Barry Sheerman
Main Page: Barry Sheerman (Labour (Co-op) - Huddersfield)Department Debates - View all Barry Sheerman's debates with the HM Treasury
(5 years, 7 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr Speaker
I have been saving the hon. Gentleman up for the delectation of the House: Mr Barry Sheerman.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
That was a very, very complacent answer to a very important question. Is it not a fact that the house is on fire? We want a radical tax like the one Mrs Thatcher introduced with Geoffrey Howe in 1981. Why do we not have a tax on banks, Amazon and all the other people making profits, and put the money into fighting climate change now, when the house is on fire?
Robert Jenrick
We on the Government Benches are not complacent about climate change; we are leading the world in this area. We are decarbonising faster than any other G20 country and we are investing billions of pounds in this area. If we want to tackle the challenge of decarbonisation, we will need to gather the greatest amount of private investment and innovation from the private sector. We will never be able to do that by going around nationalising industries below market value and making bellicose statements that shareholders are lining their pockets. The shareholders are the savers, the pensioners and the international investors that this country needs to thrive.