Cost of Living Increases

Florence Eshalomi Excerpts

Tuesday 25th April 2023 Commons Chamber

[Tulip Siddiq (Hampstead and Kilburn) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House condemns successive Conservative Governments for their mismanagement of the economy over 13 years; regrets that this has resulted in the UK being the only G7 economy that is still smaller than before the pandemic, with squeezed wages and higher mortgage rates that have increased costs by £500 a month for some households; further regrets that successive Chancellors have made working people pay for the Government’s economic failure with 24 tax rises since 2019, creating the highest tax burden in 70 years, while refusing to abolish the non-domicile tax loophole; is extremely concerned about the impact on household budgets of an inflation rate of more than 10 per cent with food prices rising at their fastest rate in 45 years; therefore calls on the Government to ease the cost of living crisis by freezing council tax this year, paid for by an extended windfall tax on oil and gas company profits; further calls on the Government to cut business rates for small businesses and support energy intensive industries including food manufacturers with their energy bills to help bring down the cost of everyday items; and finally calls on the Government to adopt Labour’s economic mission to secure the highest sustained growth in the G7 with good jobs in every part of the country.

It astonishes me that the Conservatives are acting like the cost of living crisis is over and their economic plan is working. The Chancellor is proudly boasting that Britain is back. He has even said:

“The declinists are wrong and the optimists are right. We stick to the plan because the plan is working.”—[Official Report, 15 March 2023; Vol. 729, c. 847.]

What planet does the Chancellor live on? Does he understand the reality on the ground for all of our constituents? Does he understand that on the Prime Minister’s watch, our economy is weaker, with the UK forecast to have the worst growth in the G7 this year? Real wages are lower than they were 15 years ago, with families in the UK going into the cost of living crisis significantly poorer than those in comparable European countries. The price of everyday essentials has risen by an eye-watering £3,000 since 2020, and never before have people in this country paid so much money for so little value from their public services.

The disconnect between this Conservative fantasy and the experiences of ordinary people could not be wider. Decent, hard-working people across the country are being forced to cut back on the things that underpin a good life. Mr Deputy Speaker, I will explain what I mean by a good life: a meal out once in a while with close friends, the special annual family holiday that you look forward to all year round, and a decent home to call your own. Those are increasingly things of the past; instead, people are left worrying about how they are going to pay their household bills at the end of the month and their rocketing mortgage costs.

[Florence Eshalomi (Vauxhall) (Lab/Co-op)]

I thank my hon. Friend for opening her speech in such a powerful way. Does she agree that it is really worrying that we hear tales of parents going without a meal, just to make sure that their children are able to eat?

--- Later in debate ---

[Florence Eshalomi (Vauxhall) (Lab/Co-op)]

In terms of maths, no matter how far a number of my constituents try to make the pennies stretch, they are just not stretching enough. Families’ incomes continue to go down and costs continue to go up. That is the reality of the Tory Government. The cost of living crisis has been going on for some time, and it is important that we do not talk about it as something normal and something we should accept. Every day I see that with my constituents, who are so desperate with nowhere to go. We see it in our casework and our advice surgeries. Household incomes are being squeezed. To put that in context, food prices are going up 50% faster than elsewhere in the G7, putting Britain’s food inflation rate at a staggering 19.2%. That is not some abstract maths figure from economists; that is felt in people’s weekly shop. When people go to the supermarket, they find that the price of sugar is up by 42%, milk is up by a third, and pasta by a quarter. Those are basic food items that families need to survive. That is the maths they are struggling with when they struggle to pay for this cost of living crisis.

I want to highlight the impact of this crisis on young people, which far too often we forget. We talk about young people being the future, but a number of them are struggling to live day to day. They are struggling with zero-hours contracts. We see the claims about youth unemployment going down, but these young people are in insecure jobs—Deliveroo jobs. That is not aspiration. That is not what I want for young people in Vauxhall. I want them to have long-term careers, not insecure jobs, yet that is the reality behind the figures that Conservative Members keep citing.

I am proud to represent Vauxhall. On my visits to schools and youth centres I seebold and passionate-thinking young people, but a number of them feel that politics is not for them, does not speak to them, and that the economy is skewed against them. The sad reality is that they are right. Instead of the Government getting behind votes at 16, votes are being supressed next month with the introduction of voter ID. Why are the Government so scared of allowing young people to vote? Why?

Figures from Barnardo’s show that one in four young people now live in poverty, and sadly many more face going hungry. Yesterday, children from Stockwell Primary School visited Parliament, and they spoke to me about their worries and concerns. I recently co-chaired an event of the all-party group for London, with the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Sir Robert Neill). We hosted an event with a youth charity, London Youth, to hear directly from young people about what the cost of living crisis is doing to them. We heard how many of them are having to take on weekend jobs alongside their schoolwork, just to support their families who are struggling. We heard stories of young people stepping up to care for their younger siblings, because their parents are having to work more hours because childcare is extortionate. We heard about those young people’s abject lack of hope of being able to move and have secure roots because—guess what?—they cannot afford to buy.

I have spoken about the need for us to end section 20 notices, and the impact that the cost of living crisis is having on insecure housing. If we want our young people to have hope, be successful, and contribute to the economy, we need to support them by not abandoning them, and by not making them suffer through the cost of living crisis. We need to give those young people hope, and that will happen only with a Labour Government.