Budget Resolutions and Economic Situation

Andy Carter Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd March 2021 Commons Chamber

[Andy Carter (Warrington South) (Con) [V]]

It is a pleasure, as always, to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Wakefield (Imran Ahmad Khan)—although my video background is not quite as regal.

Today’s Budget is pivotal for the UK’s recovery. It recognises the pain that so many hard-working families have experienced over the past 12 months, but it also puts us on a pathway to recovery while offering a safety net for those sectors that have been most impacted and are not yet able to reopen. I am particularly pleased to hear promising numbers from the Office for Budget Responsibility on improved growth.

It is business, particularly small business, that will be the engine that drives our recovery, so I thank my right hon. Friend the Chancellor for listening, particularly in respect of the extension to the self-employment scheme and the restart grants, which will help to protect many businesses that have been forced to close.

I am also pleased that the Chancellor has extended the cut to VAT to support the hospitality sector. Alongside the freeze on beer and spirit duty, that is an essential step for pubs and restaurants as they begin to reopen over the summer.

Small business makes up 98% of the total business population, so a small business rate of corporation tax protects many from the risk of being disincentivised from striving for the next level.

The Chancellor has rightly set out steps—such as increasing corporation tax to 25%—to reduce the strain on our public finances. I say this as a low-tax Conservative: it is important that big business pays its way in society, and those businesses that have done well in recent months should support the economic recovery.

The super deduction scheme is a welcome addition to allow businesses to invest back into their companies. Just today, I heard from a company to which I had spoken last week that is keen to install new plant: the super deduction scheme was the gift that it had been waiting for.

We have seen some significant measures supported by the Help to Grow scheme, which will give companies here in Warrington an incentive to digitally innovate and transform their business. Many such businesses have operated in a traditional sense but learned, through the pandemic, that the opportunity for growth may well be beyond their traditional customer base.

For generation rent, we have today’s news that the Government plan to back a scheme to help first-time buyers with a new 95% mortgage that is easily accessible through high street banks. That is a way to help young families in Warrington get on the property ladder, and will make an incredible difference to their lives and the lives of many families in years to come.

Having felt the wrath of Storm Christoph in January, I was pleased to see £5.2 billion for flood defence programmes to start in April, including a scheme for Warrington.

Finally, the Chancellor today started to make good on his priority to level up by building our future economy and investing in every corner of the United Kingdom, with Warrington benefiting from a high-potential opportunities programme. Put that alongside a new freeport in the north-west, and this really is an encouraging business Budget.