Lord Forsyth of Drumlean
Main Page: Lord Forsyth of Drumlean (Conservative - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Lord Forsyth of Drumlean's debates with the HM Treasury
(10 years, 11 months ago)
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Lord Deighton
The actual expenditure on infrastructure is difficult to predict because, of course, the predominant portion of infrastructure is financed by the private sector. That is why we focused on developing our energy policy, so that we can trigger investments with offshore wind, with nuclear and with various gas developments. We have laid out our expenditure plans and the proportion of investment that is capital investment is laid out in the spending round for this year and for future years. We have shifted, I believe, £9.3 billion from current spending to capital spending during the time of this Government. We have put an extra £18 billion into capital investment in Budget 2013. As a result of those changes, public investment as a share of GDP will be higher on average between 2010-11 and 2020-21 than it was under the previous Government. We are trying to shift it into the more productive areas. Transport investment in 2013-14 will be higher than at any point under the previous Government despite the fact that we were in something of a boom time there, and it will rise every year until 2020.
Lord Forsyth of Drumlean
My Lords, can my noble friend tell the House how much less would be spent on infrastructure and capital projects if the plans of Alistair Darling and the previous Labour Government had been implemented?
Lord Deighton
Again we are dealing with a hypothetical question because in 2010 our plans for capital investment were broadly similar. Since then, because of our ability to focus on government efficiencies and the delivery of other programmes more cheaply, we have been able to transfer, first, the £10 billion to which I referred into capital spending within our fiscal envelope and, then, a further £18 billion through 2020-21. These capital expenditure investments are very focused on the most productive areas—economic infrastructure—but they are also all fully costed and within a fiscal envelope that is affordable.