Oral Answers to Questions

Baroness Chapman of Darlington Excerpts

Wednesday 15th October 2014 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I agree with my hon. Friend. It was a step forward when the threshold was effectively increased by allowing things to be passed between husband and wife, making it £650,000 rather than £350,000, which I think it was before. That only happened because of the pressure from the Conservative party when we were in opposition. Taxes, as they say, are a matter for the Chancellor in his Budget, but we all want to see a system—this might have to wait some time—in which only the very rich pay inheritance tax, not hard-working people.

[Jenny Chapman (Darlington) (Lab)]

Q9. This summer, mothers from Darlington marched 300 miles to show their anger at the this Government’s wasteful mismanagement of the health service. Darlington—I want to help the Prime Minister—is in the north-east of England, like the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for South Shields (Mrs Lewell-Buck). Does he agree with the Darlington mums and, it seems, a member of his own Cabinet that spending £3 billion on reorganising the NHS was his biggest mistake?

[The Prime Minister]

What we did at the beginning of this Parliament was ensure that we cut the bureaucracy and put in the extra money. The only way to have a strong national health service is by having a strong economy. Let us look at the countries that ignored their deficits. Greece cut its NHS by 14%; Portugal cut its NHS by 17%. They have something in common with the hon. Lady’s leader: they all forgot the deficit.