Baroness Stuart of Edgbaston
Main Page: Baroness Stuart of Edgbaston (Crossbench - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Baroness Stuart of Edgbaston's debates with the HM Treasury
(13 years, 1 month ago)
Commons ChamberUrgent Questions are proposed each morning by backbench MPs, and up to two may be selected each day by the Speaker. Chosen Urgent Questions are announced 30 minutes before Parliament sits each day.
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My right hon. Friend will recognise that the agreement that was reached in the European Council last week and then later in the summit of eurozone Governments was on what size the bail-out for Greece should be and what the ring fence should be around that. We welcome last week’s announcement. What is very clear, however, is that more work needs to be done on those questions—particularly what the size of the overdraft will be and who will pay for it. We need eurozone leaders to move that forward as quickly as possible.
Part of Europe’s plan to get Europe and the eurozone out of this mess is the introduction of a financial transaction tax. Will the Minister confirm from the Dispatch Box that such a tax could be introduced through qualified majority voting and that this is essentially own resources, just by another name?
I have to tell the hon. Lady that I am not entirely clear what role a financial transaction tax would play in resolving this crisis. The EU’s own impact assessments on that tax demonstrated that it would lead to lower employment and lower growth across Europe. I do not think that that is in any way going to help tackle the problems in Europe when what we need is more investment, more jobs and more growth.