Income Tax (Charge)

David Mundell Excerpts

Thursday 28th October 2021 Commons Chamber

[David Mundell (Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for North Tyneside (Mary Glindon). I am sure that her late husband would have been pleased to see her banging the drum for her constituency.

I want to speak in this debate because I want to make two points: the first is about levelling up; the second is about the impact of the spending review on the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office budget. First, however, it would be appropriate to reference my own constituency, which, outwith the highlands of Scotland, is the largest constituency in the United Kingdom. It is therefore extremely welcome news that fuel duty is to remain frozen, especially just now when family budgets are already under so much pressure. Over the past 12 years, since the freeze on fuel duty was introduced, I have argued for its extension. It currently saves the average driver £10 every time they fill up, compared with how the escalator would have operated. In a rural area, fuel costs are always higher, so the further freeze announced by the Chancellor will be welcomed across my constituency.

The Chancellor’s announcement of a £150 million fund to help thousands of small and medium-sized Scottish firms to recover from the pandemic is also good news. The UK Government’s furlough scheme helped to save hundreds of thousands of jobs during the pandemic, and this fund will now help small businesses in Scotland to grow back even stronger. I hope to see it benefit companies across my constituency when the full details are announced.

It is particularly welcome that, through the Barnett formula, the block grant to help support public services in Scotland is to increase by £4.6 billion. As we have heard from the hon. Member for Glasgow Central (Alison Thewliss), this is not welcome. We know that, however much money there might have been in that Barnett increase, it would never have been enough for the Scottish Government. Some grievance would always have been manufactured, however the funds were deployed. On this occasion, however, I want to express my own grievance, and it is about the way in which the Scottish Government allocate funds within Scotland. The south of Scotland is systematically starved of resources, and my constituents feel that, because we are not a nationalist-supporting area, we do not see resources coming into the south of Scotland.

[Jamie Stone]

Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that the problem affects a slightly wider area than just the south of Scotland, and that the very remote areas of the highlands have the same problem as he does?

[David Mundell]

Indeed. The very northernmost part of Scotland is well represented by his good self, and the hon. Gentleman does not sit on the SNP Benches.

[Alison Thewliss]

The right hon. Gentleman is making an interesting point. I wonder whether he has spoken to his colleague, the Secretary of State for Scotland, because I understand that the Boris bridge would have left from Stranraer in his constituency, and there will now be a loss to that constituency. Perhaps the Secretary of State could speak to the UK Government and ask for the £20 billion from the imaginary bridge to come back to his constituency.

[David Mundell]

Madam Deputy Speaker, it will not surprise you to learn that, when a fixed link from Scotland to Northern Ireland was proposed, SNP Members opposed it. They were absolutely and completely opposed to it. Now that it is confirmed that it is not going ahead, they are demanding the money instead. That is just so typical of their approach.

I want to see some of this £4.6 billion coming to the south of Scotland. Many important projects that are within the responsibilities of the Scottish Government could be carried out there. We do not have levelling up in Scotland. Instead, we have areas that are deprived of resources, as the hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (Jamie Stone) has pointed out, and that continues to be so.

In relation to levelling up, I want to make what I regard as an important point to the Treasury, and I hope that it and other parts of the Government will take it on board. I welcome the levelling up funding and the approach of the shared prosperity fund and the community regeneration fund, but we have to acknowledge that smaller and rural local authorities and organisations operating in those areas are not always fully resourced to put in bids of the calibre that the Treasury and others are looking for. It is important, if we are going to proceed on this basis and achieve levelling up, that we do not allow only those who are the most professional at putting in bids and ticking the boxes in central Government to succeed. If levelling up and the shared prosperity agenda are to achieve what is being sought for them, we have to support rural and smaller local authorities and others in putting forward those bids. In that regard, I hope that the system can be changed.

I raise my second point in my capacity as the co-chair of the all-party parliamentary group on nutrition for growth. Along with Lord Collins, the co-chair, and Congressman Jim McGovern, the chair of the House hunger caucus in the House of Representatives in the United States, I am writing to the Prime Minister and the President ahead of the Tokyo summit on nutrition for growth to ask the United Kingdom and the United States to come together and demonstrate world leadership in taking forward the nutrition agenda.

[Catherine West (Hornsey and Wood Green) (Lab)]

I commend the right hon. Gentleman’s speech, particularly in relation to nutrition and the way those issues affect the developing world. Lord Collins has worked on global health, and particularly on malaria and other neglected tropical diseases. Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that these are the key issues that we need to keep on the agenda? We welcome the announcement that there will be more money for this in two or three years’ time, but we must not lose the momentum that has been gained as a result of the historic role that the UK has played in that arena.

[David Mundell]

On this occasion, I am able to agree fully with the hon. Lady. I particularly commend the work of Lord Collins, who has kept these issues on the agenda in the other place.

The covid pandemic has unfortunately led to an increase in malnutrition, and hundreds of thousands—indeed, millions—more children are being affected by that. There is an opportunity to do something about it at the summit, which will take place in Tokyo after a year’s delay. I hope that the United Kingdom will be there at the highest level and make it absolutely clear that, along with the United States, we are renewing our commitments to nutrition. The spending review, on my reading of it, would allow us to do so, and I hope that that opportunity will be taken.