Fiscal Responsibility and Fairness

Andrew Gwynne Excerpts

Thursday 19th March 2015 Commons Chamber

[Danny Alexander]

Labour Members may not like it, Mr Speaker, but I am setting out the numbers in the Treasury document published today, which is an entirely legitimate thing to do.

This will also allow us to reward the hard-working public servants whose pay restraint has helped so much to balance the books. Public servants have made big sacrifices, and we need to repay that.

No Chief Secretary has ever had to control public spending in the way that I have, and no Chief Secretary should ever have to do so again. But this scenario proves that there is no need to shrink the state in the way that some in this House propose. The recovery secured, the fiscal mandate met, national debt down, public finances that have turned the corner, a stronger economy and a fairer society, and a better future for the United Kingdom: that is what these plans deliver.

However, fairness is not simply embodied by the numbers on a spreadsheet; it is also about the actions that we take. Nothing makes people more angry than the sight of some refusing to pay the tax that they owe. Last month I committed to ensuring that any individual or company that facilitates tax evasion would face stronger criminal penalties and financial sanctions. Today we deliver on that commitment by publishing a substantial package of next steps in the clampdown on these immoral and illegal practices. We inherited—[Interruption.] If the hon. Member for Denton and Reddish (Andrew Gwynne) would simply listen to what is being said instead of ranting like a lunatic, he would hear the measures that the Government are taking to clamp down on tax evasion.

We inherited from the previous Government a tax system that had more holes than a Swiss cheese and was more complex than a Rubik’s cube. The opportunities for those who wish to get away without paying were many and varied.

[Andrew Gwynne (Denton and Reddish) (Lab)]

Which page of the Budget is this on?

[Mr Speaker]

Order. The hon. Gentleman should not keep shrieking from a sedentary position, “Which page?” If the Chief Secretary wishes to go through page numbers, that is his prerogative, but if he does not, excessive gesticulation is rather unseemly. I have high aspirations for the hon. Gentleman’s future as a statesman, but I am not sure he is aiding his objective of becoming a statesman by this rather shrill shrieking, which in any case, as I am sure Mrs Gwynne will confirm, will be injurious to his health.