Oral Answers to Questions

Edward Miliband Excerpts

Wednesday 25th January 2012 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for her question, and the point she makes is a good one. Burns night will be celebrated not just across Scotland but across the whole of the United Kingdom and in many parts of the world. When I hear the Scottish nationalists, who are so keen to leave the UK yet so anxious about having a referendum, I think that perhaps they should remember Burns’s words when he referred to the

“Wee, sleekit, cowrin, tim’rous beastie,

O, what a panic’s in thy breastie!”

[Edward Miliband (Doncaster North) (Lab)]

We are 18 months into the Prime Minister’s Government, and today’s figures show that our economy is not growing but is shrinking. What has gone wrong with his economic plan?

[The Prime Minister]

These are extremely difficult economic times and these are disappointing figures—although they are not unexpected, because the Office for Budget Responsibility forecast a small decline in gross domestic product at the end of last year. I will be frank with the right hon. Gentleman: they reflect three things. They reflect the overhang of the debt and the deficit that we have to deal with; they reflect the higher food and fuel prices that put a squeeze on household income towards the end of last year; and they also reflect the crisis in the eurozone that has frozen Europe’s economies. The forecasts for France, Germany, Spain and Italy for the end of last year forecast as great a decline, or in many cases a greater decline. This is the year when we have to take further action to get our economy moving, but the most important thing is to have a credible plan to get on top of the deficit, which has given us the lowest interest rates for more than 100 years.

[Edward Miliband]

People are fed up with the right hon. Gentleman’s excuses about what is happening in our economy. He blames the eurozone. Growth has been flatlining in our economy since well before the eurozone crisis—in fact, since his spending review in autumn 2010. And what has characterised the Government’s approach throughout this period? Total arrogance. In his first Budget the Chancellor painted a glowing picture of what his policies would deliver for our economy. He said that his policies would deliver

“a steady and sustained economic recovery, with…falling unemployment.”—[Official Report, 22 June 2010; Vol. 512, c. 168.]

We have a shrinking economy and the highest unemployment in 18 years. How bad do things have to get in our economy to shake the Prime Minister out of his complacency?

[The Prime Minister]

As usual, the right hon. Gentleman writes the question before he listens to the answer. I did not just say, “This is an issue of the eurozone.” It is an issue of debt and deficit; it is an issue of squeezed household incomes—issues that are affecting many other economies. He talks about what our policy is. We remember what his policy was: “No more boom and bust”. And yet he gave us the biggest boom and the biggest bust, which we are having to recover from. There is not one ounce of complacency; that is why we are cutting corporation tax, we scrapped Labour’s job tax, we have introduced the enterprise zones, we are investing record sums in apprenticeships—[Interruption.]

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[The Prime Minister]

We are doing all of these things, but the Labour party has only one answer, and that is to deal with a debt crisis by borrowing more and adding to debt. That is his answer. That would wreck our interest rates, wreck our economy and make things much worse.

[Edward Miliband]

The Prime Minister says that there is not one ounce of complacency, but he and his Chancellor are the byword for self-satisfied smug complacency, and that is the reality. He talks about borrowing; he is failing not just on unemployment, not just on growth, but on borrowing as well. Because of his failure on growth and unemployment, he is borrowing £158 billion more than he forecast. And now we know—he said unemployment would fall; it isn’t. He said our economy would grow; it hasn’t. He said, “We’re all in this together”; we’re not. When will this Prime Minister face up to the fact that it is his policies that are failing our country?

[The Prime Minister]

Our economy grew last year, but the right hon. Gentleman cannot find it in himself—[Interruption.] There are more people in work today than there were at the time of the last election. But we were given—[Interruption.]

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[The Prime Minister]

My right hon. Friend makes an important point. Of course the IMF managing director, Christine Lagarde, is in London today, and our message has been clear: there should be no question of committing further IMF funds until the eurozone itself has shown that it is comprehensively going to stand behind its own currency. In her speech in Germany last night Christine Lagarde made it absolutely clear that the IMF’s role is to support countries, not currency zones, and the Government support that position.

[Edward Miliband]

Last September the Prime Minister said about his flagship health Bill:

“we have the Royal College of GPs, the physicians, the nurses and people working in the health service supporting the changes we are making”.—[Official Report, 7 September 2011; Vol. 532, c. 352.]

Will he give the House an update on the support for his Bill from the medical profession?

[The Prime Minister]

I have certainly learned that when it comes to the NHS you should always expect a second opinion—or conceivably even a third opinion.

The point is this: there are thousands of GPs throughout the country who are not just supporting our reforms, but actually implementing our reforms. Let me give the right hon. Gentleman just one example of a supportive GP, who happens—[Interruption.]

--- Later in debate ---

[Edward Miliband]

How out of touch is the Prime Minister with what is happening in the NHS? Let me tell him what the medical profession is saying. The latest survey of the Royal College of General Practitioners says that 98% of GPs want the Bill withdrawn. The Royal College of Nursing has said:

“the turmoil of proceeding with these reforms is now greater than the turmoil of stopping them”.

In his famous listening exercise, the Prime Minister said:

“change—if it is to endure, to really work—should have the support of people who work in our NHS. We have to take our nurses and doctors with us.”

If he wants to hear the voice of doctors and nurses across our NHS, why does he not listen?

[The Prime Minister]

The right hon. Gentleman seems to be out of touch with what is happening in Doncaster. He asks what is happening in the NHS. Let me tell him what is happening in the NHS: 4,000 extra doctors since the election; 100,000 more patients treated since the election; in-patient and out-patient waiting times lower than they were at the election; and £7 billion of the £20 billion already saved. At the same time, we have got hospital-acquired infections at their lowest ever level. That is what is happening in the NHS, but if we listened to him, we would be cutting spending in the NHS and scrapping reforms of the NHS, and the NHS would be getting worse, not better.

[Edward Miliband]

I shall tell the Prime Minister what is happening in the NHS: waiting lists up, morale down. What does the majority-Conservative Select Committee on Health say about his reorganisation? It says that it will be a

“disruption and distraction that hinders the ability of organisations to”

release savings.

Let us be frank: this is a Bill that nobody wants. It is opposed by doctors, nurses and patients. Before the election the Prime Minister said, “No more top-down reorganisation.” Is it not time he kept at least one promise, put aside his pride and arrogance, and dropped this unnecessary and unwanted Bill?

[The Prime Minister]

I know that the Leader of the Opposition panics and backs down the first time a trade union says no, but this Government do not. Of course if you introduce choice, transparency and competition and say that the private and voluntary sectors should play a greater role you face a challenge, but that is what doing the right thing is sometimes all about. Let him remember what his party’s Health Secretary said about GP commissioning:

“That change will put power in the hands of local GPs to drive improvements in their area, so it should give more power to their elbow than they have at present. That is what I would like to see”.—[Official Report, 16 May 2006; Vol. 446, c. 861-62.]

What a shame they talk about it in government, but do not have the guts to face down opposition when they are in opposition.