Coronavirus: Supporting Businesses and Individuals

Aaron Bell Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd February 2021 Commons Chamber

[Aaron Bell (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Con) [V]]

I draw the House’s attention to my business interests in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Sheffield Central (Paul Blomfield), who spoke about hospitality, which I will come to later as well.

First, I would like to speak about the road map, which was published yesterday and announced by the Prime Minister to the nation. Like the British Chambers of Commerce, like the CBI, like the Institute of Directors, like the Federation of Small Businesses, I absolutely welcome this road map. I welcome the hope and the clarity it provides for businesses and the people of this country as we get back towards normality. The single best thing Government can do for businesses and for their employees is to enable them to reopen. Businesses need customers, they need visitors, they need audiences, they need orders and they need turnover, and the road map offers us a route for that.

The road map, of course, is only possible because of our brilliant scientists, because of our pharmaceutical businesses—the party opposite would have broken them up had it won the last election—and because of the foresight of the vaccine taskforce. I do hope Labour will withdraw its totally unwarranted criticism of Kate Bingham, who last year did a marvellous job, for which we should all be grateful. The portfolio she got us has been rolled out splendidly, thanks to the hard work throughout the NHS and to the leadership from the Department of Health and Social Care, the Minister for Covid Vaccine Deployment and his team. Because of our foresight, because of our scientists and because of the success of the roll-out, British businesses are now better placed than those in our closest international competitors, so we have a lot to be hopeful for. The road map is the right strategy, guided as it is by science, but I wonder whether the steps are the right distance apart. The lesson of last year is that scheduling the path of the virus three months into the future is a fool’s errand. So if on 5 April, at the first review of step one, the science thinks that things are going better than expected—we did have great data about the vaccine programme and its effectiveness this week—I hope we will be able to look again at the later dates, for the sake of our businesses.

As we build back better from the pandemic and help people back into jobs, I look forward to the Budget next week, when I am sure my right hon. Friend the Chancellor will build on the schemes already announced: the £2 billion already announced for kickstart, helping 200,000 young people get into work; the £2.9 billion for the UK-wide restart programme for universal credit recipients out of work for 12 months or more; and an expansion of apprenticeships that is music to the ears not only of young people in Newcastle-under-Lyme, but of our training providers, such as the excellent Newcastle College and PM Training.

Speaking specifically about Newcastle-under-Lyme, I was glad to hear the Minister talk a lot about hospitality in his opening remarks, because our hospitality and live entertainment businesses are a key part of our economy in the town centre, especially given the systemic weakness we have in the retail sector, which covid has exacerbated. I have spoken up many times in this House and in Westminster Hall for these businesses in Newcastle-under-Lyme. The grants, loans, rates holidays and tax deferrals we have offered them so far have been extremely welcome, but we need to do more just for these last few months. I know that the Chancellor will hear what I am saying today, and what colleagues have said, and will help these businesses survive for these last few months, as we all begin to emerge from this coronavirus nightmare and get our lives back to normal.