Finance Bill

David T C Davies Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd July 2013 Commons Chamber

[Catherine McKinnell]

I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

The Opposition’s new clause 10 challenges the Chancellor to publish, within six months of Royal Assent, a review of the impact of last week’s spending review announcements on tax receipts. Should the Government agree to undertake such a review, as we hope they will, we suspect that its conclusions would be pretty short, given the Chancellor’s comprehensive failure to deliver the economic boost that this country so desperately needs. It was a dead duck of a spending review, and it was even more disappointing, given the context in which it was made. The Chancellor did not want to come to the House to announce a spending review last week, but he was forced to announce a further £11.5 billion of spending cuts in 2015-6. Why? Because his economic plan has utterly and categorically failed.

[David T. C. Davies (Monmouth) (Con)]

Is the hon. Lady suggesting that the Government should be borrowing even more billions of pounds than is already the case, or that they should make further cuts? If it is the latter, she should not be surprised if she gets some support from the Government side of the House.

[Catherine McKinnell]

I am pleased to hear the hon. Gentleman suggesting that those on the Government Benches are considering supporting our proposal. I wonder whether he has realised that his Government are borrowing £245 billion more than they planned, because they have failed. Their economic plan has failed—it has failed on living standards, on growth and on getting the deficit down. The Chancellor promised in 2010 that by 2015 he would have balanced the books, yet he is borrowing £245 billion more than he planned—and those books will not get balanced in the time frame that he promised.