Anne Main
Main Page: Anne Main (Conservative - St Albans)Department Debates - View all Anne Main's debates with the Cabinet Office
(8 years, 1 month ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Prime Minister
I think it is right to cut capital gains tax, because we want to have an enterprising economy in which entrepreneurs want to get out there, set up businesses, and create wealth and jobs to generate the tax revenues that pay for the health service and the schools that we want for our country. I note that the capital gains tax rate, at 20%, will be a little bit higher than it was when the hon. Gentleman was last in government. Because we are not cutting it for carried interest, we will not have to face the absurd situation we had when he was in government in which people working in the City were paying less tax than the people who cleaned their offices.
Mrs Anne Main (St Albans) (Con)
The Prime Minister just sought to reassure my right hon. Friend the Member for Wokingham (John Redwood) that the accession of Turkey was a very long way off. Is this uncertainty what staying in looks like?
The Prime Minister
I have described the situation as best I can. For any new accession, there is veto by every country at every stage. As I see it, if we look at certain countries such as France, we find that there is no prospect of the French allowing full Turkish membership of the EU. In this debate that we are having about Europe—my hon. Friend and I will unfortunately be on opposite sides of the debate, but I promise that it will be a civilised one—I want to get rid of any of the potential scares on either side of the argument. Let us argue about what is actually going to happen rather than things that are not going to happen.