Economy

Baroness Howarth of Breckland Excerpts

Monday 7th June 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord De Mauley]

My Lords, I cannot find fault with the noble Lord’s argument that the fall in the pound has helped our exports. It is important that we maintain all efforts to promote our manufacturing industries and, indeed, exports.

[Baroness Howarth of Breckland]

By accepting that a great deal of effort needs to be made with the deficit, does the Minister not believe that there is some danger in setting the public and the private sectors against each other? There are many in the public sector whom the Government, and certainly their Liberal Democrat colleagues, depend on to deliver services to our most vulnerable people. What are the Government going to do to maintain that balance?

[Lord De Mauley]

My Lords, the noble Baroness is right that there is a balance. The public sector performs an extremely important function and nothing that the Government are doing should be taken to undermine that.