Trade and Investment for Growth White Paper

Debate between Denis MacShane and Vince Cable

Wednesday 9th February 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Denis MacShane (Rotherham) (Lab)]

Does the Secretary of State share my concern—and, I am sure, that of the right hon. Member for Sheffield, Hallam (Mr Clegg)—at the letter that I received this week from the vice-chancellors of Sheffield university and Sheffield Hallam university that said that the cut in permits for foreign students will cost Sheffield £25 million in the next year? The Secretary of State has been involved in international education; he is an internationalist; he is intellectual. We are putting up the shutters to foreign students in Britain, which is slowing us down and will cost South Yorkshire a lot of money. Can he talk to the monoculturalists in the Tory party and get some more sense on this issue?

[Vince Cable]

I am certainly talking to my colleagues in the Home Office and making exactly the case that the right hon. Gentleman has just made. [Hon. Members: “Oh!”] This is a major export industry—worth over £5 billion, quite apart from the other benefits that we derive from having overseas students—and in the universities there is almost no problem. As he knows, there is an issue with some English language schools, but those schools are also a feeder for students going to university here. It is important that we remain as open as possible, while dealing with the undoubted abuses that occur in some cases.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Denis MacShane and Vince Cable

Thursday 13th January 2011 Commons Chamber

[Vince Cable]

I can give my hon. Friend that assurance: indeed, we have already done so. In October my colleague the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions launched a new enterprise scheme to help precisely the category of people that my hon. Friend describes. It will provide mentoring and funding of up to £2,000, including a weekly allowance and access to a start-up loan.

[Mr Denis MacShane (Rotherham) (Lab)]

Does the Secretary of State agree with Winston Churchill’s formulation that he would

“rather see finance less proud and business and industry”

more confident? Does he think that the grovelling capitulation of his Bullingdon club colleagues to the banks this week really upholds that principle?

[Vince Cable]

Mr Churchill’s views have much to commend them, and they are still relevant in many ways. Certainly, we wish to see manufacturing promoted and finance working in support of it rather than against it.

Industry (Government Support)

Debate between Denis MacShane and Vince Cable

Wednesday 16th June 2010 Commons Chamber

[Vince Cable]

Let me finish my introduction; I will come to specific projects later.

In relation to taxation, the right hon. Member for Wolverhampton South East (Mr McFadden) knows that I am not in a position to pre-empt the Budget, but if he reads the Chancellor’s speech to the CBI a few weeks ago, he will see that it fully acknowledges that not only do we wish to see lower rates of business tax overall, but we understand the importance of capital allowances in manufacturing.

In my days in opposition, I tried to engage constructively and find common ground, and we have approached today’s motion in that spirit. It includes some excellent statements, to which we are happy to subscribe. I shall start by working through some of those areas that appear to be common ground. The motion states that the

“Government has a crucial role to play in fostering economic growth and in creating a better-balanced economy”.

That is absolutely right, and we totally sign up to it—it is exactly what the Government are about—but it pre-empts the obvious question: why is the economy so unbalanced to start with, and who was running the Government who led it to be so unbalanced? By unbalanced, most of us mean that one sector, and one part of the financial services industry—the City and big banks—became too dominant, while the rest of the economy, including trade in goods and services, and in particular manufacturing, was allowed to decline relatively. That is the imbalance we are talking about.

It is worth putting that in context, however. My hon. Friend the Member for Burnley (Gordon Birtwistle) made this point from a local context a few moments ago. The share of manufacturing in the British economy shrank from just over 20% in 1997 to just under 12% in 2009. Of course, that is a historical trend, but I remember in the 1980s when people were concerned about deindustrialisation. It is worth noting that the rate of decline in manufacturing over the past decade was three times as fast as it was in the 1980s. Manufacturing employment during the period of the Labour Government, when this imbalance grew, fell by 1.7 million—that is the population of Leeds, Sheffield and Glasgow combined. That demonstrates the decline in manufacturing. Furthermore, the number of manufacturing companies fell by 12% over that period. That was the imbalance created when the right hon. Member for Wolverhampton South East and his colleagues were in government.

[Mr MacShane]

I welcome the Secretary of State to his job, and he will recall that I reviewed his memoirs very positively, which added considerably to sales. He is right about the decline, but the same decline is reflected in America, Spain, France and Italy. However, one part of manufacturing as important as the rest is steel, which is an industry that I represent in Rotherham. May I bring steel industry employers and workers to talk with him? Steel requires a complex matrix to do with energy, electricity prices and trade. We had a very good relationship with the right hon. Gentleman’s predecessors, and I ask him whether, at his own convenience—there is no great hurry—I and some steel people could meet him to talk about these issues.

[Vince Cable]

That was a very constructive intervention, and I would be delighted to meet the right hon. Gentleman’s constituents. I met steelworkers before the election—indeed, I went to Redcar, which is now represented by a Liberal Democrat, and met the Corus workers there—and I would be very happy to meet any steelworkers whom the right hon. Gentleman wishes to bring.