Budget Resolutions
Debate between Bradley Thomas and John Hayes(1 day, 1 hour ago)
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Sir John Hayes (South Holland and The Deepings) (Con)
G. K. Chesterton said:
“It is human to err; and the only final and deadly error, among all our errors, is denying that we have ever erred.”
Yesterday’s Budget brought into stark relief the fact that the Chancellor and this Government have erred and, worse, are in denial about their error.
The UK faces a twin-pronged fiscal crisis. Public debt is at around 100% of GDP and rising, with debt interest making up about three quarters of the deficit. Public spending, at close to 45% of GDP, is near to a high in the post-war years. Much of that failure is systemic—Governments of all colours have failed to address some fundamental macroeconomic challenges—but yesterday’s Budget not only failed to fix that entrenched mess, but did not even acknowledge that it is happening.
As the global liberal order decays, we face global economic challenges on a scale we have not seen for 100 years. Artificial intelligence risks transforming the jobs market. A recent study by the National Foundation for Educational Research forecast that up to 3 million jobs could disappear by 2035. Employment in sales and customer service occupations has fallen by more than 10% since 2021, and around 12 million people in England currently work in occupations deemed to be in decline. That requires Government to play a role.
Government can be a force for good. This House took far too long to recognise the damage that would be done by the internet, and finally, when those horrors were obvious, it legislated. We need to restrict AI where it does similar damage, rather than indulging this naive faith in technological change at all costs.
The old, comforting bourgeois assumptions about the benign nature of globalisation and the faith in technological change risk endangering many of the jobs I have described, and the purpose and pride they fuel. The US President was right to impose tariffs on cheap goods that were destroying vital US industries. In response, China is dumping surplus goods in Europe, and it has been estimated that 3 million industrial jobs in the EU are at risk from that surge of subsidised imported goods.
In response to these existential threats, the Government seem frozen in time. Too much of the establishment remains wedded to dysfunctional orthodoxies. We are playing by the rules of the game when the important players have left the table. We cannot continue to proselytise for unbridled free trade when the two biggest economies in the world, China and America, have given up on it. We have to protect those industries that are critical to our national economic interests, building greater economic resilience by reindustrialising and by manufacturing again, so ensuring that more of what we consume is made here in Britain, with the jobs, skills and reassurance that provides. An economy can nourish communal health, but it cannot do so in a world that is wedded to globalised, multinational, corporate companies that are careless of the difference they make to communities such as mine in Lincolnshire and those across the country.
Here in Britain, and across the western world, living standards are stagnating, productivity growth has all but disappeared, and the state grows ever bigger in the face of rising poverty and worklessness. Why, then, does the political class continue to profess a blind faith in an economic model that has delivered record levels of state dependency? The assumption that little can be done to reverse the inevitable process of industrial decline is simply wrong, as the experience of the United States suggests. Once we tune out the noise surrounding President Trump’s on-and-off tariffs, we can hear the faint stirrings of industrial revival. A detailed study of the impact of tariffs during the President’s first term found that once the pre-existing decline in manufacturing employment was accounted for, tariffs contributed to rising employment in areas with a large presence of protected industries. Neither did consumer prices surge in the United States, despite the predictions of liberal economists. Just imagine the potential benefits of a consistent and coherent trade policy that puts the needs of British industry first.
Bradley Thomas (Bromsgrove) (Con)
Does my right hon. Friend agree that in a world where capital and labour are highly mobile, and one that is increasingly pressured as a result of energy costs, the best thing the Government could do is pare back the regulation that inhibits manufacturers’ ability to compete competitively and prevents the UK from being a very attractive destination for that capital and labour?
Sir John Hayes
My hon. Friend makes a valuable point. Both Governments and these big corporates welcome a regulatory system that disadvantages small and innovative companies. Big organisations quite like regulation, for they can cope with it because of their scale; small organisations struggle with it, because they simply do not have the resources to deal with it.
In 1979, manufacturing accounted for 30% of GDP in Britain; today that figure is just 8.5%. Manufacturing employed 21% of the workforce in 1982; by 2023 it employed just 8%. By some measure this is the greatest deindustrialisation of any major nation. We can and should build a different economic model—a new order.
We need a fundamental rethink of our economic model, breaking from the failed orthodoxy that currently prevails and moving towards what Hilaire Belloc and GK Chesterton called “distributism”, where local economies —introspective, feeding communal health, with shorter supply chains—mean that we can make more of what we need here in the UK, fuelling skills and nourishing communities. What Chesterton and Belloc intuitively understood was that the excessive concentration of economic power harms society and fuels the discontent that many people in Britain feel today. Real wages have stagnated, while those at the top—large corporations in particular, often based overseas—accumulate huge wealth and power.
We can build that new order. Small family businesses enrich the places in which we all live. Mutuals and co-operatives sustain communal and economic health in localities. We can do this, but it requires a radical rethink of the economic orthodoxy. The Budget does not suggest that rethink. All parties must step up to the mark and understand that we live in a post-liberal age where a new order is possible. Let us together build that new order, to deliver the common good by sustaining our national interest.
Bradley Thomas (Bromsgrove) (Con)
Yesterday the Chancellor attempted to present the Budget as a bold plan to rebuild Britain, but when we strip away the rhetoric, we see a Budget that is unsustainable, unfair and damaging to the very foundations of our economy. Most importantly, it is bad for all our constituents. Last year, the Chancellor raised taxes by £40 billion and promised that she would not be coming back for more. Yet here we are, one year on, with another £26 billion tax raid.
Credibility matters. When promises are broken so quickly, trust evaporates, and my constituents feel that betrayal directly. Families who believed the Chancellor’s assurances will now find themselves paying more tax, with less money left at the end of each month. The first duty of any Budget is to foster growth, yet the indicators all point in the wrong direction. Inflation is up, with food inflation at nearly 5%, so families in my constituency are paying more for their weekly shop. Taxes are up, and the OBR has confirmed that the UK’s tax burden is at a record high. It is projected to reach 38.3% of GDP by 2030. Our constituents are working longer hours, only to see more of their pay taken away.
Sir John Hayes
Food production in this country is critical to my constituency, my hon. Friend’s and others’, yet public procurement still does not prioritise British goods. Might he invite the Government to look at that again? It is absolutely right that this House, the Government and the public sector should support British-made goods, and British-made food in particular.
Bradley Thomas
My right hon. Friend is absolutely correct. The Government have a duty, in every single thing that they do and in their entire approach, to ensure that they promote the interests of the UK and of the businesses and farms that strive to keep us fed and prosperous.
Unemployment is up and redundancies are rising. In my constituency, local employers are cutting jobs, leaving families anxious about their future. Spending is up, and borrowing overshot forecasts by £9.9 billion this year. My constituents know that every pound borrowed today is a pound that they will repay tomorrow. Confidence is down, with business surveys showing stagnation, and local shopkeepers tell me that they are holding back investment because they see no stability. Growth is also down, with GDP growing by just 0.1% in Q3 of this year. My constituents see stagnation in wages, stagnation in opportunity and stagnation in hope.
This is Labour’s economic scoreboard: inflation is up, taxes are up, unemployment is up, spending is up, borrowing is up, confidence is down and growth is down. That is not rebuilding Britain; it is dismantling Britain’s prosperity, and all our constituents are paying the price. Two thirds of the British public now say that they want to see spending cuts. My constituents are tightening their belts, and cutting back on holidays and meals out. Some are even cutting back on heating. They expect the Government to do the same and to live within their means, yet Labour’s Budget expands spending recklessly.
Businesses in my constituency are being hit hard. Last year, employer national insurance contributions were increased and business rates relief was cut, and businesses are struggling to survive. For savers, ISA allowances have been reduced, which undermines savings. Retail has lost over 100,000 jobs in the last year. With our high streets feeling the pain, shops are closing and livelihoods are being destroyed. The Budget offers no relief for small businesses in my constituency; it only offers more burdens.
Labour claims that fairness is at the heart of the Budget, but fairness is not what families in my constituency are feeling. Income tax thresholds have been frozen, dragging more workers into higher tax bands, and savers have seen their allowances cut. Even electric car owners, who have been encouraged to go green and to do the right thing, are now being penalised. This punishes aspiration.
Farmers in my constituency are among the hardest hit, and the family farm tax remains largely intact. The changes to inheritance tax threaten the survival of the family farm, and rising input costs and inflation are compounding the pressure. Farming is not just an industry; it is the backbone of our food security, as my right hon. Friend the Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Sir John Hayes) pointed out, and the backbone of rural life, yet Labour continues to undermine it.
We are seeing an exodus of capital and labour in a world that is highly mobile. Over the last year, we have seen an exodus of high-net-worth individuals. While Labour Members may scowl at and casually dismiss that, the reality is that the displacement of those individuals would require another half a million average earners paying tax to plug the gap of tax revenue lost. That is the scale of the hole that the Government have created. Who will fill that? All of our constituents will—ordinary families, ordinary workers and ordinary savers.
Ambition without discipline is not a plan; it is a gamble. Labour’s Budget is a gamble with Britain’s future. Every £1 spent servicing debt is £1 not spent on public services, every broken promise erodes trust and every squeeze on families and businesses undermines the engine of our economy. Let us be clear: Labour spends until it runs out of other people’s money, and when the money runs out, our constituents pay the price. All of our constituents deserve better than what we have seen in this Budget. They deserve a Government who will restore fiscal discipline, encourage enterprise and deliver fairness for everyone.
Yesterday’s Budget is not a plan for the future, but a blueprint for decline. It ignores the public’s demand for spending cuts and for the Government to live within their means. It presides over the loss of further jobs, and it drives away wealth creation, leaving ordinary taxpayers to pick up the bill. It squeezes families, undermines businesses and will devastate farmers. This is not rebuilding Britain; this is dismantling Britain’s prosperity. Labour spends until it runs out of other people’s money, and my constituents cannot afford that any longer.
Taxes
Debate between Bradley Thomas and John Hayes(4 months, 1 week ago)
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Sir John Hayes (South Holland and The Deepings) (Con)
There are two fundamental macroeconomic problems facing this country. One is productivity, and the second is mass immigration, which has displaced investment in domestic skills. The Budget did nothing about those, and yet the tax system could be used to address both.
Rural Affairs
Debate between Bradley Thomas and John Hayes(1 year ago)
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Bradley Thomas (Bromsgrove) (Con)
My constituency and its neighbouring villages are defined by their green space and rurality, providing a sharp contrast to the urban west midlands next door. Our villages are home to rural enterprises and to farmers, and it is our farmers who are the lifeblood of our rural communities. Their role cannot be overstated: not only do they provide us with food security, but they contribute significantly to our local economy, and it is critical that we support them. Every single one of us relies on farmers three times a day. They are the guardians of our countryside, often working in isolated or harsh conditions, physically and in a competitive marketplace. I am delighted to be participating in the NFU’s MP fellowship scheme to better understand the pressures that farmers face.
The Prime Minister and the Secretary of State promised to protect farmers. They promised not to change inheritance rules, but then in the autumn Budget, among many other broken promises, Labour broke its pledge to farmers. It reduced reliefs and imposed inheritance tax rates on farmland, which will devastate family farms and pose a serious risk to domestic food security and food prices in our country. Not only do those changes hurt the agriculture sector and our economy, but they hurt individual farming families, with at least 249 farms affected across my constituency. I want the House to be aware of the specific concerns of two of my constituents. One wrote to me:
“This specifically targeted decision will eventually destroy family farms. It’s a mentally and physically hard industry to be in but for most has been passed on from previous generations and do it for the love. As an industry we feel we are no longer needed”.
The most impactful email I have received from a constituent came in late last night.
Sir John Hayes
Just before my hon. Friend comes to that impactful email, may I say that he makes a fundamentally important point about food security? Food security is vital to national economic resilience, as we have seen from the covid pandemic, the war in Ukraine and so on. Food security means maximising the productivity of land, so does my hon. Friend agree that another threat that farmers and rural communities face is the invasion of large-scale solar developments and other industrialisation of the countryside, which is taking productive farmland out of the business of producing food and thereby guaranteeing food security?
Bradley Thomas
I wholeheartedly agree with my right hon. Friend. As he rightly points out, we are at risk of large-scale industrial energy production installations becoming the new cash crop, displacing valuable agricultural land across our constituencies.
I want the House to be aware of a comment from a constituent who wrote to me last night:
“I have never written a personal email to an MP before but feel so strongly about the recent changes announced in the budget that I couldn’t let them go. Although on paper we might appear ‘rich’ the reality is we only make enough money each year to support…2 families and don’t have ‘millions’ in the bank. We pay our taxes like every other working person does. Every spare penny we get we invest in the farm to make it better for the next generation but after the budget announcements last week feel that that was a waste of time. I am beginning to think that the best option for my family would to be to sell up and move abroad to a country that appreciates its farmers and food.”
That is devastating, and I want the Government to reflect on those words very carefully.
I recall the Prime Minister’s words in his first speech in Downing Street, where he said that he wanted the Government to “tread more lightly” on our lives. Sadly, the Government are doing anything but; they are ruthlessly bearing down on every facet of British society in the most ideological fashion. I call on them to scrap the family farm tax and instead support British farmers. I also call on the Government to reverse the changes to tax on pick-up trucks, which are the workhorses of the countryside and of tradesmen and women across the country.
Although much of the debate has focused on farms, it is important to highlight that there is more to the rural economy than just our farmers. The countryside makes up more than 90% of the UK’s land. It is home to millions of people in our country and it contributes more than £270 billion per annum to our economy, from farming and horticulture to stewardship of the land and countryside sports. For our rural economy to thrive there needs to be sufficient infrastructure to attract people and businesses to those areas, including further investment in rural connectivity and mobile coverage.
Finally, our rural economy cannot exist if our rural areas are developed over. New housing developments cannot come at the expense of our green belt. Some 89% of land in my constituency is formally designated as green belt, but the target being imposed by the Government will directly result in thousands more homes being built on high-quality green-belt land in my constituency, which will undermine food security and our rural identity.
We must stand up for our rural communities and for farmers, and we must protect our countryside. I will always defend farms, the rural economy and our rural areas during my time in the House.