Spending Review and Autumn Statement

Baroness Hollis of Heigham Excerpts

Wednesday 25th November 2015 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hollis of Heigham (Lab)]

My Lords, picking up the last comment made by the noble Lord, Lord O’Neill, but for this House, those tax credit cuts would have become law that night. The possibility that they would subsequently have been abated seems to me improbable if they had already been banked. I am delighted, as I am sure everyone is, that the Government listened to this House and to widespread concern in the country about tax credits, which was shared by all. I am sure that we are all relieved that some 3 million low-income families will now not receive letters at Christmas telling them that they would experience cuts of between £1,000 and £3,000 a year. Noble Lords should be much praised for their willingness to require the other place to think again, as they have done—and how glad I am that they have.

However, I am puzzled by some of the comments in the Statement. The noble Lord, Lord O’Neill, correctly quoted—I would expect nothing less—from page 10 of the Statement, where the Chancellor says that because of,

“an improvement in the public finances”,

the tax credit cuts will not now happen, so these cuts are not now apparently necessary. However, on page 3, the Chancellor says that the £12 billion of welfare cuts,

“will be delivered in full”.

[Lord Tebbit (Con)]

Question!

[Baroness Hollis of Heigham]

My question, if the noble Lord, Lord Tebbit, will give me the courtesy of allowing me to speak, is: why do we need these cuts if public finances show that the tax credit cuts are not necessary, and where precisely will they fall? I have to say that the answers are not there.

[Lord O’Neill of Gatley]

My Lords, if I understand the noble Baroness’s questions correctly and specifically—I am not entirely sure that I do—it has been made clear in the Chancellor’s speech that there will be a series of measures over the term of the Parliament and the period covered by the spending review and Autumn Statement. By the end of the Parliament we will have achieved the £12 billion of savings that was set out, and the migration to universal credit will play the role that it was intended to play.