Finance (No. 2) Bill

Alison Hume Excerpts

Tuesday 16th December 2025 Commons Chamber

[Alison Hume (Scarborough and Whitby) (Lab)]

As an eight-year-old girl sheltering in the little library at my primary school, I was able to escape my bullies by using my imagination. Later, I harnessed my love of reading to build a successful career as a screenwriter, so I am delighted that the Finance Bill extends the Libraries for Primaries scheme to secondary schools. The Government have already committed £10 million to create libraries in the 1,700 primaries across the country that do not have one, and now we are giving £1,400 to every secondary school to purchase new library books. This £5 million investment is targeted at getting more children reading for pleasure, and is part of the Government’s aim to make 2026 the national year of reading.

Feeding a child’s imagination is wonderful, but making sure they do not go hungry is essential. The Chancellor’s choice to lift the two-child benefit cap will lift around 1,850 children in Scarborough and Whitby out of poverty, and next year, up to 4,000 children in my constituency will benefit from the expansion of free school meals. I have visited some of my local primary schools with fully funded breakfast clubs and seen for myself how incredibly popular they are with both children and parents. All these measures are expected to lead to the largest reduction in child poverty over a Parliament since comparable records began. The choices that the Chancellor has made in this Finance Bill and previously will endure for generations. In my constituency, children will be helped to fulfil their potential. These are the barriers to opportunity that we promised in our manifesto to break down, and they are the barriers that this Finance Bill is breaking down—promise made, promise kept.

One of the projects I loved at my primary school was “My Breakfast Table”, where we looked at where our food and drink came from. Tea from Sri Lanka was incredibly exotic; bacon from a local pig farm was decidedly less exotic, as the aromas from said pig farm often wafted as far as the school playground. Growing up surrounded by farms, I learned to value their contribution, not just through the food they produced but through the difference they made to our community. I was reminded of their practical, altruistic attitude this summer during the wildfire that centred on Langdale forest and Fylingdales moor. At its terrifying height, that wildfire covered an area 10 miles square, ripping mercilessly through shallow peat, deep peat, forest, grassland and heather moor. The farming community reacted immediately by cutting fire breaks, back-burning, bringing water in tankers, and generally assisting the firefighters from North Yorkshire fire and rescue. The farming community did not think about anything other than putting the fires out—they were all heroes, and we must value them.

[Graham Stuart]

Will the hon. Lady give way on that point?

[Alison Hume]

I will just make some progress, thank you.

I started my speech with children at the start of their lives, and I end it with people coming towards the end of their lives. I owe it to the farming families who I represent to raise my concerns about the anti-forestalling clause in the Bill. That measure means that any elderly or terminally ill farmer who transfers their ownership of their farm to a descendant, but dies within seven years, will be liable to pay inheritance tax under the new system. If they do not live seven years after the gift, that could also trigger capital gains tax.

If a farmer does not make a transfer but dies before April 2026, the agricultural estate will pass inheritance tax free. I have met several families in Scarborough and Whitby who told me that they are having heartbreaking conversations with their parents, who talk about ending their own lives before April next year. I ask my hon. Friends in the Treasury to please look at removing the anti-forestalling clause from the Bill, or at the very least introducing a transition to protect the most elderly, and those with a terminal medical diagnosis. We have shown before that we can listen and amend our policies; please can we listen again? It is my hope that we can show the same compassion for our farmers in the winter of their lives as we have for our children in the spring of theirs.