IMF Economic Outlook

Debate between Alan Brown and James Cartlidge

Tuesday 31st January 2023 Commons Chamber

[James Cartlidge]

I do not know the specific circumstances of why the café the hon. Gentleman refers to is struggling to recruit; I have no specific knowledge of it. I am sure it offers a wonderful breakfast when it is able to do so. What I can say is, talking in aggregate, and as is our slogan, we are proud to have almost the lowest unemployment for the best part of 50 years. It does present challenges when we have a tight labour market. That is why we think the best way forward is to ensure that we have the apprenticeships, skills and training to deliver the workforce to meet our growth ambitions.

[Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)]

The Minister continues the Tory playbook of excuses—global headwinds, global challenges, other countries having high inflation, Putin’s illegal war and the pandemic—but the reality is that the UK is the only G7 country facing a recession this year. Is that due to Tory incompetence, or is it the Brexit dividend?

Non-domestic Energy Support

Debate between Alan Brown and James Cartlidge

Monday 9th January 2023 Commons Chamber

[James Cartlidge]

If the hon. Lady has a business that wrote in to the Department to contribute to the review and did not receive a response, I would be grateful if she forwarded me a copy of that correspondence so that I can look into it.

[Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)]

The energy profits levy measures are predicted to bring in £56 billion and most of that money is coming from Scotland, yet businesses across Scotland are left struggling, particularly in the hospitality trade. The Struther Farmhouse Tea Room in my constituency is facing a 500% increase in its gas bill, with its gas and electricity up by £25,000 in a year. Despite what the Minister says, these businesses are now reaching a cliff edge because Government support is estimated to be a maximum of £2,000 against these increases. How many small businesses and jobs does he think will be lost under the guise of Government fiscal prudence?

The Climate Emergency

Debate between Alan Brown and James Cartlidge

Thursday 17th October 2019 Commons Chamber

[James Cartlidge (South Suffolk) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Bath (Wera Hobhouse), but I have to say that while it is a great thing that we have generally seen more consensus on this issue in the House recently, she and the hon. Members for Workington (Sue Hayman) and for Edinburgh North and Leith (Deidre Brock) have constantly made the point that the Government are doing nothing about climate change. That is a quite extraordinary accusation. We have just had the first ever quarter in history in which the energy produced from renewables exceeded that produced from fossil fuels. That is real; it is what happened in July, August and September this year for the first time ever.

I want to refer also to the speech made by the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas), whose passion on these matters I admire. She said that it was all well and good to have historical reductions in emissions, but I must point out that the 40% reduction since 1990 did not happen by magic. The biggest part of that—[Interruption.] The hon. Member for Edinburgh North and Leith is speaking from a sedentary position. She would not take my intervention on Margaret Thatcher earlier, but the point is that the biggest part of that reduction, by far, was due to the move from coal to gas. The closure of the coal mines in this country was the single most divisive and bitter industrial dispute that this country has ever had. We know what happened in the miners’ strike and what happened in the 1990s with the miners’ march through central London. We did not want that to happen, and I say this with no relish, but it was a necessary policy to put through in the national interest. There is an idea that people can jump on top of a Jubilee line train or spray fake blood on Government buildings to cut CO₂ emissions, but it takes real action.

[Alan Brown]

I know that the hon. Gentleman is trying to wind Members up, but he knows that when Margaret Thatcher shut down our indigenous coalmines and imported coal from abroad, that was an ideological attack. It had nothing to do with a gas strategy, and he should tell the truth.

[James Cartlidge]

I was being generous in giving way but, with hindsight, perhaps I should not have been. The point is that coal use has definitively slumped massively and our CO₂ emissions have fallen massively.

The good news is that I do not think we will ever need to take such difficult, divisive decisions again, because of what is happening around our coasts, and particularly —I am proud to say this as a Suffolk MP—off the coast of East Anglia. Now, 52% of our 4 GW of offshore wind-produced electricity is coming from the East Anglian shore. This debate falls at a timely moment. Had it not been for the Supreme Court decision, I would have been able to speak, during the original planned Prorogation, at the launch of Norfolk & Suffolk Unlimited. That is a new enterprise from the New Anglia local enterprise partnership based in Norfolk and Suffolk to promote inward investment into our region and to promote exports. At the heart of that will be clean growth and a drive for even more wattage to come from offshore wind.

I have a question for Ministers. We are incredibly ambitious about seeing more growth, more jobs and more electricity being produced from offshore wind, but will he assure me that investment in the grid and support from the National Grid for the greater electricity output will be sustained? There needs to be a co-ordinated strategy if we are to make the most of our potential off the coast of East Anglia and around the whole of the United Kingdom.

Having started back in the dark days of the miners’ strike, I now have another positive thought for the House. Whenever I visit primary schools in my constituency, of which there are 40, I find it incredibly uplifting to see that the next generation is so besotted with this issue. My last four primary school visits were about the issues of waste, cutting down on plastic use and using renewable energy. I think that we can be positive and optimistic about the next generation. Seeing as I took an intervention, I am now going to wind up and give others a chance to speak. The picture that needs to be painted is very positive, and this Government have played a huge historic role in that, of which I am very proud. Now we need consensus so that we can continue with these positive measures.