Economy

Debate between Baroness Donaghy and Lord Agnew of Oulton

Monday 28th September 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Agnew of Oulton (Con)]

I am not quite sure that I heard the full question from my noble friend, but I absolutely agree that inward investment is crucial for the future. As I mentioned in response to an earlier question, I believe that the huge infrastructure projects that we have committed to in the Budget will form part of the regeneration of the economy.

[Baroness Donaghy (Lab) [V]]

The Government modelled this scheme on those adopted in France and Germany, but in a rather half-hearted way. The German scheme is set to last for two years, compared with six months for the UK scheme. How did the Government reach that decision, when it would have added stability to employers’ plans to have two years?

[Lord Agnew of Oulton (Con)]

My Lords, I think the noble Baroness is looking too narrowly at the comparison. If we summarise the total fiscal interventions of the various economies over the last few months, the UK contribution has been somewhere just under 11%, those of Canada and France under 10%, Germany’s about the same, and Italy’s is about eight and three-quarters. My point is that you should not look at any one of these individual interventions as the single solution; we have tried to aggregate them.