Amendment of the Law

Debate between Caroline Flint and Edward Timpson

Monday 28th March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Caroline Flint]

I notice that the economies of the USA, France and Germany grew in the last quarter of 2010, but that of Britain shrank by 0.6%, and that the German and US economies are forecast to grow more strongly.

This is the first ever Budget for growth to downgrade its own growth forecast, yet the Government’s answer is not to continue Labour’s plan to manage the deficit reduction, but to go faster and further and hammer public spending harder. Then they blame everyone but themselves when growth forecasts fall and when Government borrowing rises. Hundreds of thousands of people tried to tell the Government on Saturday that it is hurting but not working, and they are just not listening. For this Government, giving a tax cut to the banks was more important than supporting the construction industry, keeping people in work or building new homes.

The Budget shows above all else how out of touch the Government are. With more people out of work, inflation rising and people facing the biggest squeeze on their living standards in a generation, we hear the Secretary of State make much of this year’s council tax freeze, which every Labour council has implemented, despite receiving much steeper cuts than Tory and Liberal Democrat councils in far wealthier parts of the country. However, with the Deputy Prime Minister busily coming up with a thousand and one new taxes and the Business Secretary desperately trying to resurrect the idea of his mansions tax, it remains to be seen whether the Secretary of State will be able to say the same next year.

A council tax freeze helps only so much. It is a £72 saving versus a VAT increase that will cost a family £450 extra this year, and it is coming at a time when families are losing tax credits and facing a freeze in their child benefit, when pensioners are seeing winter fuel payments cut, and when the Government’s cuts are undermining our recovery and costing people their livelihoods. They give with one hand but take with many more from the communities that we represent.

[Mr Edward Timpson (Crewe and Nantwich) (Con)]

The right hon. Lady will be aware that the Darling plan commits her party to £14 billion of cuts, beginning in a few weeks, which is only £2 billion less than the Government are committed to. Will she tell us where those cuts would fall under her party’s Government?

[Caroline Flint]

It is amazing how Conservative MPs are picky about which part of our budget they want to suggest would go different ways. On the one hand, the hon. Gentleman claims that the difference between our budget and theirs is £2 billion, and on the other hand, the Chancellor boasted in the previous Budget that there was a £40 billion difference between our plan to halve the deficit over four years and his plan to eliminate it entirely. They cannot have it both ways. We need a Budget for growth, and a few facts tell us all we need to know.