Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between David Gauke and Jim Cunningham

Tuesday 5th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Gauke]

I very much agree. Indeed, that is a point we make strongly in our education and employment strategy. Release on temporary licence can help get people into work when they leave prison. If they are in work, they are less likely to reoffend, and that can bring down crime.

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

T9. What assessment have the Secretary of State and the Home Secretary made of the adequacy of the new process for EU citizens who are residents in the UK to apply for settled status?

[Mr Gauke]

That is a matter for the Home Office, but I am assured that the Home Office believes that the system can deliver what we need for the country.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between David Gauke and Jim Cunningham

Tuesday 24th April 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Gauke]

I suspect that you, Mr Speaker, would stop me if we started a debate on the state of the public finances in 2010 and the difficult decisions that had to be taken as a result of the situation we inherited. The reality is that since October 2016 we have been recruiting more prison officers, we are ahead of what we said we would do and we are continuing to recruit prison officers. That is really important to ensure that prisons operate as they should.

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

4. What recent assessment his Department has made of trends in the level of suicide in prisons; and what steps he is taking to reduce that level.

HMRC Office Closure (Walsall)

Debate between David Gauke and Jim Cunningham

Tuesday 10th May 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Gauke]

No, I do not accept the description of debt management as a deskilled role. Debt management often involves making judgments on whether, for example, a business should enter into a time-to-pay arrangement, which is a highly skilled and sensitive role. HMRC’s assessment is that the teams in Walsall are well placed to be retrained to perform this role within debt management. Debt management is not an unskilled role within HMRC.

[Mr Jim Cunningham]

Would the staff transferred to Birmingham be on the same pay grades, or would there be differences? What would happen to somebody who was put into a lower grade and did not want to go into it?

[Mr Gauke]

As far as I am aware, there is no suggestion that people will be put into a lower grade as a consequence of these changes. In a couple of cases, HMRC is looking at whether the move will involve a promotion for those members of staff, but there is no suggestion that anyone would have a reduction in pay. As I outlined earlier, this has to be worked out on a one-to-one basis. Staff may find that they are getting a contribution for up to three years for their additional travel costs as a consequence of a move.

HMRC Office Closures

Debate between David Gauke and Jim Cunningham

Tuesday 24th November 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Gauke]

First, this is about offices, not about staff. On the numbers of people likely to be employed—for example, in Northern Ireland—it should not be taken that because offices are closing, the total number of staff employed by HMRC in Northern Ireland as a whole will be reduced. Of course, HMRC is aware of the specific issues with smuggling and is determined to address them. Let me reassure the hon. Gentleman about numbers of staff. It should not be taken from the announcement of office closures that there will necessarily be a reduction in staff in Northern Ireland at all.

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

Does the Minister not realise that when offices are closed, that has an effect on staff? With the best will in the world, there will be redundancies. Can he give us the numbers of staff affected? More importantly, I have schoolteachers in my constituency who want to sort out their pension problems. They use the HMRC hotline but they cannot get through—nobody responds to them. What is the Minister going to do about that?

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[Mr Gauke]

Let me just make this point and I will then give way.

There are significant advantages to such a system. The new offices will have the capacity to host multiple lines of businesses and have senior jobs on site. They will offer employees the opportunity to build their careers and skills in one office, and encourage upskilling. They will be in locations with strong transport links and close to pipelines of talent. They represent the way in which business is done in the 21st century.

[Mr Jim Cunningham]

The Minister has been very generous in and good about giving way. He mentioned that 4,000 employees may be affected by 2027. Is he saying that he can redeploy all those employees?

[Mr Gauke]

To return to that point, I gave the statistic that 4,000 of the current 58,000 people employed by HMRC will be outside a reasonable daily travel distance by 2027, as HMRC has acknowledged. I am afraid that there will have to be redundancies for those people, assuming that they are still working for HMRC, over the course of that period. I would make the point that the vast majority of HMRC staff—I recognise that this is difficult for those who are not in such a position—will clearly be able to work in the regional centres I have mentioned.

Tax Credits (Working Families)

Debate between David Gauke and Jim Cunningham

Tuesday 7th July 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Gauke]

My hon. Friend makes a very, very good point. We are in a similar position to that of five years ago: we have one side of the House recognising the need to address our deficit and to put in place the conditions for growth and the other side opposing any measures to try to address the problem.

[Mr Jim Cunningham]

If the hon. Gentleman cuts tax credits, the difference will be made up by employers, say some on the Government Benches. But how will he do that without legislation? Will we not return to the days of previous Conservative Governments when some people in Coventry were on £1 an hour?

[Mr Gauke]

The position is that we have to make difficult decisions to address the public finances. Tomorrow, my right hon. Friend the Chancellor will announce the first Budget of the Conservative Government. I will not discuss what may or may not be in that Budget, and I do not think that Members would expect me to do so one day beforehand, but I can reassure the House that we will have four days of debate on the Budget to discuss the measures that it contains. None the less, I reiterate that we must address a deficit that remains too large. I am afraid that, once again, as we saw throughout the previous Parliament, Labour is failing to address the issue.

Stamp Duty Land Tax Bill

Debate between David Gauke and Jim Cunningham

Wednesday 10th December 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Gauke]

It is an example of that. In yesterday’s Treasury questions, in the context of the reduction of the 50p rate of tax to 45p, I pointed out that the proportion of income tax paid by the top 1% has been higher—and is projected to be higher—in the years since that cut than it was when the 50p rate was in place. There is a similar point to be made here. For properties, we estimate that the top 1% will be paying just under 40% of all stamp duty yields, whereas in 2010, under the old system, the top 1% were paying only 19% of all yields. Stamp duty has become more progressive as a consequence of our changes.

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

How does that affect the shrinking tax base? This is a genuine question, by the way. The tax base seems to be shrinking at the moment, so will this change have an impact on the tax base, or will it be neutral?

[Mr Gauke]

I do not know whether the hon. Gentleman is referring to the fact that there has been a deliberate shrinkage of the tax base, in that we have taken 3.4 million people out of income tax. Perhaps that was not what he meant, but I am happy to draw the House’s attention to that policy none the less. The Government have, on a number of occasions, made the tax system more progressive. At a time when the public finances are in a difficult position and we need to consolidate them, we have ensured that the wealthiest in society bear a significant burden, and this measure is an example of that. We have made stamp duty land tax more progressive by reducing the burden on ordinary households and collecting more tax from the top end, where there has been a significant appreciation in values in recent years.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Gauke]

My hon. Friend raises an important point. Indeed, I am about to mention some of the measures that we have taken in respect of helping the housing market, including Help to Buy.

We are investing billions of pounds of public money to provide affordable new homes, including £4.5 billion during this spending review period to provide 170,000 new units, and a further £3.3 billion to deliver 165,000 more units over three years from 2015. As announced in the autumn statement, there will be another £1.9 billion between 2018 and 2020 to continue delivering homes at the same rate. We are also reforming planning laws. The autumn statement package contains commitments on releasing land with capacity for up to 150,000 homes and new measures to support up to 133,000 homes.

[Mr Jim Cunningham]

Will the Minister give way?

[Mr Gauke]

I should like to make some progress, as I want to answer the question asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Reading West.

In September, we introduced a new £400 million rent to buy programme, boosting the building of new rental homes to help people to upgrade into home ownership. The programme allows people to rent affordably and to save for a deposit, and then to buy that home or another one. To answer my hon. Friend’s question, more than 66,000 households have benefited from the Help to Buy equity loan and mortgage guarantee schemes, four fifths of whom were first-time buyers.

[Mr Cunningham]

Obviously we want people to be able to own their homes, but there is another facet to this: social housing, either through local authorities or housing associations. What element of the money that the Government are putting into these schemes is going to that end of the market? The drop from 70% to 65% that the Minister mentioned earlier probably relates to people going into the rental market.

[Mr Gauke]

The hon. Gentleman should bear in mind that almost 217,000 affordable homes have been delivered since April 2010. Between 2011 and 2015, some £19.5 billion of public and private investment is going into affordable homes, and we are on track for the highest rate of affordable house building in at least two decades. The Government are delivering on all aspects of how we ensure that we give people the opportunity to have decent housing. These SDLT reforms will give another boost to people wishing to fulfil their aspirations to own the place they live in.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between David Gauke and Jim Cunningham

Tuesday 11th March 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Gauke]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. We have to look across the board, and what we see is a Government who, in difficult circumstances, while taking difficult decisions to reduce the deficit, have made every effort to ensure that work pays. I am sure that we will continue to do so.

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

12. What comparative assessment he has made of trends in the annual rates of inflation and growth in average earnings since May 2010.

[The Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury (Mr David Gauke)]

The fall in living standards is a consequence of the economic crisis. In its latest forecast, the Office for Budget Responsibility expects real earnings to rise in 2014 and growth to strengthen in every year of the forecast. The only way to raise living standards is to stick to our long-term economic plan and to deliver a recovery that works for all.

[Mr Cunningham]

Despite this Government’s policies making the economic situation worse, the hard work of the skilled labour force and small businesses has started to lift the economy. Is the Minister aware that in the west midlands GDP per capita is 18% below the UK average and wages are well below the national average? Real wages fell by 5% from 2010 to 2013; wages are not rising and people in the west midlands are struggling to make ends meet. What are the Government doing about that? They should stop blaming the previous Government because it is their policies that caused this in the first place.

[Mr Gauke]

The reality is that the west midlands, as with other parts of the country, is growing strongly. Today’s figures show that manufacturing has grown by 3.3% over the past year, and that is particularly important for the west midlands. The reality is that we are moving into a period of growth, and that is encouraging. Further work needs to be done, but the truth is that this Government have succeeded in turning around the mess that we inherited.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between David Gauke and Jim Cunningham

Tuesday 25th June 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

How many jobs will high-speed rail create?

[Mr Gauke]

Over time, tens of thousands.