Oral Answers to Questions

Edward Miliband Excerpts

Wednesday 16th October 2013 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I commend my right hon. Friend for raising the issue. I think the plain fact is that what has happened has damaged national security, and in many ways The Guardian itself admitted that when, having been asked politely by my national security adviser and Cabinet Secretary to destroy the files that it had, it went ahead and destroyed those files. It knows that what it is dealing with is dangerous for national security. I think that it is up to Select Committees in the House to examine the issue if they wish to do so, and to make further recommendations.

[Edward Miliband (Doncaster North) (Lab)]

I join the Prime Minister in sending warmest congratulations to the England team on its victory last night and on getting to the World cup finals next summer, and I add my commiserations to Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.

Today’s economic figures show a welcome fall in unemployment. They also show that prices have risen faster than wages, and that is 39 out of 40 months that living standards have fallen since he became Prime Minister. Will he confirm what everybody knows: that there is a cost of living crisis in this country?

[The Prime Minister]

First of all, let me welcome the right hon. Gentleman’s welcome for the unemployment figures. Not everyone in the House will have been able to study them, but it is good news. The number in work is up 155,000, unemployment is down 18,000, women’s unemployment is down, youth unemployment is down, long-term unemployment is down and vacancies are up, and crucially the fall in the claimant count is 41,000 this month alone. That is the fastest fall in the number of people claiming unemployment benefit since February 1997. These are welcome figures. Of course we all want to see living standards improve, and last year disposable income increased, but the way to deliver on living standards is to grow the economy, keep producing the jobs and cut people’s taxes.

[Edward Miliband]

There are almost 1 million young people still out of work and record numbers of people working part-time who cannot find full-time work. That is no cause for complacency from this Government, and I think the British people will be very surprised to hear the Prime Minister telling them that their living standards are rising when they know the truth: under him, living standards are falling month upon month upon month. There is a cost of living crisis, and one of the reasons is rising energy bills, which one leading charity reports today is one of the things driving people to food banks. In the light of that, does the Prime Minister think that the energy company SSE’s decision to raise its customers’ energy bills by 8.2% is justified?

[The Prime Minister]

Let me come back to the right hon. Gentleman on the youth unemployment figures which he mentions, because the youth claimant count—the number of young people claiming unemployment benefit—is down 79,000 since the election. There is absolutely no complacency—we need more young people in work, we need more jobs—but one of the remarkable things about today’s figures is that they show for the first time that there are 1 million more people in work than there were when this Government came into office.

Let me remind the right hon. Gentleman of something he predicted. In October 2010 he said this—[Interruption.] I think people will want to listen to this. He said the Government clearly

“have a programme which will lead to the disappearance of a million…jobs.”

That was his prediction. He was 100% wrong, and he should apologise to this House of Commons. Of course we all want to see energy prices come down. That is why we are putting people on the lowest tariff, but the one thing that will not work is a price con, and that is what he is recommending.

[Edward Miliband]

The person who should be apologising is this Prime Minister, for the cost of living crisis facing millions of families. Let us talk about SSE. It says on its website—and I quote—that it has just one strategic priority and it calls it its “dividend obsession”: it is not to get bills down; it is not to be on the side of the consumer. So it is make-up-your-mind time for the Prime Minister. Whose side is he on: the energy companies’ or the consumers’?

[The Prime Minister]

We are on the side of hard-working families, which is why we have cut income tax for 25 million people, why we have frozen the council tax, why we have lifted 2 million people out of tax. Let me make this simple point about living standards: if we want to help with living standards, the best way to do that is to cut people’s taxes. Now, we can only cut taxes if we cut spending. The right hon. Gentleman has opposed every single spending cut that we have proposed; even now he still wants to spend more money. That is the truth: more spending, more borrowing, more debt. It is the same old Labour.

[Edward Miliband]

Is it not striking that the one thing the Prime Minister does not want to talk about is energy prices? He cannot talk about that because he has no answer. Let us have an answer on the energy price freeze. Can he confirm that in opposing the freeze he has on his side the big six energy companies, and in supporting a freeze we have on our side consumer bodies such as Which? and small energy producers such as Co-op Energy and the vast majority of the British people?

[The Prime Minister]

If an energy price freeze was such a great idea, why did the right hon. Gentleman not introduce it when he stood at this Dispatch Box as Energy Secretary? The fact is that it is not a price freeze; it is a price con. He is not in control of worldwide gas prices, which is why he had to admit the next day that he could not keep his promise—that is the truth. The reason why he does not want to talk about the economy is because he has not got a credible economic policy. He cannot explain why the deficit is falling, the economy is growing and unemployment is coming down. I have to say to him that given that his problem is having no credible economic policy, he does not help himself by having a totally incredible energy policy.

[Edward Miliband]

I thought that the right hon. Gentleman might get to the record of the last Government, because his Government have found a new tactic; they have been floundering all over the place and they blame the last Government and green levies. Let us talk about green levies, because who said, “Vote blue, go green”? I think it was this Prime Minister. Who said, as Leader of the Opposition:

“I think green taxes as a whole need to go up”?

It was him. He has been talking about my record as Energy Secretary, so I looked back at the record on the Energy Bill of 2010. Did he oppose that Bill? No, he supported it. You could say, Mr Speaker, that it was two parties working together in the national interest. Does he not feel faintly embarrassed that in five short years he has gone from hug a husky to gas a badger?

[The Prime Minister]

Oh dear! The only embarrassing thing is this tortured performance.

The right hon. Gentleman wants to talk about the record of the last Labour Government. Let me remind him, on the cost of living, that they doubled the council tax; they doubled the gas bills; they put up electricity bills by half; they put up petrol tax 12 times; they increased the basic state pension by a measly 75p; and then when it came to the low-paid, they got rid of the 10p income tax band altogether. Labour has absolutely no economic policy, and that is why the former Chancellor, the right hon. Member for Edinburgh South West (Mr Darling), said on 9 September:

“I’m waiting to hear what we’ve got to say on the economy”.

We have all been waiting, but I think we should give up waiting because they are a hopeless Opposition.

[Edward Miliband]

I will tell the right hon. Gentleman what happened, because he talks about the last Labour Government: living standards went up by £3,700 over the 13 years of the last Labour Government; living standards are down by £1,500 under him. This is the reality of Britain under this Prime Minister: food bank use on the rise; energy bills soaring; even if you are in work, you are worse off; and a Prime Minister in total denial about the cost of living crisis facing millions of families.