Finance Bill

Desmond Swayne Excerpts

2nd reading
Wednesday 27th November 2024 Commons Chamber

[Mel Stride]

My right hon. Friend makes a perceptive point, to which I will come momentarily, but first let me deal with VAT on private schools. We have already heard about the displacement effect—the behavioural effect—and the thousands of pupils who will have their education disrupted and the impact on their families, but does not this measure tell us all we need to know about socialism? Those who stretch to try to make ends meet to send their children to those schools are to be denied. Their aspiration is to be sacrificed on the altar of envy. Is it not as simple as that?

My right hon. Friend the Member for Beverley and Holderness (Graham Stuart) is right: the Budget will not create strong foundations for the future; it will create a vulnerable and brittle economy. The Chancellor has very little headroom against her fiscal targets. Against the stability target, because the Government have talked down the economy and gilt rates have responded in turn, it is conceivable that almost all that headroom has already disappeared. I will prophesy that, without doubt, perhaps if the forecasts turn in the wrong direction, or the pressure on departmental spending over the next two years becomes difficult for a profligate Labour Government, or because of some external factor, as my right hon. Friend suggested—maybe tariffs from Donald Trump’s America, or if his deficit-funded tax cuts lead to higher bond yields and higher interest rates here—I almost guarantee the House that, however it occurs, this Government will come back for more in due course.

[Sir Desmond Swayne (New Forest West) (Con)]

May I prophesy too?

[Mel Stride]

I will let my right hon. and gallant Friend prophesy.

[Sir Desmond Swayne]

To be fair to the Prime Minister, he made it absolutely clear that things would have to get worse. The difficulty is—this is my prophecy, if you like—that there is no prospect of them getting better thereafter.

[Mel Stride]

That is an extremely astute observation. The prophecy is that things will get tougher further down the line. It will then be the case that this Government took decisions that left us in a weak and vulnerable position to withstand them. Why has this happened? The Labour party has very little business experience. Very few Members on the Government Front Bench have started up a business or grown a company in any significant manner.

Oral Answers to Questions

Desmond Swayne Excerpts

Tuesday 29th October 2024 Commons Chamber

[Rachel Reeves]

We will set out more details in the Budget tomorrow, including the consequentials that will go to the Scottish Government.

[Sir Desmond Swayne (New Forest West) (Con)]

Investment requires a measure of optimism, not the collapse in business confidence that the Chancellor has engineered. She would have done better to stress some of the positives that she inherited, wouldn’t she?

[Rachel Reeves]

It is good to have an explanation of how to do my job from one of the Conservative Members who crashed our economy. Some £63.5 billion of investment into the UK was announced at our international investment summit—investment in life sciences, investment in data centres and digital, investment in clean energy—because businesses have confidence that this Government are bringing stability back to our economy and working with businesses to seize the opportunities. I am really excited about doing that in all parts of our country and working with business to do so.

Public Spending: Inheritance

Desmond Swayne Excerpts

Monday 29th July 2024 Commons Chamber

[Rachel Reeves]

We have had to make difficult decisions today to cancel road and rail infrastructure projects. These are not decisions we wanted to make, but if the money is not there, we cannot go ahead with those projects. It is as simple as that. The money has to be there and the sums always have to add up, because I will not make the mistakes of the previous Government and Liz Truss, crashing the economy and sending interest rates and mortgage rates spiralling for our constituents. That is why I have had to take these actions today to get a grip on public spending and public finances. I make no apology for that, but I recognise the damage it does to so many constituents with projects that they had expected to see happening.

[Sir Desmond Swayne (New Forest West) (Con)]

When the Chancellor’s legislation enables illegal entrants to leave their current accommodation, where will they go?

[Rachel Reeves]

Under the previous Government, no applications were being processed and so nobody was being sent home. We will process those applications and send people who have no right to be here back home.