Oral Answers to Questions

Baroness Keeley Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

I do not know why Opposition Members want to talk down the British economy. What the chief economist at the CBI said contrasts with the hon. Gentleman’s remarks about manufacturing. The chief economist said:

“The outlook for UK manufacturing output growth is very encouraging.”

We are going to support manufacturing. We have the corporation tax cut that I announced in last June’s Budget, and we have the new centres for innovation and manufacturing. We are going to help manufacturing, whereas Labour shrank manufacturing.

[Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab)]

Talking of making things, a small manufacturing firm in my constituency is investing in the development of a new engine. If it moved into production, hundreds of jobs would be created in the 15th most deprived area in the country. Will the Chancellor tell us why the Government have cut Labour’s investment allowances, which would be just the thing to help and support a small and vital manufacturer like the one in my constituency?

[Mr Osborne]

Manufacturers, including the one to which the hon. Lady has referred, benefit to the tune of £250 million from the reductions in corporation tax that we announced in the June Budget. That is what we have done to support British industry. As I have said, under the Labour Government British industry shrank: while the share of the economy taken by financial services grew by a third, the manufacturing share halved.