Lord Flight
Main Page: Lord Flight (Conservative - Life peer)
Lord Flight (Con)
My Lords, would the Minister agree with the fact that wages have risen faster in the past six months than since before 2007? Has that anything to do with the tax credit reforms?
Lord Ashton of Hyde
My Lords, I did not know that they had risen that fast. The former Chancellor, Alistair Darling, said that tax credits were never intended to subsidise lower wages. However, the current Chancellor has been very careful not to claim that tax credits have depressed wages. The fact is that we want to increase people’s wages. We introduced the national living wage and we want people to keep more of what they earn, rather than subsidising people through the benefits system.