Oral Answers to Questions

Ellie Reeves Excerpts

Wednesday 25th November 2020 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend asks an excellent question, and we are developing a national bus strategy that will look at the needs and how to get more people to use our buses. In addition to championing green zero-carbon or low-carbon buses, we are providing £20 million for a rural mobility fund to support demand in rural areas.

[Ellie Reeves (Lewisham West and Penge) (Lab)]

Food bank use in my constituency has been increasing steadily as working families, including public sector key workers, struggle to make ends meet. Can the Prime Minister therefore tell us whether he thinks the median pay of teaching assistants of just under £14,000, and of nursing auxiliaries of £18,000, is enough to live on? I will ask him again: instead of delivering a public sector pay freeze later today, will he give those key workers a well-deserved pay rise?

[The Prime Minister]

The hon. Lady is right to value key workers and the amazing job that they do—particularly teachers and teaching assistants, who have done fantastic work in getting our kids back into school over the last few months and continue to do an amazing job. I am proud not just of the work we have done to increase public sector pay, with an inflation-busting package in July for the third year running, but of what we are doing to support the record increases in the living wage—delivered by a Conservative Government, invented by a Conservative Government. Conservative Governments can do these things because we understand how to run a strong economy.