Public Bodies Bill [Lords]

Debate between Andrew George and Lord Beamish

Tuesday 25th October 2011 Commons Chamber

[Andrew George]

I was going to remind the House that the proposal to abolish the Agricultural Wages Board was in the Conservative party manifesto, not in the Liberal Democrat manifesto, and the proposal to abolish the Agricultural Wages Board was not in the coalition agreement. The issue should be subject to discussions between the two parties, as well as parliamentary debate and scrutiny.

It has always been my view that one of the great benefits of a coalition is that it puts Parliament on the front foot, whether the Opposition like it or not, and it strengthens Parliament. It means that issues such as this, which cannot be resolved between the two parties through whatever usual channels are now established within the coalition, are subject to quite proper parliamentary scrutiny, and Back-Bench Members of the two parties in the coalition are able to hold those on the coalition Front Bench to account.

[Mr Kevan Jones]

Is it not the case that the hon. Gentleman and the Liberal Democrats have not been consulted about the abolition of the Agricultural Wages Board, and that his new clause is an attempt to save face with some of his constituents who will be affected by that? He can give the impression that he has fought for them, when later tonight the Government will abolish the Agricultural Wages Board anyway.

Finance Bill

Debate between Andrew George and Lord Beamish

Monday 12th July 2010 Commons Chamber

[Andrew George]

I am not sure that I am qualified to advise, but I am sure that the hon. Gentleman is right. If the Treasury could be encouraged to adopt this approach, I hope that it would at least ensure that it was sufficiently free-ranging to deal with any of the consequential behavioural activities that might arise as a result of such proposals.

[Mr Kevan Jones]

Although we are rewarding the banking sector, the proposals on annual investment allowances, which are cut in the Budget from £100,000 to £25,000, will directly affect many small and medium-sized businesses. Surely it is wrong that we are rewarding the people who got us into this mess in the first place, but penalising small businesses, which are getting a double whammy, because they are penalised by the lack of lending from the very institutions that we are rewarding.

[Andrew George]

Opposition spokesmen and the Treasury Ministers will have heard that intervention, which further embellishes the point that the hon. Gentleman wishes to make. I have no further comments to add, and I look forward to the Minister’s response.

[Mr Kevan Jones]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for St Ives (Andrew George), who has become a rather lonely figure on the Government Benches. Last week, he was the only Liberal Democrat who was not defending the indefensible, for which I pay him credit. At least he is prepared to come to the Chamber and argue against the measures in the Budget that will affect his very poor community in Cornwall, unlike some of his colleagues, who make comments in the press, but are absent from debates on the Finance Bill. I hope that on at least one or two occasions he will join us in the Lobby to stop the effects of the measure on his constituents and mine, although I know that he feels uncomfortable about voting against the coalition.

In 2008, in the run-up to the general election, bashing the bankers was something that everyone wanted to do. It is strange that we now have a Finance Bill that will reward them. There has been a change in the past few months from the stance that the Deputy Prime Minister adopted on 20 April, when he described bankers as “reckless and greedy” and holding

“a gun to the head”

of the country.

I support the amendment tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham East (Chris Leslie) and by my right hon. Friend the Member for East Ham (Stephen Timms), and the amendment tabled by the hon. Member for St Ives. I wish to deal with the effect on other sectors, which that amendment raises. We have discussed the banking sector a great deal, but it is important to look at other sectors, too. There has been a feeding frenzy, which suggested more or less that the previous Government got things wrong, and that we should be penalising the banking sector. That view was reinforced by the Prime Minister himself who, when he was in opposition, said on Channel 4 in December 2008 that

“more senior bankers should be sent to prison.”

On another occasion, he should that they should do voluntary work rather than earn large bonuses in the City. The Conservative party went very quiet at the election, possibly because, as the Deputy Prime Minister said—and I agree with him—it is

“completely in hock to the City”.

We have seen that position defended tonight.

A number of banks have clearly made huge profits. Barclays, as has been mentioned, had a 92% increase in profits in 2009, and stand at £11.6 billion. The Royal Bank of Scotland—remember that?—paid its investment bankers £1.3 billion in bonuses, despite making just £1 billion in profit. Lloyds has made a profit of up to £1 billion. The proposals in the Finance Bill to reduce corporation tax rewards the banks for the mess they got us into, and do not acknowledge the fact that the individuals in question have been carrying on regardless, even though, as several hon. Members have said, the people who have suffered will have their services cut. The members of the public who are the victims are somehow to blame for the financial mess that we are in.

I do not understand how—well, I can, because they are called Conservatives—in the lead-up to the election, people can speak tough words against the banking sector, but one of the first things they do is to reduce corporation tax and reward the individuals who got us into the mess in the first place. Those same Conservatives—this was raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham East—opposed all the measures that we took not only to ensure that the banking sector did not collapse but to protect the British economy.

Capital Gains Tax (Rates)

Debate between Andrew George and Lord Beamish

Monday 28th June 2010 Commons Chamber

[Andrew George (St Ives) (LD)]

I wish to approve the headline description of the emergency Budget and what it is intended to achieve, which, as my hon. Friend the Member for Bradford East (Mr Ward) has said during the Budget debate, is that the richest pay the most and the vulnerable are protected. We must test that claim as we proceed. The coalition Government face many challenges in achieving that, in circumstances in which the public finances are in a very serious state, which I do not need to describe again this evening.

I wish to give the Budget a fair wind at this stage, and of course as a Liberal Democrat I gather a degree of satisfaction from a number of measures that I and my colleagues have campaigned for, namely the increase in the tax allowance with a target of an allowance of up to £10,000, taking many thousands of people on low income out of tax altogether; the restoration of a meaningful annual increase in the basic state pension, for which pensioners have been crying out for decades; increases in the child care element of the child tax credit for the poorest; the closing of the gaping tax avoidance loophole created by the previous Government through changes to capital gains tax; the introduction of a banking levy; and the protection of lower-paid public servants. There are a number of measures that I applaud and welcome very much.

This is a coalition Government and a new arrangement altogether, with two distinct parties. Seeking consensus between those parties inevitably creates significant debate.

[Mr Kevan Jones (North Durham) (Lab)]

The hon. Gentleman is showing by his demeanour that he is not very enthusiastic for his coalition. He says that he has campaigned for many things in the Budget. Can he tell the House when he and the Liberal Democrats campaigned for an increase in VAT?

[Andrew George]

As far as I recall, none of the three main parties ruled out the prospect of VAT increasing. It is only when one is in government that one can see the nature and state of the finances, and therefore fully understand the impact that it is likely to have.

Having said that, as all Members will know, there is an amendment about VAT on the Order Paper in my name and those of some of my hon. Friends. It asks, I think reasonably, that an impact assessment be undertaken, taking into account a number of factors including the impact that the VAT increase would have on businesses, charities and families and households across the income range and age groups. It is vital that, in order to advance a number of the challenging measures in the Budget, the Government should reasonably be expected to bring forward more information than they are able to at this emergency stage of the Budget, so that we can debate the impact of those changes.