Angus Robertson
Main Page: Angus Robertson (Scottish National Party - Moray)Department Debates - View all Angus Robertson's debates with the Scotland Office
(11 years, 9 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Michael Moore
It was important to have that summit to discuss all the key issues and to emphasise how that fuel discount has provided for people in island and remote communities. My hon. Friend has made a strong case for the Budget and I am sure that the Chancellor will have heard it.
Angus Robertson (Moray) (SNP)
Has the Secretary of State raised the unfairness of the bedroom tax with the Chancellor of the Exchequer? Will he not tell him that it is one of the most rancid pieces of legislation to have been rammed through since the poll tax? Will he remind us how many Scottish Members of this House voted for it?
Michael Moore
For as long as the hon. Gentleman’s party makes lots of promises but with no way of paying for them, folk will not listen terribly carefully to what he has to say.
Angus Robertson
Anybody watching this debate will have noticed that the Secretary of State was not prepared to confirm that 82% of Scottish Members of this House voted against the bedroom tax. Just as with the poll tax, an unpopular, regressive measure is being imposed on the people in Scotland when the overwhelming majority of their public representatives are totally opposed to it. Could the Secretary of State explain how, in a modern, 21st-centruy democracy, it is possible to impose something just like the poll tax—the bedroom tax—on Scotland?
Michael Moore
I want a sustainable welfare system that protects the most vulnerable and supports people into work and makes it pay. The reforms under universal credit will help to ensure that happens—backed up by our fair tax delivery, which has meant that more than 180,000 Scots have been taken out of tax altogether and that 2 million Scottish families on low and middle incomes are paying less tax.