Economic Policy
Debate between Chris Evans and George Osborne(11 years, 9 months ago)
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Urgent Questions are proposed each morning by backbench MPs, and up to two may be selected each day by the Speaker. Chosen Urgent Questions are announced 30 minutes before Parliament sits each day.
Each Urgent Question requires a Government Minister to give a response on the debate topic.
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Mr Osborne
My hon. Friend is right that it is very welcome news from the oil and gas industry, and it is partly because we have been able to provide certainty on decommissioning relief, which it has long sought. One of the challenges for the UK economy is the secular decline in the North sea oil field as it reaches its maturity. Although we will get oil out of it for many more years, we have to look to the post-North sea future, and that is one of the big challenges for the SNP.
Chris Evans (Islwyn) (Lab/Co-op)
As a political strategist, does the Chancellor understand that linking the fortunes of the UK economy to discredited credit rating agencies is at best naive and at worst plain stupid?
Mr Osborne
That question rather reveals Labour Members’ confusion today. They cannot decide whether this credit rating decision matters or not. What I am saying is that we have to have the credibility to show the world that we can pay our way, and that is precisely what we are doing.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Chris Evans and George Osborne(12 years, 2 months ago)
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Mr Osborne
We have toughened up the regulation of consumer credit, and next year there will be a tough new consumer agency, the financial conduct authority, which we are creating in order to deal with the bad advice that is sometimes provided to families. Indeed, Martin Wheatley, its chief executive, gave an interesting speech about that last week, and about the impact of sales commissions and the like on the provision of bad advice and bad products to families. We are taking action to do that, but as I said, the worst possible thing for all those families, and everyone else in the country, would be a sharp rise in interest rates, which a loss of confidence in the Government’s fiscal policies would bring about.
Chris Evans (Islwyn) (Lab/Co-op)
10. What estimate he has made of the effect of the level of VAT on the retail sector in the last 12 months.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Chris Evans and George Osborne(13 years, 9 months ago)
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Chris Evans (Islwyn) (Lab/Co-op)
1. What factors he has identified as underlying the fall in gross domestic product in the fourth quarter of 2010.
The Chancellor of the Exchequer (Mr George Osborne)
The Office for National Statistics attributes the actual fall in GDP to the bad weather in December, but we have been clear that even without that effect, the numbers were disappointing. In the past week, there have been more encouraging survey data showing services, construction, retail and especially manufacturing all growing more strongly—something the Opposition have been mysteriously silent about.
Chris Evans
Could the Chancellor please tell the traders on Blackwood High street whom I met this Saturday whether the rise in VAT will help or hinder them this quarter?
Mr Osborne
The VAT increase, like the other measures we are taking, helps to deal with the record Budget deficit that we inherited from the Labour party. By dealing with that, we have provided financial stability for the British economy. That has also been made clear by the previous Chancellor, the right hon. Member for Edinburgh South West (Mr Darling), who would also have gone ahead with a VAT increase.
Financial Assistance (Ireland)
Debate between Chris Evans and George Osborne(14 years ago)
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Chris Evans (Islwyn) (Lab/Co-op)
The Chancellor seems confident that the bail-out package will work. What will happen if it does not? Will there be more loans, and can we expect public sector cuts to pay for them?
Mr Osborne
Of course, an absolute precondition of the package being negotiated is that not just the UK but the IMF and others believe that it will work. An enormous amount of effort is going into putting together a package that will deal not just with the sovereign debt situation, but—the former Chancellor alluded to this—with the Irish banking situation. That is a key part of the package.