Baroness Quin
Main Page: Baroness Quin (Labour - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Baroness Quin's debates with the Cabinet Office
(3 years, 9 months ago)
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Baroness Quin (Lab) [V]
My Lords, I begin with warmest congratulations to my new noble friend Lord Khan.
The Chancellor of the Exchequer understandably spoke at length in his Budget speech about the effect of Covid on the economy but managed to avoid any mention whatever of the Government’s Brexit deal, which is creating huge problems for our economy and our exporters. We remember the Prime Minister trumpeting his deal on Christmas Eve and claiming, astonishingly, that it meant no non-tariff barriers. In saying this, was he deliberately telling us a lie, or did he not understand the deal that he had put his signature to? The new barriers to doing business in our biggest and nearest market are harming industries as diverse as the fishing industry on the one hand and our hitherto outstanding successful creative industries on the other. In my local area, some small businesses which export to the EU and which want to grow have suddenly lost half of their trade, with the food and drink sector particularly badly affected.
The Prime Minister also promised us a Brexit windfall for the NHS, but nurses’ pay goes up only 1%. Please can the Government reconsider that?
The Budget contained controversial announcements on the levelling-up agenda. For example, the Chancellor’s own area in North Yorkshire was given a higher priority than other much less well-off places. I note that in my own region, the north-east, the only good news was for Teesside and Darlington, both of which have Conservative politicians the Government are keen to shore up. Nothing was given to any areas north of Teesside. Why were those areas excluded?
Finally, I regret strongly that the levelling-up money is being distributed by centrally controlled and centrally judged schemes, which involve would-be beneficiaries spending valuable time and resources in putting forward bids with no guarantee of success. Can we not have a fair allocation of this money based on need and on a genuine partnership between central government and the local areas concerned?