Economy and Jobs

Anna Soubry Excerpts

Thursday 29th June 2017 Commons Chamber

[John McDonnell]

The argument we heard was that corporation tax cuts would lead to a large-scale increase in business investment in our economy, but business investment fell last year for the first time since 2009. It remains lower than that in the rest of the G7 countries, with the exception of Italy. Corporations are now sitting on more than £580 billion of earned income that they are not investing. Some have been exposed as using that earned income in share buy-outs to boost performance statistics and therefore boost bonuses. That is the product of the corporation tax cuts.

[Anna Soubry (Broxtowe) (Con)]

Will the right hon. Gentleman give way?

[John McDonnell]

In due course.

Let us look at how seven years of austerity has contributed to the grotesque and widening levels of growth inequality in the UK. A report last year by Credit Suisse found that the richest 1% of people in the UK now own almost one quarter of the country’s wealth. The Sunday Times rich list told us that the richest 1,000 families in the UK had more than doubled their wealth since the financial crash.

[Anna Soubry]

Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that, because of Conservative policies, some 4 million people in this country who are at the lower end of the wage scale no longer pay any tax at all? This is the party that reduces taxes for the less well-off.

[John McDonnell]

It is a party that has used the taxation system to cut corporation tax, capital gains tax, inheritance tax and the bank levy, which has meant a redistribution from the poor to the wealthy.