The Government launched its consultation on a General Anti-Abuse Rule (GAAR) on 12 June 2012. A significant number of responses were received from a wide range of respondents. HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) published a summary of responses on 11 December 2012 noting that the majority of respondents were broadly in favour of an anti-abuse rule, though there were concerns that the draft legislation had the potential to apply more widely than the stated target.

The role and composition of the GAAR Advisory Panel was an important element of the consultation. The response document notes that, “most respondents welcomed the introduction of the Advisory Panel as a taxpayer safeguard. There was support for the view that it should be a non-judicial body that would consider a case before it progresses to a court or tribunal.”

In addition to the thorough consultation and following the publication of the provisions on GAAR in December 2012, the House of Lords Economic Affairs Committee considered the Government’s proposals for an anti-abuse rule, as part of their enquiry into selected provisions of the draft Finance Bill. The Committee considered representations from a range of sources. The majority of those who made comments or gave evidence were also broadly in support of the new rule. The Committee’s report is available here: http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld201213/ldselect/ldeconaf/139/13906.htm

The consultation and the summary of responses is available at:

http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/*/http://customs.hmrc.gov.uk/channelsPortalWebApp/channelsPortalWebApp.portal?_nfpb=true&_pageLabel=pageLibrary_ConsultationDocuments&propertyType=document&columns=1&id=HMCE_PROD1_032453

There is no plan to review the use of powers that allow subordinate legislation to amend primary legislation. Parliamentary Counsel and Departments work to ensure that new delegated powers are proportionate. Each Government Bill is accompanied by a memorandum explaining the delegated powers included in the Bill and explaining why they are necessary.

Lord Renton’s report provides valuable lessons on how legislation is prepared and since its publication in 1975 there have many more similar reports. The Office of the Parliamentary Counsel are leading the Good Law initiative to help ensure that law is necessary, clear, coherent, effective and accessible. As part of our commitment to achieve better legislation, this Government has published record numbers of Bills in draft for pre-legislative scrutiny.

The Office of the Parliamentary Counsel continue to draft all Government Bills. The teams within the office are allocated to departments. This helps to build strong working relationships with departmental officials and legal advisors. Within the office there are arrangements in place to share expertise and identify key lessons from each Bill.

All Government Bills are subject to collective agreement and as part of this process the Law Officers’ offices are consulted. All Bills are published along with a statement of compatibility with the European Convention on Human Rights and most Bills are accompanied by a memorandum setting out the interaction with Convention rights.

The United Kingdom has an extensive statute book, which extends back hundreds of years, so Government Bills often need make provision against the background of this complex legislative landscape. Powers to make supplementary and incidental provision by secondary legislation are often needed to ensure that an Act produces the result intended by Parliament.

The drafting of secondary legislation is the responsibility of lawyers in Government Departments. The Government Legal Service runs a structured training programme, and produces comprehensive guidance on drafting statutory instruments. The Office of the Parliamentary Counsel also makes its drafting guidance available to Departmental lawyers.

The Department receives monthly updates from the Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) on the time taken by police forces, including West Midlands police, to complete local police checks as part of the disclosure application process.

The DBS hold quarterly meetings with NHS Professionals, a DBS Registered Body which supports applicants from the hospital and care home sectors in making disclosure applications. No complaints have been raised by this Registered Body with
regard to delays with applications.

The agreed standard for police disclosure performance is set out in a Service Level Agreement between each force and the Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS). The standards include a requirement for forces to complete 100% of
local checks within 60 days. Where performance falls below this standard, action will be taken. The DBS will work with the force to develop and agree a recovery plan. Performance will be monitored against the plan and further
action agreed as appropriate.

Parliament will be given a full opportunity to examine the terms of the EU's accession to the European Convention on Human Rights in accordance with the requirements of the Constitutional Reform and Governance Act 2010 and the European Union Act 2011, as well as the usual EU scrutiny processes in each House.

A draft accession agreement is currently before the European Court of Justice for an opinion on its compatibility with the EU Treaties. The Commission's 2014 Work Programme sets out that the Commission intends to produce a legislative proposal on the internal

EU rules this year; that will be deposited in Parliament once it is received. The 2014 Work Programme was deposited in Parliament on 15 November 2013:

http://europeanmemoranda.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/memorandum/communication-from-the-commission-to-the-european-parliament-the-council-the-european-economic-social-committee-1384673730

The Lithuanian presidency provided a state of play report on the EU's accession to the European Convention on Human Rights at the Justice and Home Affairs Council of 5-6 December, which the Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice, the right hon. Member for Epsom and Ewell (Chris Grayling), the Secretary of State for Justice attended.

That report indicated that the Commission's legislative proposal will not be issued until the European Court of Justice has delivered its opinion on the compatibility of the draft accession agreement with the EU Treaties. This was set out in the written ministerial statement given by the Secretary of State for the Home Department, the right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May), on 12 December 2013, Official Report, columns 58-62WS:

http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201314/cmhansrd/cm131212/wmstext/131212m0001.htm

Officials from the Ministry of Justice are working with colleagues across government to identify a suitable case in which to make clear our position on the legal effect of the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights. We are seeking to do so as soon as possible; the timescale will depend upon when such a case arises.

All pupils attending state-funded schools in reception, year one and year two in England will from September 2014 be offered a free school lunch. We will be providing over £1 billion funding for this policy between 2014 and 2016.

The Secretary of State for Education, the right hon. Member for Surrey Heath (Michael Gove), and I wrote to all local authorities and schools in England on 23 January 2014¹ setting out how revenue funding for this policy will be allocated in 2014-15. Schools will receive a flat rate of £2.30 per meal taken, based on actual take-up by newly eligible infant pupils, which will be measured in the Schools Census from October 2014. In addition, in recognition that some smaller schools will face particular challenges, we will provide transitional funding totalling £22.5 million in 2014-15 for small schools, which will be provided before the start of the new academic year. We will provide more details on the revenue funding arrangements in due course. We expect to announce allocations later in the year, when pupil numbers from the January 2014 school census are finalised.

This revenue funding is in addition to the £150 million of capital funding being be made available in 2014-15 to support schools and local authorities in providing the facilities necessary to deliver the new entitlement. Allocations of capital funding to local authorities were announced on 18 December 2013².¹

Available at:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/ministerial-letter-about-universal-infant-free-school-meals

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/letter-to-local-authorities-on-universal-infant-free-school-meals²

Available at:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/capital-allocations-for-basic-need-and-infant-free-school-meals

The Government announced in September 2013 that all pupils attending state-funded schools in England in reception, year one and year two will be offered a free school lunch from September 2014. The Chancellor of the Exchequer subsequently announced over a billion pounds of funding for this policy between 2014 and 2016 in his autumn statement, 5 December 2013, Official Report, columns 1101-1113. The Government is legislating to make this new entitlement permanent.

The pupil premium was introduced to help schools raise the attainment of their disadvantaged pupils and not to pay for free school meals. We use data on pupils from each year's January school census to calculate pupil premium allocations for the following financial year.

We are not yet able to publish pupil premium allocation for 2014-15 and beyond as the data on the number of eligible pupils in each school which is used to allocate the pupil premium is not yet available. For the 2014-15 financial year we have published provisional allocations¹ for schools based on data from the January 2013 school census. We will finalise allocations later in the year when the January 2014 school census data is available.

Data from the January 2015 school census, used to calculate the 2015-16 pupil premium allocations, wilt not be available until June 2015.¹https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/pupil-premium-2014-to-2015-illustrative-allocation-tables

I have been asked to reply on behalf of the Treasury.

For the last 18 consecutive years the European Court of Auditors (ECA) has not been able to give a positive statement of assurance on the spending of EU funds, due to material error being found in EU budget payments. The ECA requires an error rate of less than 2% before declaring the EU budget to be free from material error.

The European Council, consisting of the Heads of State and Government of the member states of the European Union, its President, and the President of the Commission, has no formal legislative power. It is charged under the Lisbon treaty with defining the general political direction and priorities of the European Union. Since the treaty of Rome was signed in 1957 the number of subject areas voted on by qualified majority voting in the European Council has increased. The number remains small, however, and the decisions which can be taken by qualified majority voting are for the most part procedural or appointment decisions. For example, the appointment of the President of the European Council is made through a qualified majority vote in the European Council, as is the appointment of double-hatted High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy. A right of veto in the European Council, however, is retained in policy areas such as defence and most areas of common foreign and security policy, also in the case of proposed treaty amendments, and procedural matters such as the number of European Commissioners or the composition of the European Parliament.

The Council of the European Union (“the Council”) is one of the two legislative bodies of the European Union, the other being the European Parliament. There are currently 10 different configurations of the Council, each dealing with a different policy area. In each composition, membership is made up of representatives of the Governments of the member states, usually a Minister, who is responsible for the area, with the chair being held by the member state holding the presidency, apart from the Foreign Affairs Council, which is chaired by the EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy. Some of the subject areas decided by qualified majority voting within the Council are education, health, the environment, agriculture and fisheries, and equal opportunities. The Lisbon treaty, which entered into force on 1 December 2009, also extended qualified majority voting in the Council to a large number of policy areas including transport, energy, tourism, and sport, and also to certain procedural matters including amendments to the statute of the Court of Justice of the EU. Policy areas decided by unanimity in the Council include, but are not limited to, Council decisions relating to the common security and defence policy, decisions on application for EU membership by a European state and taxation provisions.

Statistics on the nationality (or citizenship) of state pension recipients is not available. The award of UK state pension is normally made on the basis of contributions that have been paid by or credited to the individual.

Statistics on the nationality (or citizenship) of state pension recipients is not available. The award of UK state pension is normally made on the basis of contributions that have been paid by or credited to the individual.