Oral Answers to Questions

Chris Leslie Excerpts

Tuesday 5th November 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Order. That has nothing to do with the responsibilities of the Chancellor. [Interruption.] Order! In the name of respect for parliamentary process and the traditions of the House, I ask Ministers not to behave in that way. We deserve better.

[Chris Leslie (Nottingham East) (Lab/Co-op)]

I shall return to the actual question of duties. Has the Chancellor found the £750 million that is needed to pay for the freeze? At the party conferences, he also promised to spend a further £700 million on school meals, a further £300 million on his Work programme, and a further £600 million on a marriage allowance. That is £2.3 billion of promises. Let us be clear about this. Is the Chancellor going to raise taxes or cut services to pay for those promises, or is he planning simply to borrow even more? Which is it?

[Mr Osborne]

What a question from a Labour Front- Bench team that wants to spend £27 billion more, and to borrow every penny of it. If this is the hon. Gentleman’s debut performance as shadow Chief Secretary, I am afraid that he will have to do a lot better. His job should be to control the promises that he makes. As for our side, we are paying for the commitments that we are making to the hard-working people of this country.

[Mr Osborne]

I will tell the right hon. Gentleman how: by sorting out the mess that he created.

[Chris Leslie]

Despite all that hot air, it seems that there are still £2.3 billion of unfunded promises. Would it not be far easier if all those promises were fully costed and funded and independently checked by the Office for Budget Responsibility, just to ensure that the Chancellor’s sums add up?

We have proposed that all the main political parties should be able to submit tax and spending plans to the OBR ahead of the election manifestos. Surely we can all agree that—as the Chair of the Treasury Committee has suggested—an independent audit by the OBR for all the main political parties would be good for the democratic process, so will the Chancellor now join us in a cross-party consensus on that?

[Mr Osborne]

As to a cross-party consensus, I remember when I was speaking from the Opposition Dispatch Box and the hon. Gentleman’s party was in government that it opposed the creation of the OBR—opposed it time and again. I believe it is important that we preserve the independence and integrity of this new body, which is working well but is entrusted with the very important task of providing the economic forecasts for whoever is in government. That should be its primary purpose and the changes to the primary law that the hon. Gentleman is proposing are not very practical.