Fiscal Responsibility and Fairness

Debate between Duncan Hames and Danny Alexander

Thursday 19th March 2015 Commons Chamber

[Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)]

I commend my right hon. Friend for the action he is taking in government to prevent tax dodging—not long ago it was relatively easy to take advice on that simply by watching the “Daily Politics”. Will he say how much extra revenue Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs has been able to collect as a result of action he has already taken to prevent tax dodging?

[Danny Alexander]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his question, which gives me the opportunity to pay tribute to the excellent people who work for HMRC. They work hard, day in, day out, on behalf of us all, to ensure that we bring in the revenue that is required, and that compliance procedures are in place to ensure that people cannot get away with dodging tax. As a result of the actions we have taken, more than £100 billion of revenue is being collected by the Exchequer that would not otherwise have been collected.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Duncan Hames and Danny Alexander

Tuesday 10th March 2015 Commons Chamber

[Danny Alexander]

As I said, we are consulting on that matter and have already taken considerable action to deal with intermediaries. I am sure that more will be said about the issue in due course.

[Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)]

Youth unemployment in my constituency has halved under this Government, and the Chief Secretary met some of the young people in new jobs at Anthony Best Dynamics in Bradford on Avon last year. Will he or the Chancellor accept an invitation to accompany me to one of the advanced manufacturing businesses in Chippenham which, with the support of the relevant Government programmes, can extend many more opportunities by creating jobs in 21st-century products in Chippenham?

[Danny Alexander]

I gladly accept the invitation, although time is limited. As my hon. Friend said, through visiting Anthony Best Dynamics I have seen precisely the benefits that apprenticeships can provide for young people wanting to get highly skilled jobs in the technology companies that are creating very high value added for the UK economy. The work that he has done in his constituency to promote businesses taking on apprentices is an example to the entire House.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Duncan Hames and Danny Alexander

Tuesday 2nd September 2014 Commons Chamber

[Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)]

The Treasury’s infrastructure fund is paying for increased transport capacity in enterprise zones, through roads and rail services, unlocking large new housing developments. Is the Chief Secretary prepared to use the fund also to pay for the internet and communications infrastructure that those homes and businesses will desperately need?

[Danny Alexander]

The support we are offering to enterprise zones includes access to high-speed broadband, and my hon. Friend will also know that a significant part of our infrastructure plan is precisely to invest in and ensure that high-speed broadband is available in the vast majority of homes in this country. That is certainly something we will turn our minds to again in the autumn statement.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Duncan Hames and Danny Alexander

Tuesday 28th January 2014 Commons Chamber

[Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)]

We know that the Chancellor is keen to cut high marginal rates of tax. Does he appreciate that an advantage of the further increase in the personal allowance for which the Liberal Democrats are calling is that it would almost entirely scrap the effective 30% marginal tax rate faced by those who are aged over 65 and whose incomes amount to no more than the national average?

[Danny Alexander]

May I first take this opportunity to congratulate my hon. Friend, and my hon. Friend the Member for East Dunbartonshire (Jo Swinson), on recently becoming parents? He is quite right to suggest that further increases in the personal allowance would benefit all parts of the population. The Chancellor will make announcements in the Budget in March and, as a party, we will be campaigning for further increases in the personal allowance, precisely to ensure that the benefits are spread as widely as possible.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Duncan Hames and Danny Alexander

Tuesday 10th December 2013 Commons Chamber

[Danny Alexander]

I know that the shadow Chancellor has made one change since last week. He has appointed a new special adviser on hand gestures: Greg Dyke. [Interruption.] That is the gesture the shadow Chancellor’s colleagues are making every time they hear him in this House of Commons. The fact is that the Liberal Democrats, as part of this coalition Government, are delivering a sustainable economic recovery. We are part of a Government who are delivering £700 for every single working person in this country and who are delivering a proactive approach in the European Union, including by ensuring that the integrity of the European treaties is maintained, and that is what this legal action is all about.

[Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)]

T4. I welcome the Chief Secretary to the Treasury’s ambitious plans for capital investment for a stronger economy that were set out last week. He will have heard me urging the Prime Minister to make up for the previous Government’s failure to rebuild Wiltshire college’s Chippenham campus. Could my right hon. Friend see his way clear to making that investment, so as to equip our young people with the skills that will enable them to get on in life?

[Danny Alexander]

I know how important that project is for the college that my hon. Friend mentions. I can confirm that the Skills Funding Agency has told the college that it is prepared to make grant funding available for the project, subject to some additional assurances being received. Those assurances are being sought this week, and the agency hopes to respond to the college by the end of this week.

Investing in Britain’s Future

Debate between Duncan Hames and Danny Alexander

Thursday 27th June 2013 Commons Chamber

[Danny Alexander]

Today I have announced the guarantee for the Mersey Gateway bridge, which is necessary to enable that project to go forward because of the private funding. That is a new announcement of a guarantee. We are setting out tens of billions of pounds of new investment in roads until 2020. I know that the hon. Lady in particular has argued in the past for longer-term certainty on funding for road projects to allow us to get better value for money for those investments. That is precisely what we will do.

[Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)]

This must be the most substantial and, dare I say, lengthy commitment to a stronger economy made by a Liberal in government from that Dispatch Box since Lloyd George. How much less could we have afforded to invest in our future had the Government not taken the decisions necessary to ensure that the interest rates at which we borrow are kept low?

[Danny Alexander]

My goodness! I am not sure quite how to respond to that one—I am blushing slightly, but I am grateful for the positive remarks from my hon. Friend. He makes a very important point. If we had not entered into the process of clearing up the economic mess left by the Labour party, we would not be able to invest any of this money at all.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Duncan Hames and Danny Alexander

Tuesday 12th March 2013 Commons Chamber

[Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)]

9. What recent assessment he has made of the effect of alcohol duty and fuel duty on the cost of living and household budgets.

[The Chief Secretary to the Treasury (Danny Alexander)]

As a result of Government actions on fuel duty, from April average pump prices will be 13p per litre lower than if we had implemented the previous Government’s plan to squeeze motorists, and will remain at least 10p per litre lower over the remainder of the Parliament, giving real help to millions of families and small businesses.

[Duncan Hames]

I certainly welcome the efforts that the coalition Government have already made, but with the price of fuel now once again nudging £1.50 per litre in some places, does my right hon. Friend recognise the anxiety that the continuing prospect of rises in fuel duty causes people in rural parts of Wiltshire, as much as in the highlands of Scotland, who find themselves with little alternative to running a car?

[Danny Alexander]

As my hon. Friend knows, as a fellow rural MP I fully understand the pressures he describes, which is why we have taken the action I set out in my previous answer. He will also know that the pressures on the public finances remain substantial. I would remind him and the House that 25 million working people in this country will see the largest ever increase in their income tax personal allowance, meaning that the income tax cuts delivered by this Government will amount to £50 a month from April.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Duncan Hames and Danny Alexander

Tuesday 6th November 2012 Commons Chamber

[Danny Alexander]

The Government are increasing taxes on the wealthiest in society and using that money for a number of things, including to put in place a new free child care entitlement for disadvantaged two-year-olds; to extend the child care entitlement of three and four-year-olds to 15 hours a week; and to reduce the income tax personal allowance, which benefits families in work. The hon. Lady should welcome rather than criticise those policies.

[Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)]

Some pensioners with capped draw-down and self-invested pension plans have seen their retirement income halve as a result of decisions by the Government Actuary’s Department. How would the Minister suggest those pensioners cope in retirement with such a sharp fall in access to what is, after all, their own money?

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Duncan Hames and Danny Alexander

Tuesday 10th May 2011 Commons Chamber

[Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)]

Given the Chancellor’s concern for the use of taxpayers’ money, will he really allow members of GP consortia boards to be paid as much as £30,000 a year for just one day’s work a week?

[Danny Alexander]

As I said in response to my hon. Friend the Member for Southport (John Pugh), one of the things we need to do as part of the listening exercise is hear the concerns about how consortia will work and ensure that the financial regime that is in place is sustainable and puts the maximum amount of resource to the front line.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Duncan Hames and Danny Alexander

Tuesday 21st December 2010 Commons Chamber

[Danny Alexander]

I am certainly not going to let the hon. Gentleman know of my intentions in advance, but it is characteristic of the attitude on his side of the House that Opposition Members do not have a single question to ask that offers a proposal for dealing with the economic problems that they caused. It is economic common sense on the Government side of the House; just nonsense on the Opposition side.

[Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)]

Many jobs today require a university degree, yet compared with the position on funding employees’ vocational training, there is no equivalent tax shield for employer contributions to higher education. Will the Chancellor explore changes to tax rules to encourage voluntary contributions from employers towards their graduate recruits’ higher education?

Public Spending

Debate between Duncan Hames and Danny Alexander

Thursday 17th June 2010 Commons Chamber

[Danny Alexander]

I will say two things to the hon. Gentleman. First, his point about PFI is not within the scope of this statement. However, in the context of the spending review, we will have to look at every single way in which public money is spent—including the operation of PFI—to ensure that we are getting value for money and not spending taxpayers’ money unnecessarily when the spending settlement is going to be so tight.

The hon. Gentleman will see, when he reads the statement in the Library, that the search-and-rescue helicopter replacement is one of projects whose cost-effectiveness will be reviewed by the Ministry of Defence and the Department for Transport. Obviously, they will produce their report as and when that process has been completed.

[Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)]

In the light of the Chief Secretary to the Treasury’s statement and of the fact that this will be a fixed-term Parliament, will he introduce constraints to prevent a similar spending spree in the run-up to the next general election?

[Danny Alexander]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his question, and I understand the motivation behind it. Given the scale of the challenge that we face in the form of the enormous structural deficit and the need to bring down that deficit further and faster than the previous Government proposed, I suspect that that task will consume all our time in the Treasury over the next five years, without having to worry about the question that he has raised.