Budget Resolutions and Economic Situation

Douglas Chapman Excerpts

Tuesday 21st March 2023 Commons Chamber

[Douglas Chapman (Dunfermline and West Fife) (SNP)]

“Growth” is fast becoming a word with no meaning in relation to our economy, thanks to the ever-increasing financial and fiscal fiascos racked up by this UK Government. Just as the Chancellor delivered his Budget last week, the OECD announced that Britain will be the only economy to contract this year. It will be an outlier, the worst performer among the wealthiest countries. Is this the good news the Chancellor wanted from his four E’s mantra of “enterprise, education, employment and everywhere”? You can fool some of the people some of the time, but you cannot fool all of the people all of the time.

Hard-working families and individuals cannot make it to their next pay cheque without visiting the multitude of food banks that have popped up throughout the country after 13 years of Tory austerity and mis-management. Levelling up is yet another misleading and meaningless mantra to add to the list.

The Chancellor has admitted that there are quite a few other E’s, and these need to be examined more closely if we are to find the truth of this Budget. One of them is “eating,” because extraordinary levels of inflation have pushed grocery bills well above record highs, affecting families’ ability to afford adequate food.

There is another E to add to this sorry tale of fiscal mismanagement, and that is for “extreme poverty.” It is not even five years since the UN special rapporteur on extreme poverty, Professor Philip Alston, described the “systematic immiseration” of the British people through Tory austerity, creating “workhouse” conditions for the working poor and the destitute.

What about that big E—“Europe”? The Resolution Foundation has pointed out that our household incomes are falling even further behind those of our European neighbours. Ours are a grand total of £4,000 less than those of our German counterparts, and we are a staggering £11,000 worse off thanks to Brexit and other pay cuts. The Resolution Foundation also reported that the wage stagnation we are experiencing in the UK is “unprecedented”. It says we have

“a toxic combination of low growth and high inequality”

and that that

“is what failure looks like.”

The E there would be the “epic failure” that has built up over these successive disastrous Tory Governments. That is not an E anybody would want to boast about. When a Government are failing on this scale, it is time to do some soul searching, but that can be done only if big truths are faced, however uncomfortable.

The truth is that Brexit remains the big E in the room; it is a continuing kamikaze catastrophe for citizens and businesses alike. It is hard to grow an economy when you have cut yourself off from your largest market, and other countries across the world seem none too fussed about partnering up with a splendidly isolated old Blighty.

To make matters worse, this Chancellor has thought it wise to slap a hefty tax burden on our biggest export—another E. I am referring to Scotch whisky, an export that was previously so badly wanted in the UK that the Union Jack was even stuck on all the packaging.

Finally, let me say that there is one E we can agree with the Chancellor on, and that is the “expression” he used during his Budget speech: “independence is far better than dependence”. That may have been the only true E muttered by a Tory Minister in the past 13 years, and the sooner that Scotland is independent, the better it will be for everyone.