Baroness Kramer
Main Page: Baroness Kramer (Liberal Democrat - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Baroness Kramer's debates with the HM Treasury
(1 week, 2 days ago)
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Lord Livermore (Lab)
I completely agree with my noble friend. He is absolutely right that the previous Government left a £22 billion black hole; they had no idea how to fund that. We have still heard absolutely no alternative put forward by the Conservative Party: no alternative for dealing with the challenges that we face, no alternative for restoring economic stability and therefore no plan for driving economic growth.
Baroness Kramer (LD)
My Lords, does the Minister accept that growth will be very limited unless we fix the NHS, but that the NHS cannot be fixed until we significantly strengthen and expand both community health and social care services? So why are the Government levying increased employers’ NICs on GPs, dentists, pharmacies, hospices and care services so that they are now planning significant cuts? How does this make any sense? By the way, our proposals were costed and funded.
Lord Livermore (Lab)
I am grateful to the noble Baroness for her question. With the greatest respect, she wants the investment in the National Health Service but is opposing the national insurance contributions increases that fund this increased investment. I am afraid that you cannot have one without the other.