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156913

registered interest
date	20/11/2014
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	Insolvency
house id	1
legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, what assessment he has made of the effect on financial redress for creditors from April 2015 of changes to funding of insolvency litigation in the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012.
tabling member constituency	Chesterfield
tabling member printed	Toby Perkins
uin	215424
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 27/11/2014 answer text <p>Insolvency trade body, R3, commissioned research to try to measure the impact of the civil justice reforms on insolvency litigation. This research estimates that contingency fee arrangement backed insolvency litigation realises £150m-160m per annum.</p><p>When the exemption for insolvency proceedings was introduced in 2013 the impact assessment made the assumption that by April 2015 alternative funding arrangements would have been developed for insolvency cases. On that basis it was assumed there would be no major impact on the volume of insolvency cases which were pursued, or on the value of assets recovered in the long-run, although the risk of recoveries falling was acknowledged.</p> answering member constituency East Dunbartonshire answering member printed Jo Swinson question first answered 27/11/2014 15:41:30 answering member 1513 label Biography information for Jo Swinson
tabling member	3952 label Biography information for Mr Toby Perkins

156916

registered interest
date	20/11/2014
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	Insolvency
house id	1
legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, what discussions he has had with the Secretary of State for Justice on the effect of the changes to insolvency litigation in the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012 on the Government's ability to tackle director misconduct.
tabling member constituency	Chesterfield
tabling member printed	Toby Perkins
uin	215435
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 25/11/2014 answer text <p>Ministers are regularly in touch about matters in which they have a common interest.</p><p> </p><p>The changes in the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012 are not expected to have any impact on the c.1, 200 directors we disqualify every year as a result of actions brought by officials in The Insolvency Service.</p><p> </p> answering member constituency East Dunbartonshire answering member printed Jo Swinson question first answered 25/11/2014 13:33:49 answering member 1513 label Biography information for Jo Swinson
tabling member	3952 label Biography information for Mr Toby Perkins

156917

registered interest
date	20/11/2014
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	Post Office Card Account
house id	1
legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, what assessment he has made of the future of the Post Office card account after March 2015.
tabling member constituency	Colne Valley
tabling member printed	Jason McCartney
uin	215421
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 26/11/2014 answer text <p>The Post Office card account is a matter for the Department for Work and Pensions. The Department for Business, Innovation and Skills does not have a role in commercial negotiations between other Departments and Post Office Ltd.</p><p> </p><p>Post Office Ltd and the Department for Work and Pensions are currently discussing the future of the Post Office card account and an announcement will be made when these discussions are concluded.</p><p> </p> answering member constituency East Dunbartonshire answering member printed Jo Swinson question first answered 26/11/2014 15:21:53 answering member 1513 label Biography information for Jo Swinson
tabling member	3953 label Biography information for Jason McCartney

156919

registered interest
date	20/11/2014
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	Postal Services
house id	1
legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, what recent representations he has received form private sector mail delivery companies on delivering mail in urban areas of the UK; and what assessment he has made of the effect of such proposals on the Royal Mail's ability to deliver Universal Service Provision in rural areas.
tabling member constituency	Vale of Clwyd
tabling member printed	Chris Ruane
uin	215390
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 25/11/2014 answer text <p>Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) Ministers and officials meet intermittently with representatives of UK postal companies, though there have not been any recent representations from such operators specifically on the issue of delivering mail in urban areas of the country.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p>Under the Postal Services Act 2011, Parliament gave Ofcom as an experienced and independent regulator the primary statutory duty to secure the provision of the universal service to all addresses – urban and rural – in the UK. Ofcom maintains an ongoing monitoring regime which tracks Royal Mail’s performance and any actual or potential market impacts on the provision of the universal service. Ofcom has said that their own evidence clearly shows that the service is not currently under threat.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p>Ofcom has been reviewing the case which Royal Mail has been making about the potential impact of competition on their ability to provide that service and is expected to make a statement very shortly. More information about Ofcom’s regulatory regime can be found on its website (<a href="http://www.ofcom.org.uk/" target="_blank">www.ofcom.org.uk/</a>).</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p>The BIS Select Committee is currently carrying out an inquiry into postal competition in the UK and postal operators have recently submitted their evidence on market competition to inform the inquiry. Copies of written submissions can be found on Parliament’s website (<a href="http://www.parliament.uk/business/committees/committees-a-z/commons-select/business-innovation-and-skills/inquiries/parliament-2010/competition-in-the-uk-postal-sector-/?type=Written#pnlPublicationFilter" target="_blank">http://www.parliament.uk/business/committees/committees-a-z/commons-select/business-innovation-and-skills/inquiries/parliament-2010/competition-in-the-uk-postal-sector-/?type=Written#pnlPublicationFilter</a>).</p><p> </p> answering member constituency East Dunbartonshire answering member printed Jo Swinson question first answered 25/11/2014 13:43:59 answering member 1513 label Biography information for Jo Swinson
tabling member	534 label Biography information for Chris Ruane

156924

registered interest
date	20/11/2014
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	Motor Vehicles: Insurance
house id	1
legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, how much and what proportion of the total annual expenditure of the Competition and Markets Authority was spent on activities relating to the motor insurance market in each of the last 10 years for which figures are available.
tabling member constituency	Birmingham, Northfield
tabling member printed	Richard Burden
uin	215383
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 25/11/2014 answer text <p>The Competition and Markets Authority became the UK’s lead competition and consumer body in April 2014, combining the Competition Commission (CC) with many of the functions of the Office of Fair Trading (OFT). It does not keep records of its expenditure by market. However, based on approximate time allocations and all-inclusive staff costs, and taking into account some external costs such as the cost of commissioning surveys, the total cost of the CC/CMA market inquiry into private motor insurance (which ran from 28 September 2012 to 24 September 2014) was approximately £2million. On the assumption that this cost was spread evenly over time, this would have represented approximately 4% of the CC’s costs in 2013/14.</p><p> </p> answering member constituency East Dunbartonshire answering member printed Jo Swinson question first answered 25/11/2014 13:26:38 answering member 1513 label Biography information for Jo Swinson
tabling member	301 label Biography information for Richard Burden

156926

registered interest
date	20/11/2014
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	Motor Vehicles: Insurance
house id	1
legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, how much and what proportion of the total annual expenditure of the Financial Reporting Council was spent on activities relating to the motor insurance market in each of the last 10 years for which figures are available.
tabling member constituency	Birmingham, Northfield
tabling member printed	Richard Burden
uin	215385
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 25/11/2014 answer text <p>I understand that the Hon Member has already been in correspondence with the Financial Reporting Council (FRC) on this issue.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p>The FRC publishes annual reports on its activity and in addition reports to parliament on the exercise of its statutory functions.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p> answering member constituency East Dunbartonshire answering member printed Jo Swinson question first answered 25/11/2014 13:22:12 answering member 1513 label Biography information for Jo Swinson
tabling member	301 label Biography information for Richard Burden

157049

registered interest
date	20/11/2014
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	Part-time Employment: Females
house id	1
legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, what steps he is taking to provide (a) assistance and (b) guidance for employers to help them provide flexible and high quality part-time work for women with young children; and if he will make a statement.
tabling member constituency	Hackney North and Stoke Newington
tabling member printed	Ms Diane Abbott
uin	215367
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 28/11/2014 answer text <p>Flexible working is central to how the Coalition Government sees employment in the future. From 30 June this year, following a full consultation with businesses on how best to do so, we extended the right to request flexible working to all employees.</p><p> </p><p>The Government has also made it easier for employers to consider requests for flexible working by replacing the previous statutory process for considering requests with a duty on employers to consider requests in a ‘reasonable manner’. To support this Acas has published a statutory Code to help businesses understand how to handle requests. Further information is available from: <a href="http://www.acas.org.uk/index.aspx?articleid=1616" target="_blank">http://www.acas.org.uk/index.aspx?articleid=1616</a>.</p><p> </p><p>To support the creation of more high quality part-time jobs, we are working to encourage cultural change in flexible working, especially to encourage employers to think about flexible working when they recruit new employees. For example, the Government convened an employer-led group to make practical recommendations on how flexible working can be beneficial and how it can be built into employer’s recruitment. Following the recommendations of this group we are encouraging the use of the strapline “Happy to Talk Flexible Working” by employers when they advert jobs.</p><p> </p><p>Furthermore, on 10 June, my Rt. Hon. Friend the Minister of State for Pensions and my Hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff Central (Jenny Willott) led a conference on flexible working for employers. The conference explained the benefits of flexible working and providing practical tips on getting it working within individual workplaces, including a practical session on successfully designing part-time jobs.</p><p> </p><p>In addition, to promote part-time work more generally, BIS, in partnership with the <strong>Business is Great</strong> campaign,<strong> the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) </strong>and<strong> PwC</strong>, sponsored a new initiative launched by Timewise in search of the UK’s most flexible small businesses that offer flexible work options to employees. The competition ran from 16 October to 24 November. The winner will be announced publicly by Friday 20 March 2015. The Government is also promoting flexible working and part-time working as part of the GREAT campaign to target business press. More detail on the GREAT campaign here: <a href="http://www.greatbusiness.gov.uk/flexibleworking/" target="_blank">http://www.greatbusiness.gov.uk/flexibleworking/</a>.</p><p> </p><p>Finally, Acas have produced guidance booklets for employers and employees on how to manage flexible working and a work-life balance. Further information is available from: <a href="http://www.acas.org.uk/index.aspx?articleid=1283" target="_blank">http://www.acas.org.uk/index.aspx?articleid=1283</a>.</p> answering member constituency East Dunbartonshire answering member printed Jo Swinson question first answered 28/11/2014 14:17:16 answering member 1513 label Biography information for Jo Swinson
tabling member	172 label Biography information for Ms Diane Abbott

157051

registered interest
date	20/11/2014
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	Low Pay
house id	1
legislature	25259 pref label House of Commons
question text	To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, what steps he is taking to encourage employers to implement the living wage; and what estimate he has made of the number of employees who earn less than the living wage.
tabling member constituency	Barnsley Central
tabling member printed	Dan Jarvis
uin	215412
answer	answer is ministerial correction date of answer 25/11/2014 answer text <p>We have encouraged employers by publicly expressing our support for paying the Living Wage when it is affordable and not at the expense of jobs.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p>To encourage higher living standards we have: raised the personal allowance providing an additional £700 in employee’s pay packets, increased the National Minimum Wage year-on-year despite the worst recession in living memory and on October 1<sup>st</sup> 2014 increased the minimum wage in real terms for the first time since 2007. The Low Pay Commission has reported that real increases are set to continue each year providing the economy continues to grow.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p>Finally, recent employment growth means that there are now more people in work than ever before providing welcome opportunities for those seeking work.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p>According to the 2014 Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings there are around 5.7 million paid below the Living Wage or 22.7 per cent of workers.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p> answering member constituency East Dunbartonshire answering member printed Jo Swinson question first answered 25/11/2014 13:29:42 answering member 1513 label Biography information for Jo Swinson
tabling member	4243 label Biography information for Dan Jarvis