National Insurance Contributions (Secondary Class 1 Contributions) Bill

Gavin Williamson Excerpts

Consideration of Lords amendments
Wednesday 19th March 2025 Commons Chamber

[James Murray]

I am very aware of the fact that we inherited an economy and a fiscal situation in a mess. That was completely unsustainable, and it was our duty as a Government to address it. No responsible Government could have let things carry on as they were, with the fiscal situation the way it was. That is why we took the action we did.

[Sir Gavin Williamson (Stone, Great Wyrley and Penkridge) (Con)]

Will the Minister give way?

[James Murray]

I will not, as I have already given way several times and must make progress.

We had to take those decisions to put the fiscal responsibility back at the heart of government, to return economic stability to the public finances, and to have the basis for the investment on which we can grow the economy and put more money in people’s pockets.

Lords amendments 1, 4, 5, 9 and 13 relate to the NHS and social care providers. The amendments seek to maintain the employer national insurance contribution rates and thresholds at their current level for NHS-commissioned services, including GPs, dentists, social care providers and pharmacists, as well as those providing hospice care. As Members of both Houses will know, as a result of the measures in this Bill and wider Budget measures, the NHS will receive an extra £22.6 billion over two years, helping to deliver an additional 40,000 elective appointments every week.

Primary care providers—general practice, dentistry, pharmacy and eye care—are important independent contractors that provide nearly £20 billion-worth of NHS services. Every year, the Government consult the general practice and pharmacy sectors.

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[James Murray]

The various organisations or services that I am talking about, whether GPs, pharmacies or organisations that provide social care, receive money from Government, and the way that those discussions take place is by considering pressures on the providers of those services in the round—that is the way the negotiations take place. Direct support for employer national insurance contributions obviously applies to central Government, local government and public corporations, which is much the same way that the previous Government approached things under the health and social care levy. Pressures on social care or GPs, as I have been outlining, are considered in the round in terms of their funding settlements, and as I said, the £880 million of new grant funding can be used to address a range of pressures facing adult social care.

[Sir Gavin Williamson]

The hon. Gentleman makes an interesting point, but let us look at children’s hospices, which will be down £4.9 million. Most funding for children’s hospices does not come from the Government; it comes from communities and from people supporting them. Can the Minister, at the Dispatch Box, assure children’s hospices such as Acorns in the west midlands that they will not be down the money that they will be losing through extra NI contributions, and that that £4.9 million will be replaced by the Government for children’s hospices?

[James Murray]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for mentioning hospices, and perhaps I may set out the Government’s position on hospices and some of today’s amendments. The Government recognise the vital role that hospices play in supporting people at the end of life, and their families, and they also recognise the range of cost pressures that the hospice sector has been facing over a number of years. We are supporting the hospice sector with a £100 million increase for adult and children’s hospices, to ensure that they have the best physical environment for care, and £26 million of revenue to support hospices for children and young people. The £100 million will go towards helping hospices to improve their buildings, equipment and accommodation, to ensure that patients continue to receive the best possible care.

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[James Murray]

The £100 million that the right hon. Gentleman alluded to is important funding to help hospices improve their buildings, equipment and accommodation, to ensure that patients receive the best care possible. As I said a few moments ago, there will be £26 million of revenue to support children and young people’s hospices. More widely, the Government provide for charities, including hospices, through the wider tax regime, which is among the most generous in the world. That included tax reliefs for charities and their donors worth just over £6 billion for the tax year to April 2024. Finally, as the right hon. Gentleman will know, all charities, including hospices that are set up as charities, can benefit from the employment allowance that the Bill more than doubles, from £5,000 to £10,500. That will benefit charities of all sizes, particularly the smallest.

[Sir Gavin Williamson]

The Minister knows that that is funding for one year, and mainly for buildings, as he has admitted. This will be a cost on hospices every single year going forward. It will be cumulative and mean that hospices have to ask their communities for more and more, just to give that basic help. Will he commit to funding children’s hospices by the £4.9 million that the Government are taking off them every year, or not—yes or no?

[James Murray]

The points I was making before I gave way to the right hon. Gentleman are recurrent features of the tax system. The support through the tax regime for charities and their donors, which was worth more than £6 billion in April 2024, is a feature of the system that happens every year. The increase in the employment allowance from £5,000 to £10,500, which will benefit hospices that are set up as charities, is a permanent change that we are making through the Bill.

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[Gareth Davies]

The problem with that intervention is that the chairman of GB Energy himself disagrees about the number of jobs that it will supposedly be creating. I have set out clearly some of the things that we would do differently, and the different choices we would make from the choices this Labour Government are making.

When we talk about small businesses, and about the impact of this national insurance tax increase on businesses as a whole, the Minister and other Labour Members incorrectly suggest that only the largest businesses will be forced to pay this jobs tax. As I have told them consistently in every debate we have had on this Bill, that is simply not the case. Village butchers, high street hair salons and community pharmacies are not what most people would regard as large businesses, yet businesses such as those will be hit. If the Government really want to ensure that our smallest businesses are exempt from at least part of this damaging tax, they should support the Lords amendments that are before us today.

[Sir Gavin Williamson]

We know that the Minister is having to defend the undefendable—he has got a certain Matt Hancock about him in how he does it with zeal. [Interruption.] Sorry, Madam Deputy Speaker. Does the shadow Minister agree that the people who are paying for these increases are taxpayers? They are people who are working hard. I was talking to a manufacturing business in my constituency that was going to give its employees a 4.5% pay increase, but can now only afford to give them a 2% increase. This money is coming out of the pockets of hard-working people.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)]

I remind hon. Members that language should be respectful at all times.

Finance Bill

Gavin Williamson Excerpts

Report stage
Monday 3rd March 2025 Commons Chamber

[Dave Doogan]

I will crack on with new clause 2, as it relates to the Government’s catastrophic management of the fiscal regime for Scotland’s oil and gas. In December, Norway’s sovereign wealth fund touched €1.7 trillion, but Scotland is no wealthier now in real terms than we were when North sea oil and gas was discovered in the 1970s. More than £400 billion has flowed from Scottish waters to the Treasury over the years, with very little coming back the other way. Rather than reverse that trend, the Labour party has chosen to accelerate it with an increase in the energy profits levy. The windfall tax was supposed to apply to the extraordinarily high profits from the high global oil price that preceded its introduction, but that level has long since gone. Through its changes to the EPL, the Labour party jeopardises investment and, in doing so, the future of our skilled offshore energy workforce and our ability to hit net zero.

Analysis from Offshore Energies UK shows that the increase to and extension of the EPL risk costing the economy £13 billion, which will in turn cost up to 35,000 jobs. The analysis also shows a reduction in viable capital investment offshore from £14.1 billion to £2.3 billion in the period 2025 to 2029 as a result of the changes that the Government are planning in the EPL. That loss of economic value impacts not only on the core sector itself but on the domestic onshore supply companies, many of which are in my constituency, and many of which will have a role to play in the just transition. That reflects a political choice by the Labour party to deprioritise investment in the decarbonisation agenda. Rather than allow a more valuable decarbonisation relief as the solitary positive by-product of its tax hike, Labour has ensured that there can be absolutely no silver lining to this policy cloud.

The simple truth is that the UK cannot meet the net zero targets or create green growth if the Labour party’s policies hack away at both investment and the domestic workforce that we need to deliver the energy transition. It is clear that the Labour party is abandoning Scotland’s existing energy sector, and putting at risk the just transition in the process. With those changes to the EPL, Labour will have created a worst-of-all-worlds scenario whereby it starves industry of investment, sacrifices the jobs that we need to deliver net zero, puts at risk our energy security, will not bring down energy bills, and harms the economy of Scotland, while failing to invest the money required to truly deliver the benefits that we all need to see from the just transition.

[Sir Gavin Williamson (Stone, Great Wyrley and Penkridge) (Con)]

Does the hon. Gentleman think that there is a real challenge in terms of the policies that the Government are encouraging? A much quicker retreat from the North sea will bring forward the decommissioning costs, which have not been taken into account by the Treasury and will add billions and billions of pounds in extra costs to the UK taxpayer.

[Dave Doogan]

The right hon. Gentleman is absolutely correct: wherever we look, the fiscal ambitions of the Labour Government on North sea oil and gas, or energy more generally, seem to be counterproductive. They are introducing a policy that anybody with a passing understanding of the industry realises will have precisely the opposite result of its stated aim, but the Government will not listen, much to my regret.

Analysis from OEUK shows that the oil and gas sector’s total tax yield will peak in 2026 under Labour’s increase in the EPL before declining, compared with the previous scenario, in which Treasury receipts continued to increase over the period. The analysis shows that while the expected tax take from UK oil and gas producers would increase in the very short term, ultimately it will result in a £12 billion net loss to tax receipts compared with the current regime. If the Labour party does not care about the jobs that the policy will cost, the harm it will do to the just transition or the damage to the economy of Scotland, surely Labour can accept that a tax increase that actually reduces the amount of tax received is, at best, counterproductive. That is why the SNP will support new clause 2 if it is pressed to a Division.

The SNP appreciates the many and varied reasons why parents choose to use private schools, but it is not fair or sustainable to treat private school fees differently from other discretionary spend for the purposes of VAT. The VAT exemption offered to private schools costs the UK taxpayer £1.6 billion annually—money that could be invested in other public services. However, the SNP also understands that for many parents whose children are enrolled in private schools the UK Government’s decision to remove that exemption will be extremely worrying.

The Scottish Government have sought to ensure that the distinctive nature of the Scottish education system is understood by the UK Government in this transition. In particular, the Scottish Government have raised concerns with the UK Government about the decision to include grant-aided special schools in the policy. In Scots law, they are not considered independent schools. In Scotland, there is a clear distinction in educational law between grant-aided special schools and independent schools, and the UK Government’s policy regrettably does not reflect that. I know the Minister studiously avoids almost everything that I say, but I hope that he heard that, and I would be very grateful if he could address it when he sums up.

On Scotch whisky, when the last Tory Government hiked whisky duty, the tax revenue raised from the industry fell by £300 million. That should have been a salutary lesson to any Government who came afterwards. The sensible option for both supporting Scotch whisky and Treasury receipts would have been to cut whisky duty. Instead, the Labour party is raising it again. On top of that, we now have a UK Government plan to grant a different definition of a single malt to English producers than that of Scottish single malts. The definition is entirely inconsistent with the global reputation of the quality of single malts, and seeks to tear up a well-established dictionary definition of a single malt while pulling the rug from underneath Scotch whisky producers. The Government must listen to warnings from the industry, the Scottish Government and those from across the political spectrum, and scrap the plans and duty hikes, which are an act of sabotage to Scotland’s world-class industry.

The industry already faces the risk of Trump tariffs, which cost over £600 million in exports the last time they were applied under his first presidential term. Rather than further damage from the UK Government, the industry needs support, starting with the reversal of the plans to hike duties still further. It is high time that Westminster finally listened to organisations such as the Scotch Whisky Association and stopped discriminating against Scotland’s national drink, which supports more than 40,000 jobs and delivers more than £7.1 billion to the London Treasury every year. The SNP will support new clause 8 if it is pressed.

I have spoken consistently about what is under debate in the Bill, but the wider context cannot be ignored. Labour has no cogent plan for reforming the economy. It seeks to reduce the deficit and not raise taxes, and it wants to stimulate growth with large investments. It is impossible to do all those things at once, and it is astonishing that the Government seem to persist with this wilful ignorance. A Government may increase spending to kick-start the economy and deliver growth and public services, but that requires tax increases and/or deficit spending, both of which the Labour Government are too scared to pursue because of their short-sighted election promises to abide by fiscal rules and not increase the highest-revenue sources. We are therefore stuck in the worst of all possible worlds, with insufficient growth—especially green growth—insufficient investment, a deficit causing a rising debt burden, and no way to increase revenue meaningfully. The UK Government are bizarrely persisting with gaslighting themselves in thinking that they are “fixing the foundations” and delivering growth. They are doing nothing of the sort, and if they stick with this Bill and the Budget on which it is predicated, they never will.

Finally, is it not astonishing that when farmers push back on agricultural property relief, family businesses push back on business property relief, pensioners push back on their winter fuel allowance, the Scotch whisky industry pushes back on duty hikes, the North sea oil and gas industry pushes back on the EPL, and when the Women Against State Pension Inequality Campaign pushes back, they are all told, “No. The situation is too bad. You’ve just got to suck it up,” but when the non-doms push back, they get swept right to the heart of the Treasury and the Chancellor, and they get whatever they want? That is the Labour Government.

Growing the UK Economy

Gavin Williamson Excerpts

Wednesday 29th January 2025 Commons Chamber

[Darren Jones]

My hon. Friend knows that I am not let out of the Treasury often, but when I am I will be delighted to visit. These are classic examples of how, by working together with private investors and local businesses to co-ordinate investment on road junctions, rail, housing developments or even football stadiums, we can get to a point where we can unlock economic growth for people and improve their communities. We are absolutely interested in looking at all those opportunities.

[Sir Gavin Williamson (Stone, Great Wyrley and Penkridge) (Con)]

What assessment has the Treasury made of whether the increase in employers’ national insurance contributions will increase or decrease business investment?

[Darren Jones]

The right hon. Member is inviting me to speculate on the OBR forecast, which will be presented to the House on 26 March.

Oral Answers to Questions

Gavin Williamson Excerpts

Tuesday 21st January 2025 Commons Chamber

[James Murray]

As I have set out, the UK CBAM will mitigate the risk of carbon leakage by placing a carbon price on some of the most emissions-intensive industrial goods imported into the UK, including in the iron and steel sector. The UK CBAM is designed for the UK context, and in some areas, its emissions scope is wider than the EU CBAM—in respect of indirect emissions, for instance. The first CBAM industry working group was held earlier this week, and I understand that a representative of the UK steel sector attended. I will make sure that my officials continue to engage with the industry sectors most affected, and I am very happy to discuss this further with my hon. Friend.

[Sir Gavin Williamson (Stone, Great Wyrley and Penkridge) (Con)]

Heavy industry, whether it is steel, ceramics or so many other areas, is totally dependent on low energy costs. The trajectory is that energy costs are rising, especially in industry, whether as a result of regulation or world markets. Many other countries are doing more to protect their heavy industries by making sure they can have low input costs for energy. What more can the Minister do to protect our heavy industry in the future?

[James Murray]

The No. 1 thing for industry and households is to bring down the cost of energy. That is why we are investing in renewable home-grown energy for the future, to make sure we have energy independence, energy security and, crucially, lower bills for those households and businesses.

UK-China Economic and Financial Dialogue

Gavin Williamson Excerpts

Tuesday 14th January 2025 Commons Chamber

[Rachel Reeves]

I will always stand up for Britain’s national and economic interest, which is why I am helping some of our best businesses to export around the world. That is what I did in China at the weekend, and it is what I will continue to do. I will always stand up for our economic interest.

[Sir Gavin Williamson (Stone, Great Wyrley and Penkridge) (Con)]

Has the Chancellor of the Exchequer spoken to the Governor of the Bank of England about what action needs to be taken to bring about stability in our bond markets?

[Rachel Reeves]

I regularly speak to the Governor of the Bank of England; indeed, he was with me on the delegation to China this weekend. We work closely together to ensure that the British economy remains competitive in global markets.

Farming and Inheritance Tax

Gavin Williamson Excerpts

Wednesday 4th December 2024 Commons Chamber

[Sir Gavin Williamson (Stone, Great Wyrley and Penkridge) (Con)]

The hon. Gentleman has made an important point, but analysis will show that over a 10-year period, 99% of the profit from the average 350-acre arable farm owned by a couple will go back towards paying inheritance tax. That does not leave enough money for them either to invest or to live. I wonder how the hon. Gentleman thinks they can deal with that.

[James Murray]

I have confidence in the way in which we have calibrated the policy. As I said to the right hon. Member for Salisbury (John Glen), it has balanced the need to retain significant, generous provision of inheritance tax relief for family farms with ensuring that, at the same time, we fix the public finances in the fairest way possible.

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[Jon Pearce]

No. The message from this Government is that we are committed to farming, and to making it profitable and sustainable. That has to be the message that we send out to those young farmers.

There is no doubt that farmers in my constituency have been struggling terribly for the past 14 years, working seven days a week, 12 hours a day, for very little reward. The last Government promised them the earth, but left them in the sheep dip. After all the Brexit promises, what they got was the Leader of the Opposition selling them out in trade deals with New Zealand and Australia. Boris Johnson promised farmers that subsidies would stay at 100%, but then the Government phased out the basic farm payment. The Opposition’s incompetence saw farmers miss out on £358 million that could have been in their back pockets when they desperately needed it, and then came Liz Truss. Her mini-Budget and all those unfunded tax cuts—a point that I will return to—crashed the economy, causing interest rates to rise and driving many farmers to the brink. Over 12,000 farmers and agricultural businesses were lost under the last Government, so we will not take any lectures from the Opposition about the farming industry.

[Sir Gavin Williamson]

The hon. Gentleman has 428 farms in his constituency. How many of those farmers will thank him for supporting the Government today?

[Jon Pearce]

I live in one of the rural villages and speak to the farmers in my villages all the time. The fact is that those farmers voted for me because they were so let down by the last Government.

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[Sir Gavin Williamson (Stone, Great Wyrley and Penkridge) (Con)]

Staffordshire is the largest dairy-producing county in the midlands and across the county we have 9,600 people working on farms. Four hundred and thirty-two of those farms are in my constituency, and they are an incredibly important part of the fabric of the area. So many of my constituents who listened to the Budget were genuinely shocked. They were shocked because they took it at face value when the Labour party said that there would not be any changes in inheritance tax for agricultural land. They listened and they believed.

I know—I always like to believe the very best of people—that the Ministers on the Front Bench from the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs would have fought for that position, but this policy was a diktat from the Treasury. In my experience, there is a tendency for the Treasury to do that to many Departments. That diktat has meant a change in position, and one that has a severe impact on many people’s lives. If there were a factory in Staffordshire employing 9,600 people and its future viability was in jeopardy, Ministers would be rallying to its support. Members across the House would be saying, “Let us do something to save these jobs and save these livelihoods.” But that is not the case here.

[Josh Fenton-Glynn]

Will the right hon. Member give way?

[Sir Gavin Williamson]

I will, of course, give the hon. Gentleman the opportunity to burnish his potential to be that Parliamentary Private Secretary in DEFRA that I know he is so desperate for on any occasion.

[Josh Fenton-Glynn]

Why is the right hon. Member so dismissive of DEFRA, which is a fine Department whose work those of us who believe in the countryside value? I wonder why he was not so loud when 875 agribusinesses in his region closed in the last 14 years.

[Sir Gavin Williamson]

All the while I have been a Member of Parliament, I have fought for my farmers, and I will continue to do so.

I invite the Minister for Food Security and Rural Affairs to the next Staffordshire agricultural show as my guest. I will happily take him around, and he can look for farmers who are in favour of the Government’s policy. He can talk to my farmers. There are 446 farmers in the Stafford constituency, which neighbours my own, who I imagine will have a very similar view to that of farmers in my constituency: that this policy will put them out of business. If I take the Minister around the Staffordshire agricultural show, he might meet some of the 351 farmers from the neighbouring Lichfield constituency. Let him see how many of them believe that his policy will help them to grow their businesses.

A family business, whether it is a farm or a manufacturing business, invests not just for five years but for a generation and more. The Government’s policy will drive large financial institutions to own much more of our land—not local farmers who are invested in the community and care about the villages and towns that serve them. This policy is already having an impact. Many businesses that supply farmers are already seeing a significant drop-off in orders, whether it is people who supply agricultural machinery, people who supply seed or many more. I urge the Minister, who I believe comes to this House with a good heart, to look at the wider impact that the policy will have on our countryside, and at how it can be changed and improved.

The Labour party says that it wants to capture the large landowners—the James Dysons. I have a great deal of confidence that such people will be able to find different arrangements that mean that their wealth will never be touched, but many small farmers, who have worked hard all their lives to build something that they can hand on to their children, will be impacted. I fear for them, and I urge the Government to put the dogma of party politics to one side and really think of the impact that the policy will have on the lives of so many farmers who are trying to do the right thing for this country and our countryside.

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[Sir John Hayes]

rose—

[Sir Gavin Williamson]

rose—

[Daniel Zeichner]

Opposition Members have had a lot of time to make their points. I am going to make mine. Would Conservative Members have been so interested during the last Parliament? I remember sitting on those Opposition Benches hour after hour on the rare occasions when there were rural debates. They had no interest then; suddenly now.

Oral Answers to Questions

Gavin Williamson Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd December 2024 Commons Chamber

[Rachel Reeves]

Stoke-on-Trent has a proud industrial history and some beautiful buildings. My hon. Friend makes an important point—I will raise it with colleagues at the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government. The £500 million boost to the affordable homes programme also allows up to 10% of that delivery to come from acquiring existing homes. Social landlords, including some local authorities, can bid for funding to bring empty homes back into use for social housing.

[Sir Gavin Williamson (Stone, Great Wyrley and Penkridge) (Con)]

Many of my constituents have benefited over many years from the right to buy their council homes and social housing, which has given them an important step on to the ladder to home ownership. The discounts in Staffordshire are going to be cut to £16,000. I do not doubt that the Chancellor, like me, wants to help as many people as possible on to the path to home ownership. Will she pledge to review that decision with regard to the impact it will have on so many people, and look at restoring that discount in future?

[Rachel Reeves]

As the right hon. Gentleman will know, home ownership fell under the previous Government. We are determined to turn that around and ensure that more people, particularly families, get on to the housing ladder. As he has confirmed, the right to buy discounts will continue, but in future every penny of that money will go back into building new social housing, so that more people can have a home of their own and a roof over their head.

Winter Fuel Payment

Gavin Williamson Excerpts

Tuesday 10th September 2024 Commons Chamber

[Chris Murray]

Sorry, I will not give way, I must make progress. Thirdly, we must look more broadly at all the challenges that older people face. Waiting lists are appallingly long. Older people in my constituency can wait 18 months for a hip replacement; others spend their life savings on private healthcare. I understand that people are concerned, but we do people no favours by pretending that tough choices do not exist. Delaying that decision only leads to tougher, less enviable choices ahead.

[Sir Gavin Williamson (Stone, Great Wyrley and Penkridge) (Con)]

rose—

[Chris Murray]

Let me make progress. If the House wants to understand tough choices, look no further than my home of Scotland. Despite having higher public spending and higher taxes than the rest of the UK, our pensioners face the longest waiting lists on record. Today, the SNP will oppose means-testing the winter fuel allowance in Westminster, while bringing in its means-testing in Scotland. That is not to clean up the mess that the Tories left them, but to clean up their own mismanagement of Scottish finances. We can do better.

In taking this step, we must recognise that the country has changed since the winter fuel allowance was introduced. Today, when I look around my constituency, I see that age is no longer the main factor in whether someone can afford to heat their home. It cannot be right that we continue to give the wealthiest pensioners £300 a year. As society changes, we must adjust. We do today’s pensioners a better service by targeting those who need help the most.

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[John Slinger]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. I say to him and his constituents that the Government are making every effort to ensure that vulnerable pensioners and pensioners who need pension credit receive it. We are sticking by the triple lock to make sure that pensioners are better off year on year, and I am glad and proud that we are doing so.

[Sir Gavin Williamson]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[John Slinger]

I will make some progress, if I may. I have already taken two interventions.

This Government are choosing to move on from the terrible choices of the previous Government. We are choosing a stable, strong economy that will benefit all of the people of this country—all demographics in all regions, the next generation and definitely pensioners.

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[Sir Gavin Williamson]

In Stone, Great Wyrley and Penkridge, over 19,600 pensioners are going to lose their winter fuel payments. Of course, so many of them are incredibly proud and do not want to apply for additional benefits, and so many will be just outside of being eligible. The decisions of this Government are condemning them to a cold and incredibly hard winter.

[Dr Hudson]

My right hon. Friend is exactly right that many people are too proud to claim these benefits, and that many people are just above the cut-off point. These people have been portrayed by some Labour Members as rich and able to deal with it, but that is not the case.

I am proud that our Conservative Government not only provided winter fuel payments, but extensively supported older people and the country through difficult times during the pandemic and the effects of the war in the Ukraine and, very importantly, that they honoured the Conservative triple lock, meaning that pensioners got the pension increases they deserve.

I am also proud that my party is continuing to defend older people, including through the compassionate Conservative motion that triggered this debate and vote, and that I was proud to sign. The economic decisions we make speak volumes about our values as a society and a country. How the Labour Government respond to this debate on winter fuel payments, and how they respond in the upcoming Budget, is their chance to show where their values truly lie. This Government need to confirm that, now and in the upcoming Budget, their need to save money will not come at the expense of older people and the financial support they need.

This Government really need to think again about their move to cut winter fuel payments, for the sake of the millions of older people who need them and for the implications it will have. If Labour chooses to continue with this heartless policy, my constituents and the constituents of Conservative colleagues can be assured that my party and I will continue to stand up for our pensioners and will maintain our call that the winter fuel payment cut be reversed.