id	26
	answering dept short name	Business, Innovation and Skills
	answering dept sort name	Business, Innovation and Skills
	hansard heading	Housing: Construction
	house id	2
	legislature	25277 pref label House of Lords
	question text	To ask Her Majesty's Government, in the light of their stated intention of building more houses, what is their assessment of the ability of the United Kingdom building supplies industry to provide bricks, timber and other materials; and what measures they are taking to encourage growth in the building supplies industry to provide sufficient materials to ensure the success of the house building programme.
	tabling member printed	Lord Jones of Cheltenham
	uin	HL254
	answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 24/06/2014 answer text <p> </p><p>The Government has noted advice from the Construction Products Association that there is no general lack of capacity in UK products manufacturers. The Association advises that only 19 per cent of companies producing heavy building materials are currently operating at near capacity. As the products sector adjusts to the return to growth it expects that capacity will increase further in response to demand.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p> answering member printed Viscount Younger of Leckie question first answered 24/06/2014 16:31:26 answering member 4169 label Biography information for Viscount Younger of Leckie
	tabling member	248 label Biography information for Lord Jones of Cheltenham

61514

	registered interest
	date	11/06/2014
	answering body	Department for Business, Innovation and Skills
	answering dept id	26
	answering dept short name	Business, Innovation and Skills
	answering dept sort name	Business, Innovation and Skills
	hansard heading	Students: Loans
	house id	2
	legislature	25277 pref label House of Lords
	question text	To ask Her Majesty's Government why the Student Loans Company does not provide up-to-date online information about the state of an account, detailing all repayments made into the account via the PAYE system since the last statement was issued.
	tabling member printed	Baroness Sharp of Guildford
	uin	HL292
	answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 24/06/2014 answer text <p> </p><p>HMRC collates employer information on student loan deductions at the end of each tax year and provides this information in P14 “end of year summaries” to the SLC. The SLC calculate interest and statements are issued to borrowers, advising them of their deductions, interest and outstanding balance at the end of the tax year. This process is repeated annually until all student loan repayments are collected.</p><p> </p><p>The repayment information held by the SLC will, as a result of this system, be accurate to the April of the previous tax year. The SLC is not in a position to provide an accurate settlement of a borrower's balance more recently than the previous April. However, the borrower can track and monitor their own settlement balance online if they retain a note of all their repayment deductions made over the tax year.</p><p> </p><p>HMRC, BIS and SLC are currently discussing arrangements to share student loan repayment information more quickly, but there is no mechanism to do so in the current tax system and necessary changes will take some time to implement.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p> answering member printed Viscount Younger of Leckie question first answered 24/06/2014 16:20:36 answering member 4169 label Biography information for Viscount Younger of Leckie
	tabling member	2113 label Biography information for Baroness Sharp of Guildford

62428

	registered interest
	date	17/06/2014
	answering body	Department for Business, Innovation and Skills
	answering dept id	26
	answering dept short name	Business, Innovation and Skills
	answering dept sort name	Business, Innovation and Skills
	hansard heading	Copyright
	house id	2
	legislature	25277 pref label House of Lords
	question text	To ask Her Majesty's Government what progress they are making on their consideration of (1) protection of metadata, (2) remedies against lookalikes, and (3) equalisation of penalties for physical and digital copyright infringement.
	tabling member printed	Lord Clement-Jones
	uin	HL366
	answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 24/06/2014 answer text <p> </p><p><strong>(1)</strong> The issue of protection of metadata was considered as part of the industry-led Copyright Hub project, to which the Government contributed initial funding. This involved key players seeking cross-industry agreement to help keep metadata with copyright works and resulted in the publication of a voluntary Code of Practice on Creating and Maintaining Metadata in Images. It is clearly important for industry to take up that code of practice, before Government could consider whether or not any further action may be appropriate.</p><p><strong> </strong></p><p><strong>(2) </strong>The Government is considering the case for granting a civil right of action to business against lookalike packaging, for which it launched a review of the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations (CPRs). The Review commenced this spring, and the initial call for evidence closed on 19 May. The Government is keen to continue engaging with stakeholders on this issue; a structured roundtable has been scheduled for 14 July. The final report is expected to be published in October.</p><p> </p><p><strong>(3) </strong>The Intellectual Property Office has commissioned Inngot Ltd to carry out a review of the use of copyright infringement sanctions. The review has commenced and is expected to report in November. Data gathering for copyright infringement sentencing is already underway, with a broad range of industry stakeholders being consulted including trade bodies; IP rights owners and IP legal professionals. The Government will consider what further action is needed once the final report has been published.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p> answering member printed Viscount Younger of Leckie question first answered 24/06/2014 16:32:44 answering member 4169 label Biography information for Viscount Younger of Leckie
	tabling member	3396 label Biography information for Lord Clement-Jones

62191

	registered interest
	date	17/06/2014
	answering body	Department for Business, Innovation and Skills
	answering dept id	26
	answering dept short name	Business, Innovation and Skills
	answering dept sort name	Business, Innovation and Skills
	hansard heading	Royal Mail: Scotland
	house id	1
	legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
	question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, what estimate he has made of the proportion of Royal Mail staff who bought shares in the newly-privatised company in (a) Paisley and Renfrewshire North constituency, (b) Renfrewshire and (c) Scotland.
	tabling member constituency	Paisley and Renfrewshire North
	tabling member printed	Jim Sheridan
	uin	200637
	answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 24/06/2014 answer text <p>The Government has not made any estimates by constituency, county or country of shares bought by Royal Mail staff.</p><p>As part of the Royal Mail Initial Public Offering, each eligible employee has now received 729 shares free of charge. Only 372 of the 147,000 eligible employees opted out of the scheme. Approximately 99.75% of employees accepted the shares that we offered them. Under the Employee Priority Retail Offer, over 15,000 employees (just over 10%) bought additional shares in Royal Mail.</p> answering member constituency Sevenoaks answering member printed Michael Fallon question first answered 24/06/2014 15:55:07 answering member 88 label Biography information for Sir Michael Fallon
	tabling member	1464 label Biography information for Jim Sheridan

62538

	registered interest
	date	18/06/2014
	answering body	Department for Business, Innovation and Skills
	answering dept id	26
	answering dept short name	Business, Innovation and Skills
	answering dept sort name	Business, Innovation and Skills
	hansard heading	Furniture and Furnishings (Fire) (Safety) Regulations 1988
	house id	1
	legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
	question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, how many prosecutions there have been for breaches of the Furniture and Furnishings (Fire) (Safety) Regulations 1988 in each of the last three years.
	tabling member constituency	Bury North
	tabling member printed	Mr David Nuttall
	uin	201238
	answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 24/06/2014 answer text <p> </p><p>The data requested is not held centrally.</p><p> </p> answering member constituency Sevenoaks answering member printed Michael Fallon question first answered 24/06/2014 13:55:48 answering member 88 label Biography information for Sir Michael Fallon previous answer version 4739 answering member constituency Sevenoaks answering member printed Michael Fallon answering member 88 label Biography information for Sir Michael Fallon
	tabling member	4140 label Biography information for Mr David Nuttall

62543

	registered interest
	date	18/06/2014
	answering body	Department for Business, Innovation and Skills
	answering dept id	26
	answering dept short name	Business, Innovation and Skills
	answering dept sort name	Business, Innovation and Skills
	hansard heading	Royal Mail
	house id	1
	legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
	question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, with reference to the Answer of 1 May 2014, Official Report, column 782W, on Royal Mail, what link was established in the engagement letter between the payment of the discretionary fee and the ending of the stabilisation period; and what targets or deadlines were set in the letter.
	tabling member constituency	Edinburgh South
	tabling member printed	Ian Murray
	uin	201166
	answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 24/06/2014 answer text <p> </p><p>The engagement letter between the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills and the syndicate of banks involved in the initial public offering indicated that the payment of the discretionary fee would be determined 10 days after the end of the stabilisation period and paid 5 days after that.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p>As I said in my previous answer (1 May 2014, Official Report, column 782W), we informed the banks that a decision would not be taken in the timeframe set out in the engagement letter given the volatility of the Royal Mail share price after the IPO. The share price remains volatile.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p>We have not set any timetable for the decision.</p><p> </p> answering member constituency Sevenoaks answering member printed Michael Fallon question first answered 24/06/2014 14:00:07 answering member 88 label Biography information for Sir Michael Fallon previous answer version 4736 answering member constituency Sevenoaks answering member printed Michael Fallon answering member 88 label Biography information for Sir Michael Fallon
	tabling member	3966 label Biography information for Ian Murray

62589

	registered interest
	date	18/06/2014
	answering body	Department for Business, Innovation and Skills
	answering dept id	26
	answering dept short name	Business, Innovation and Skills
	answering dept sort name	Business, Innovation and Skills
	hansard heading	Furniture and Furnishings (Fire) (Safety) Regulations 1988
	house id	1
	legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
	question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, how many inspections each local authority has carried out to ensure compliance with the Furniture and Furnishings (Fire) (Safety) Regulations 1988 in each of the last three years.
	tabling member constituency	Bury North
	tabling member printed	Mr David Nuttall
	uin	201237
	answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 24/06/2014 answer text <p> </p><p>The data in the detail requested is not held centrally. The total number of inspections carried out by local authority trading standards across all products, which would include those for furniture and furnishings, was 9,674 in 2011.</p><p> </p> answering member constituency Sevenoaks answering member printed Michael Fallon question first answered 24/06/2014 13:52:18 answering member 88 label Biography information for Sir Michael Fallon previous answer version 4737 answering member constituency Sevenoaks answering member printed Michael Fallon answering member 88 label Biography information for Sir Michael Fallon
	tabling member	4140 label Biography information for Mr David Nuttall

61515

	registered interest
	date	11/06/2014
	answering body	Department for Business, Innovation and Skills
	answering dept id	26
	answering dept short name	Business, Innovation and Skills
	answering dept sort name	Business, Innovation and Skills
	hansard heading	Students: Loans
	house id	2
	legislature	25277 pref label House of Lords
	question text	To ask Her Majesty's Government why the Student Loans Company and HM Revenue and Customs joint accounting system is able to continue deducting repayments on loans via the PAYE system even when repayment has been completed; and why in such circumstances it is necessary for the individual customer to alert them to the situation and to reclaim overpayment.
	tabling member printed	Baroness Sharp of Guildford
	uin	HL293
	answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 24/06/2014 answer text <p> </p><p>It is possible for borrowers with Income Contingent Repayment (ICR) loans nearing the end of their repayment term to over-repay their loans because there is a time lag between the deductions from borrowers pay (by employers), HMRC's annual process for student loan repayment accounting and the student loans Company (SLC) subsequently receiving payment information from HMRC. As a consequence it is possible for people to over repay before the SLC becomes aware that their repayments should stop.</p><p> </p><p>Because of this, SLC notifies borrowers in the final 23 months of repayment that they may opt out of the PAYE system and complete their loan repayments by Direct Debit (DD). This would ensure they do not over repay their loan. If borrowers choose not take up DD repayment it is likely that they will over repay. Borrowers are advised to monitor their own repayments. If they can demonstrate to SLC that they have paid enough by providing evidence, such as payslips, SLC can then ask HMRC to issue a &quot;stop&quot; notice to employers and refund any over repayments at the earliest opportunity.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>The SLC provides guidance and tools to help borrowers calculate their loan balance and when they are likely to repay their loan in full. The SLC refunds all over repayments to borrowers' bank accounts.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p> answering member printed Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon question first answered 24/06/2014 15:16:22 answering member 4210 label Biography information for Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon
	tabling member	2113 label Biography information for Baroness Sharp of Guildford