Bank Bonuses

Dennis Skinner Excerpts

Tuesday 11th January 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

I agree with all of that. We want to see bonus restraint; we want to see bonuses lower this year—[Interruption.] Lower this year than they were under the Labour Government. That is one objective. Secondly, we want to see bonuses deferred. Thirdly, we want to make sure that they do not reward risk-taking that goes badly wrong—that is why we want the ability to claw back. We also want to get away from the system—again, this thrived under the previous Government—of guaranteed bonuses, which people got regardless of what happened to their financial institution. That is precisely what the code of practice addresses, it is precisely why we are looking at greater transparency and greater shareholder involvement, and it is precisely why I want this new settlement with the banks.

[Mr Dennis Skinner (Bolsover) (Lab)]

Is not the truth of the matter that this Government want the students, the homeless and the disabled to pay for this deficit, while their banking friends—the Tories’ banking friends—will get off scot-free, despite causing the problem in the first place? It is a bucket load of hypocrisy.

[Mr Osborne]

Again, the hon. Gentleman has amnesia. He seems to forget that for 13 years he supported a Government who allowed this problem to develop. Indeed, as far as I can tell, half the people who were in that Cabinet have gone on to work in the City.

Oral Answers to Questions

Dennis Skinner Excerpts

Tuesday 21st December 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

My hon. Friend raises a good point. That is something on which we are seeking official advice, and I will keep him informed of any progress that we make on it.

[Mr Dennis Skinner (Bolsover) (Lab)]

Now that the Chancellor has adopted a more belligerent tone in the last few minutes, will he open up and tell us what he really thinks about the WikiLeaks cable?

[Mr Osborne]

rose—

Crown Currency Exchange

Dennis Skinner Excerpts

Tuesday 7th December 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hoban]

Often in these cases—I do not want to go into detail on this—the FSA is dependent on disclosure by directors. As the hon. Lady said, the FSA does not have the power to access criminal records to enable it to find out whether directors’ disclosures are accurate.

The question that we need to address is why foreign exchange services are not more tightly regulated. Traditionally, buying and selling currency is the same as buying and selling any other commodity, whether it is gold and silver or food and drink. With the exception of Crown, this kind of trading has been, and remains, a low-risk business. It is something that millions of us do day in, day out, whether at the post office, in banks or at bureaux de change, without a problem. But Crown’s business model was different, and what should have been straightforward transactions led to substantial losses for its customers. I accept, of course, that Crown has inflicted substantial losses on customers. The Government are anxious to learn the lessons from this failure and to take what action may be needed, including regulatory changes.

[Mr Dennis Skinner (Bolsover) (Lab)]

A lot of people have lost money, including people in my constituency and loads of others. Does the Minister think that, as in the case of Equitable Life, it would be a good idea to make sure that the financial ombudsman has a look at this case?

[Mr Hoban]

It is not a matter for the ombudsman—it is for the administrator to decide what further actions are needed. As I said, the problem is that the nature of this business was such that it fell outside the regulatory perimeters. It is not covered by the Financial Ombudsman Service or the financial services compensation scheme, so there is a distinction between this case and the one to which the hon. Gentleman refers.

Autumn Forecast

Dennis Skinner Excerpts

Monday 29th November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

That is, of course, a very significant feature of what is happening today. It is completely unprecedented for a Chancellor to present an autumn forecast that has been produced independently by people who have been verified by the all-party Treasury Committee and who had their own separate press conference. In addition, Members have had a couple of hours to look at this document. If one thinks back, for example, to a year ago and the pre-Budget report, when the previous Chancellor produced the autumn forecast, one recalls that he rattled off the numbers. There was absolutely no opportunity for the shadow Chancellor to have examined those numbers or to have looked at the document, or for any other Member in the House to have done so. It was the Chancellor’s judgment, rather than an independent judgment. Our approach is a major improvement to fiscal policy making in this country. The legislation is before the House of Lords, and I hope that when it comes to the House of Commons it will have all-party support.

[Mr Dennis Skinner (Bolsover) (Lab)]

Why are the Irish banks worth saving yet Northern Rock was not?

[Mr Osborne]

What the Irish banks are getting, in many cases, is a capital injection. As in the UK, the banks have been very poorly regulated. We are improving our regulation system. If the hon. Gentleman does not think we should be supporting the Irish banking system, the impact of his proposals on his constituents in Derbyshire would be very severe.

Draft EU Budget 2011

Dennis Skinner Excerpts

Wednesday 13th October 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Ian Davidson (Glasgow South West) (Lab/Co-op)]

I rise to support a reduction in the EU budget. As some Members may be aware, I have advocated that any such cut would more than meet the costs of providing a second aircraft carrier for the Royal Navy.

Who would have thought that less than six months after the election we would be having a debate where a Conservative-led Government would be denounced by many of their Back Benchers for being soft on Europe? I was surprised to hear my right hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham (Mr MacShane) say—I think that he is correct—that, as far as he can tell, there has been almost complete continuity of policy from the previous Government to this Government in terms of their relationship with the EU. I have noticed that many commentators are similarly remarking that there seems to have been very little change in policy towards the EU. I hope that that is simply a question of settling in, and that when the Government find their feet they will be much more prepared to stand up for British interests.

There is another possibility. Yesterday, we heard that the alternative vote referendum was being brought forward simply as a concession to the Liberal Democrats—the Liberal tail wagging the Conservative dog. I hope that the Government’s softness on the European Union is not another case of the Liberals having received undue concessions from the Conservatives. I point out to Conservative Members that it is not possible to buy Liberal Democrats—they can only be rented for short periods, and one can never rely on their remaining rented. If the Conservatives are counting on the Liberal Democrats to support them all the way, they are likely to be sadly mistaken.

Unless I am very much mistaken, it is noticeable that there are no Liberal Democrats here at the moment, unless Members who are sitting on the second Bench back have joined them.

[Mr Dennis Skinner (Bolsover) (Lab)]

They’re all in Europe.

[Mr Davidson]

Are they all in it together? Yet again, I suspect that the Liberals are leaving the Conservatives to do the dirty work for them and put the budget through. I imagine that if the Conservatives carry on their course of action and we have an AV voting system next time around, the UK Independence party will do far better in the first ballot than it might have done in the past. I find it a great cause for regret that the Conservatives seem to have gone soft on Europe in such a short period.

Proposed Public Expenditure Cuts

Dennis Skinner Excerpts

Monday 13th September 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

Let me give my hon. Friend a specific example: disability living allowance. We were faced with a number of options, but we decided that we wanted to keep it as a universal benefit, and instead look at the criteria that allowed people to get on it and ensure that they were entitled to stay on it. We are particularly conscious of benefits on which people in vulnerable positions are dependent, but with each benefit, we are proceeding with caution, seeking as wide a consensus as possible. However, my hon. Friend has my commitment that we are doing everything that we can to protect the vulnerable during this process. I would also make a general observation: the thing that really hurts the most vulnerable in our society is when a country loses control of its public finances.

[Mr Dennis Skinner (Bolsover) (Lab)]

Is the Chancellor really aware that as a result of these successive sadistic statements about cuts, war pensioners are ringing Members of Parliament and people who are severely disabled are frightened to death of losing their benefits? Is it not time that he had the gall to tell the truth: that this is all about using the deficit, which we had planned for, as an opportunity to carry out the Tory ideology of cutting the power of the state?

[Mr Osborne]

As the hon. Gentleman is now a Blairite, I thought that I would read out what his master said recently, which is relevant to what he has just said:

“I look at those policy papers now—the work on…the use of social security budgets…and I do think how different it would have been if we had done it. If we had…not wandered into a cul-de-sac of mixed messages and indecision… But there it is. It didn’t happen, and that’s it.”

We are trying to do the things that he once promised in his election manifesto.

Equitable Life

Dennis Skinner Excerpts

Thursday 22nd July 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hoban]

I have made it my duty to maintain a good and open relationship with EMAG. I met its members again earlier this week and I spoke to the chairman, Paul Braithwaite, this morning to advise him that I was making the statement. Today, I am publishing 2,500 pages of material that help underpin Sir John’s work and I hope that people who are interested will examine that in detail and respond to his findings and the actuarial advice that he received.

[Mr Dennis Skinner (Bolsover) (Lab)]

When the policyholders realise just how much they will get, they will think that it is a far cry from all the statements by the then Tory Treasury spokesman, who has somehow landed up as Secretary of State for Transport, and the Liberal spokesman, who promised the moon and to pay everything in full. The small print indicates that those policyholders will now realise that the Tory party and the coalition are in full retreat on the payments that they should receive.

[Mr Hoban]

I know that the hon. Gentleman is concerned about pension arrangements, but in all the debates in which I participated on the matter, whether in Westminster Hall or Opposition day debates, I do not think that he spoke up once for Equitable Life policyholders.

Oral Answers to Questions

Dennis Skinner Excerpts

Tuesday 13th July 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Last but never least, I call Mr Dennis Skinner.

[Mr Dennis Skinner (Bolsover) (Lab)]

Has the Treasury done a calculation of the number of construction jobs that will be lost as a result of not building 700 schools? Does that not prove that public sector cuts equal private sector misery? Get that into your head.

[Danny Alexander]

The thing I have got into my head is that the plans laid down by the previous Government for this programme, particularly in the Department for Education, were among the most irresponsible financial planning carried out by that Government in their entirety. When that Government were planning to cut capital spending in half and increase the spending on this programme, taking no account of the pressures in primary schools, for example, that was pure irresponsibility. My friend the Secretary of State for Education has made the right decision on this matter. I know that it is painful in many constituencies, but this is one of many things that the Opposition should be apologising for, not criticising.

Financial Services Regulation

Dennis Skinner Excerpts

Wednesday 16th June 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

The risks around Lehman Brothers are well documented.

[Mr Dennis Skinner (Bolsover) (Lab)]

What are they?

[Mr Osborne]

Suddenly, the hon. Gentleman is interested in the regulation of Lehman Brothers, but there we go.

The risks were pretty clear. No arrangements were in place for winding up a large and complex financial firm. That was one concern. No arrangement was in place that would allow a global firm to avoid dying nationally in the way that it did. It was heavily exposed to, for example, the derivatives markets and other things. That had not been spotted either by the British regulator or, of course, the American regulator, which was in the lead. We need to investigate precisely that kind of issue, not just here in Britain, but across the world. That is being done in the international councils on which we sit. But surely, whether with Lehman Brothers, the Royal Bank of Scotland, HBOS or Northern Rock, we must learn the lesson of what went wrong. Again, I find it breathtaking that, at the beginning of the Parliament, the Labour party has set itself against changing the system of regulation. [Hon. Members: “No we haven’t.”] Labour Members may say that, but that is exactly what the shadow Chancellor did about 53 minutes ago.

Oral Answers to Questions

Dennis Skinner Excerpts

Tuesday 8th June 2010 Commons Chamber

[Justine Greening]

The best thing that we can do to support credit unions is make sure that they are on a sustainable footing. When I talk to Conservative Members, many of them say that they want to see their credit unions merge. We need to ensure that credit unions can offer a broader range of products to local people, and we need to look at how credit unions operate. Interestingly, although complaints to the financial services ombudsman are broadly increasing, when it comes to credit unions they are falling. The most recently released statistics show that just one in 66,000 complaints related to a credit union. The hon. Gentleman is right to ask how we can support credit unions. The Prime Minister has been supportive of them and we look forward to seeing what more we can do to support them over the coming months.

[Mr Dennis Skinner (Bolsover) (Lab)]

If everybody has to share the burden of cutting the budget deficit, will the Chancellor start at the very top, and call upon the royal family to tell them that under no circumstances will they get a single penny of the £7 million increase that they are demanding in the civil list?