Finance Bill

Aidan Burley Excerpts

Wednesday 2nd July 2014 Commons Chamber

[Helen Goodman]

I think it must be a matter of regret to everybody in the House that DCMS has taken 36% cuts. Of course, the question whether they can be restored is, as the hon. Gentleman knows, a completely separate one. I am just pointing out that the tax relief, if the legislation is properly drafted, will not cancel out the effect of those cuts. I am hoping that no one on the Government side is trying, through some sleight of hand, to give such an impression.

To return to the point that my hon. Friend the Member for Darlington (Jenny Chapman) raised, it is my understanding that in Darlington, the theatre is what is called a receiving house. That means that new plays are not being made in Darlington. Companies come on tour to Darlington and their productions are shown for several days. There are many very good producing houses in the regions as well; one good example would be the Nottingham Playhouse, where they make plays and tour them, and sometimes they tour them to London—they have just had something on at the Almeida.

A receiving house will not get the benefit of this tax relief; it is the producing company that gets the benefit. Of course, it may be that if they get the tax relief or the tax credit, they could offer the production to the receiving house for slightly less money, which might ease the situation in a place like Darlington, but there will not be a direct benefit, as I understand it.

My next question is whether the definition of touring is the right one and whether the measure will address the regional imbalance. As my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North pointed out, it is completely sensible to say that the extra relief is given if the play is taken to more than six places, but we must question whether 14 productions in two places is an appropriate definition of touring. Some of those who responded to the Government’s consultation said it would be a good idea to have a geographical definition of touring, and I do not understand why the Minister has not done that. I think he is risking some revenue leakage on this point. To give a concrete example, a play could be on on one side of Shaftesbury avenue for 14 nights, then move to the other side of Shaftesbury avenue for 15 or 25 nights and it would benefit, but the Government would not have achieved their policy objective of ensuring that the theatrical experience took in a new, wider audience.

I think there is a problem and I am disappointed by the way the Minister has drafted the provision; it is a weak spot. On the other hand, he might be being too restrictive in the number of production companies that can benefit, although we do not yet know how the guidelines will operate. In principle, of course it is a good idea to support British theatre. It is a great industry, we are very good at it and we have some of the best actors and theatre companies in the world, so in principle, it is a good idea to have a theatre tax relief, but I do have those two questions about those two parts of the new clause and the schedule.

[Mr Aidan Burley (Cannock Chase) (Con)]

I have a couple of questions for the Minister about the accelerated payment of tax and avoidance cases. I have written to him about this and received a letter from him, and also met him subsequently. Others have mentioned this issue, which has caused a lot of concern, especially within the accounting community. Many of my constituents who are accountants and who run businesses have written to me and met me to voice their concern about what they believe is retrospective legislation, with no right of independent appeal. I hope the Minister will be able to reassure my constituents and those of other Members.

The first question is about the oft-quoted 80% success rate in tax avoidance cases tried at court. The Minister has quoted that statistic, and HMRC has quoted similar figures, but we have yet to discover the source of that statistic, nor do we have a list of the cases on which it is based. Many of those who have contacted me feel that the figure is unsubstantiated. Will the Minister tell us the source of that 80% success rate statistic?

Secondly, there is a strong view that this law is being implemented retrospectively, with no right of independent appeal. I know the Minister has said it is not retrospective legislation, but he knows that that opinion is not shared by the accountancy profession, the legal profession, the CBI or even the Treasury Select Committee. Will he comment on that?

It is predicted that the legislation will result in some 150,000 redundancies, and the loss of future tax revenues from companies going to the wall, including some in my constituency, is estimated to be £50 billion, all to collect a mere £4 billion in unpaid revenues over the next five years. That seems to me to be a very bad bang for your buck. Does the Minister believe it is worth such loss and unemployment?

[Mr Gauke]

We have had, unsurprisingly, a wide ranging debate. I shall try to respond to the points raised by hon. Members in our debate, starting with those relating to new clause 1 and new schedule 1 on oil and gas. I outlined the measure in my opening remarks, and a number of questions have been raised. The question that gets to the heart of the matter concerns the impact on drilling activity and how that affects the UK’s competitiveness.

The Government’s support for the sector over the past few years through field allowances and decommissioning relief certainly has helped to encourage record levels of investment—£14.4 billion in 2013 alone—and supported the market for rigs in the UK continental shelf, where rates are driven by demand. Rig rates in the UK are among the highest globally, so we are not convinced that this measure will drive rigs from the UK continental shelf. In fact, recent press coverage indicates that rigs continue to be attracted to the UK continental shelf after the measure’s introduction.

In addition, the Government do not accept that they should seek to address the issue of rising costs by accepting an unfair tax system where a small group of companies are able to pay almost no UK tax. The new oil and gas authority which the Government announced as part of their implementation of Sir Ian Wood’s recommendations will aim to identify ways to ensure that Government and industry can work together to address cost escalation.

Oral Answers to Questions

Aidan Burley Excerpts

Tuesday 28th January 2014 Commons Chamber

[Nicky Morgan]

I am interested to hear the hon. Lady’s question, as she also voted for the decarbonisation target that would have added £125 to bills. However, I am sure she welcomed the winter fuel payments made to 14,000 people in her constituency in winter 2012-13. This Government are on the side of helping people to deal with the rising cost of their fuel bills. In autumn statement 2013, we extended the energy company obligation target, but we have certainly not given up on it.

[Mr Aidan Burley (Cannock Chase) (Con)]

13. What assessment he has made of the level of recent job creation in the private sector.

[The Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury (Mr David Gauke)]

The latest data published by the Office for National Statistics on public and private sector employment are available up to September 2013. Between the first quarter of 2010 and the third quarter of 2013, private sector employment increased by 1.67 million, more than offsetting a decrease in public sector employment of 433,000. Over the period, for every public sector job lost, 3.9 have been created in the private sector.

[Mr Burley]

In Cannock Chase, 4,000 more people were employed in the private sector in the 12 months to June 2013 than in the same period in 2012, an increase of more than 12%. Unemployment is down 40% in Cannock Chase since May 2010. What further action is the Treasury taking to make it easier for small businesses in my constituency to take more people on?

[Mr Gauke]

To highlight one measure, the introduction of the employment allowance in April will mean that the first £2,000 of jobs tax will not need to be paid. It is worth noting that some believed it was not possible that growth in private sector job creation would outweigh public sector jobs lost. Indeed, in 2011 the shadow Chancellor said that that whole idea was a “fantasy”.

Multiannual Financial Framework

Aidan Burley Excerpts

Wednesday 31st October 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Bone]

I shall press on because other Members wish to speak and I want to be as brief as possible.

I think that every Member, whether they vote for the Government’s motion or not, wants a reduced budget. We all think that there should be a real reduction in the EU budget, because how can we tell our constituents that they are suffering cuts so that we can give the European Union money to waste? We have a superb Minister at the Dispatch Box listening to the debate. At its conclusion, I genuinely hope that the Government will be able to accept this modest amendment. Would not that be great? The British people, instead of seeing artificial division, would then know that the whole House was in favour of a reduced budget in real terms, albeit perhaps with the exception of Plaid Cymru Members, who might have done a dirty deal somewhere along the line.

The real issue that I want to talk about is the rebate. I shall give Prime Minister Blair the benefit of the doubt, because when he gave up the rebate, he thought that there would also be a massive cut in common agricultural policy payments, meaning that our net contribution would not go up. According to figures from the House of Commons Library, during the following five years of the Labour Government, our net contribution to the EU was £16 billion. That is a lot to pay for membership of the EU, but unfortunately, since Tony Blair left, our rebate has gone down and there has been no reform of the CAP, so over the period of the coalition Government, as things stand—even without a budget reduction—we will be paying £36.4 billion to be a member of this club. How can we say that we will pay £36.4 billion, and then that we will pay some more to allow for inflation?

[Mr Aidan Burley (Cannock Chase) (Con)]

Is my hon. Friend aware that the “more” figure that we will pay under the Government’s inflationary proposals is £1.3 billion over just the next two and a half years? How many nurses, doctors and teachers would that buy?

[Mr Bone]

I agree entirely.

The issue tonight is not whether I am happy to vote with the hon. Member for Rhondda—

--- Later in debate ---

[Sir Tony Baldry]

In all honesty, if the hon. Lady goes into a different Division Lobby from the Prime Minister this evening, she will not be helping the Prime Minister or our party. It is as simple as that. The Prime Minister has made it clear what he wants to achieve. If he achieves a freeze in the EU budget, he will have done something that no other Prime Minister has ever managed.

[Mr Burley]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Sir Tony Baldry]

No, I am not going to give way.

All that happens on these Benches, whenever the Prime Minister says he is going to achieve something, is that those who are somewhat self-indulgent seek to set him an even higher hurdle—

--- Later in debate ---

[Greg Clark]

This has been a debate of passionate contributions, as befits such an important consideration—the next seven years’ budget of the EU. It is right, and many Members have referred to this, that the House should give consideration not just to the aspirations and the good intentions surrounding the European Union, but to the nitty-gritty—the decisions that need to be taken and which affect all our constituents. I am proud to be a Member of a House that will undertake this level of scrutiny.

It comes down to this: we want to see a real-terms cut in the budget. We all want to negotiate for that. That is the position that unites most Members of the House, but in seeking to advance that agenda the Prime Minister has done something historic, something that no Prime Minister during the history of our engagement with the European Union has managed to do, which is to secure from the most powerful allies that we have in the European Union a position that we should negotiate for the first time a cut over seven years in the EU budget, or a maximum of a real-terms freeze. That was agreed two years ago and has been scrutinised by the House in detail. Having put that to the House, it is reasonable for the Prime Minister to go into the negotiating chamber able to deliver on the commitments that he has had from his colleagues there.

It has been made clear that we on the Government Benches regard this as a red line. We will deploy a veto if our conditions are not met. That is widely understood. This debate will be watched outside the Chamber and everyone can be clear about that. We have seen total confusion on the part of the Opposition as to what is a red line. The Leader of the Opposition, the shadow Foreign Secretary and the shadow Chancellor would not confirm that they would even deploy a veto. [Interruption.] The shadow Justice Secretary asks what our position is. Our position is that we would deploy a veto if our conditions and our red lines are not met.

[Mr Burley]

Can the Minister confirm the amount of extra money which, under the Government’s proposals, we will send to the EU over the next two and a half years? According to my calculations and the House of Commons Library, it is an extra £1.3 billion between now and the next general election. Can he confirm that figure or tell the House what the figure is?

[Greg Clark]

It is true that the increase that we are talking about would involve further contributions from the House, but the negotiation that we are entering is to avoid that, to minimise the contribution that we make and to secure the best deal for the taxpayer.

The hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr Skinner), who is not in his seat, referred to the Maastricht debates and the attitude of the official Opposition at the time. If we could have drawn from the behaviour of the Opposition their intention in government, we would have reached a wholly misleading conclusion. During their time in government, from 1998 to 2010, they presided over a 47% increase in the contributions that we made to the EU budget. They surrendered our rebate in return for no reform. The reform that we were expecting was in the common agricultural policy. Our contribution to that increased over the time that they were in power from £48 billion to £56 billion.

We have secured the agreement of member states. We have led the way by managing our national finances. If our negotiating position does not succeed, we are ready, willing and able to veto. We urge the House to stand with us as the Prime Minister goes to negotiate for us.

The Economy

Aidan Burley Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

The truth is that the whole country has paid the price for the disastrous economic policies of the previous Government. There is no easy way to reduce the largest deficit in our history, but the Opposition oppose every single measure we introduce. That is incredible and it is precisely why they have been rumbled—rumbled by the serious economic press and by everyone else.

[Mr Aidan Burley (Cannock Chase) (Con)]

Is the truth not that the Opposition’s two policies—cutting VAT and halving the structural deficit over this Parliament, rather than eliminating it—mean just one thing: more borrowing? Does more borrowing not just mean one thing: us paying more interest? Is it not morally disgusting that when we came into government a year ago we were spending £120 million a day just to service the interest on their debt, which they now want to increase?

[Mr Osborne]

My hon. Friend is right. The debt interest payments would have increased to £180 million a day if we had not pursued our current policies. That became one of the largest Budget items under the Labour Government. Deficit reduction has avoided the interest payments that we would have had under Labour.

Oral Answers to Questions

Aidan Burley Excerpts

Tuesday 21st June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Justine Greening]

The right hon. Gentleman’s hearing must be suffering, because he obviously did not hear my earlier answer to the hon. Member for Denton and Reddish (Andrew Gwynne).

[Mr Aidan Burley (Cannock Chase) (Con)]

T4. Dr Adrian Steele, the managing director of Mercian Labels in Cannock, has just been named as one of the midlands’ most promising entrepreneurs. His company supplies labels and barcodes to the medical industry and employs 32 people. Does the Chancellor agree that it is small business entrepreneurs such as Dr Steele who will grow our economy back to strength, and will he continue to support manufacturers, who were shamefully neglected by the Labour party?

[Mr George Osborne]

My hon. Friend is right. Manufacturing halved as a share of our economy under the Labour Government and financial services grew dramatically over that period. Since the last election, manufacturing output is up 4.2% and the private sector has created more than 500,000 new jobs net, which is all good news. The example he brings to the Chamber is just one of many companies that are investing and employing people, and despite a choppy recovery we should celebrate that.

Oral Answers to Questions

Aidan Burley Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Gauke]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his question. I, too, have received many representations on this point. Of course, we keep VAT under review within the restrictions that exist.

[Mr Aidan Burley (Cannock Chase) (Con)]

Is the Minister aware that according to the Institute for Fiscal Studies, if we only halve the deficit rather than close it completely over the lifetime of this Parliament, we will spend an extra £10 billion on interest? Does he think that that is money that would be better spent on schools and hospitals in this country rather than foreign investment bankers?

Fuel Prices and the Cost of Living

Aidan Burley Excerpts

Wednesday 16th March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Justine Greening]

I do not think the right hon. Gentleman even believes that himself. The bottom line is that he wants—[Interruption.] The shadow Chief Secretary says that we need to take action now, but he wants us to embark on a process that took six to seven years the last time it happened. How is that taking action now?

Let me tell the House on which items the rate was changed. Here are a few of the products and services to which a reduced VAT rate is now applied in other countries:

“minor repairing of bicycles, shoes and leather goods, clothing and household linen”.

Window cleaning was also one, and hairdressing was another. The Government at that time—a Government of whom the right hon. Member for Morley and Outwood (Ed Balls) was part—did not seek to add road fuel to that list. He says that that was because the previous Government never raised VAT on fuel. That is not strictly true, of course: they reduced it, but then put it back up again, as we have heard. The other reason was that, year on year—and, in the final stages, month on month—they were consistently raising fuel duty, so they had no need to use VAT as a tool. They were getting plenty of additional tax from the motorist.

[Mr Aidan Burley (Cannock Chase) (Con)]

The last Government might not have increased VAT, but they certainly increased fuel duty. When Labour came to power in ’97, duty on unleaded petrol was 36p a litre; when the last Government left office in 2010, it had risen to 57.9p a litre. Does my hon. Friend think that Labour Members should take some responsibility for increasing fuel duty by more than 20%?

[Justine Greening]

Of course they should, but as so often they never do, unfortunately.

Banking

Aidan Burley Excerpts

Wednesday 9th February 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

First, I respect the hon. Gentleman’s consistency on this issue. Secondly, I said explicitly that I did not think that the anger would disappear any time soon; memories will be long of what has gone wrong in recent years. It will help that bank boards will at least be aware of the some of the salaries that are being paid in their organisations, which they simply were not under the previous regime. That is one thing that clearly went wrong at the Royal Bank of Scotland.

[Mr Aidan Burley (Cannock Chase) (Con)]

A man named Tom Bell set up a charity in my constituency to improve the quality of life for tens of thousands of disabled and disadvantaged kids. He was awarded the OBE for his efforts. In assessing the rewards given to bankers, what does the Chancellor make of the five peerages, eight knighthoods, seven CBEs, four OBEs and four MBEs that were given to bankers by the Labour Government?

[Mr Osborne]

The statistics speak for themselves. Of course, the shadow Chancellor used to be the chief economic adviser and, given that almost everything at the Treasury was signed off by him, he presumably signed off the knighthood for Sir Fred Goodwin. Perhaps in one of our future encounters we will hear the truth about that.

Bank Bonuses

Aidan Burley Excerpts

Tuesday 11th January 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

That was about the time when the right hon. Member for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath (Mr Brown), the then Prime Minister, said:

“The day of big bonuses is over.”

That is the kind of rhetorical—[Interruption.] That is the situation that we have inherited—no proper code of practice, no permanent bank levy, no plan for improving the system of regulation. We are putting in place measures that we believe will materially improve lending in this economy and the regulation of our banking system. Every single one of them has, for opportunistic reasons, been opposed by the Labour party.

[Mr Aidan Burley (Cannock Chase) (Con)]

On BBC television yesterday, the Leader of the Opposition stated that Labour’s bankers tax brought in £3.5 billion whereas the Government’s levy would bring in only £1.3 billion. Will the Chancellor confirm that the right hon. Gentleman got his figures incorrect? Actually, Labour’s bankers tax brought in just £2.3 billion, whereas the Government’s levy will bring in more, at £2.5 billion.

[Mr Osborne]

My hon. Friend is right. When the bonus tax was introduced by the previous Chancellor, he explicitly said that there would be displacement activity and that the net receipts to the Treasury would be less. Those have been looked at by the Inland Revenue and verified by the independent Office for Budget Responsibility. They are less than the £2.5 billion or thereabouts that our bank levy will raise on a regular year-on-year basis once it is fully up and running.

Oral Answers to Questions

Aidan Burley Excerpts

Tuesday 16th November 2010 Commons Chamber

[The Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury (Mr David Gauke)]

The response to the consultation on real-time information—the next stage of it—will be published shortly. We will outline the details in that, but additional sums have been identified as part of the spending review process to pay for the real-time information project.

[Mr Aidan Burley (Cannock Chase) (Con)]

T6. More than 20% of my constituents in Cannock Chase are employed by manufacturing centred small businesses. Will the Chancellor assure them that the small business tax review will simplify and reduce taxes for small businesses rather than complicate and increase them?

[Mr Osborne]

Yes, I can give that assurance. I also note that the actions that the Government have taken have kept the small companies rate down, avoiding the rise in the rate that we inherited.