Andrew Gwynne
Main Page: Andrew Gwynne (Labour (Co-op) - Gorton and Denton)Department Debates - View all Andrew Gwynne's debates with the HM Treasury
(8 years, 3 months ago)
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Mr Osborne
I thank my hon. Friend for his remarks. I should point out that I did not identify where the additional runway should be in the south-east of England, although I cannot but note that his constituency is next to Gatwick, so that may have been a loaded question.
As for my hon. Friend’s broader point, he is right to point to the stability of the banking system. Although we remain vigilant, we are not, today, talking about a banking crisis, despite a very significant adjustment in financial markets. That is because of difficult decisions made by this Government and their coalition predecessor to strengthen the capital requirements, so that banks have 10 times as much capital as they had seven or eight years ago, and to strengthen the oversight of our banking system by putting the Bank of England in charge. I think that those decisions have been justified by what has happened in the last 10 days, but that does not mean that we can ease up; of course we remain vigilant.
Andrew Gwynne (Denton and Reddish) (Lab)
The Chancellor referred to his fiscal charter, which, of course, has three pillars: the welfare cap, debt reduction in every year of this Parliament, and his target of deficit reduction by 2019-20. We know that he is not going to meet the last one, but can he update the House on the other two pillars?
Mr Osborne
The fiscal charter was explicitly designed to ensure that the House of Commons could hold Ministers to account for their fiscal policy, and, indeed, maintain controls on welfare policy. However, it also provided for a specific requirement, in the event of a negative shock, for them to come back to the House of Commons with a new proposal. That, it seems to me, is thinking ahead, and it has been required because of the challenges that we now face in the economy.