Oral Answers to Questions
Gavin Williamson Excerpts(13 years, 9 months ago)
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Mr Hoban
The hon. Lady will be aware that the financial inclusion fund, which was set up by the previous Government, was coming to a close at the end of March. Other sources of debt advice are available. For example, the Consumer Credit Counselling Service is an effective provider of advice, while the Money Advice Trust provides advice over the phone. There are sources of advice out there, but as I said in response to a question from the hon. Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Steve McCabe), the Consumer Finance Education Body, which was set up by the previous Government and which we proposed, will reach out to the most vulnerable people in society to ensure that they get access to high-quality advice.
Gavin Williamson (South Staffordshire) (Con)
T8. Will my right hon. Friend join me in welcoming the decision by Moog Aircraft, which is based in my constituency, to invest millions of pounds in a new site to replace its old factory, securing 400 jobs in South Staffordshire? After 13 years of Labour’s decline in manufacturing, is this not a further sign that we are now seeing a manufacturing recovery?
Mr Osborne
My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. I join him in congratulating the company on its announcement. Under the last Labour Government the share of the economy taken by manufacturing halved; under this Government we are seeing a manufacturing revival.
National Insurance Contributions Bill
Gavin Williamson Excerpts(13 years, 10 months ago)
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Mr Gauke
We come back to the central point that we are acting on a regional basis rather than trying to break down the figures for wards, constituencies or boroughs because of the nature of the labour market and people travelling to work. I concede that several hon. Members will not accept that, but it is the right approach given the nature of the labour market.
Gavin Williamson (South Staffordshire) (Con)
Seventy per cent. of my constituents travel out of the constituency to work in neighbouring boroughs—in Wolverhampton, Dudley and Stourbridge. It is more typical for the benefits to come to those boroughs than to South Staffordshire, but people throughout the region will benefit.
Stephen Timms
My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. I also agree with the hon. Member for High Peak (Andrew Bingham) about the importance of high-speed broadband for bringing about this kind of change. Of course, at the moment we do not know which Department in Government is responsible for broadband—we were attempting to clarify that earlier.
In his speech on 4 November, the Prime Minister went on to spell out how his vision could be achieved. He said that experience
“teaches government some simple things. Go with the grain of what is already there. Don’t interfere so much that you smother. But do help out wherever you can. Help to create the right framework, so it’s easier for new companies to start up, for venture capital firms to invest, for innovations to flourish, for businesses to grow.”
That is what the Prime Minister has said he wants to happen in the east end tech city initiative.
Gavin Williamson
Does the right hon. Gentleman feel a sense of responsibility, as a former Minister, for the 11,000 pages of tax code which, every single day and every single year, stifles new businesses in setting up? Does he accept a responsibility for that stifling of innovation and industry?
Stephen Timms
I take a good deal of satisfaction from the progress that we saw with the development of high-tech business spin-outs from universities under the aegis of the previous Government. That was one of their very significant achievements.
Gavin Williamson
Do you not accept that the 11,000 pages of tax code, which doubled under the last Labour Government, is stifling British industry, and that that is partly your responsibility and your party’s responsibility?
Stephen Timms
I do not think that it is the Deputy Speaker’s responsibility.
Savings Accounts and Health in Pregnancy Grant Bill
Gavin Williamson Excerpts(14 years, 1 month ago)
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Alex Cunningham
I think that the point that the hon. Member for North East Somerset (Jacob Rees-Mogg) made was that perhaps families such as his do not need that sort of income. If he wants to forgo it, that is all well and good, but there are hard-working families in my community that need that money.
Let us add to all that the impact of the 27% cuts on local authorities and the effect that will have on services, including initiatives such as breakfast clubs, and again we see the family under attack. In the north-east, we already know that family dependency on benefits will grow, with some 43,000 public and private sector jobs lost over the next few years. People will see few jobs for them to chase as unemployment undoubtedly soars.
Today, the Government attack again. I object to the scrapping of both the child trust fund and the saving gateway and I believe the Government are making a big mistake by getting rid of them.
Gavin Williamson
The hon. Gentleman strikes me as a very enlightened individual, and I am sure that he is very aware that every Government have to make difficult choices. If he were to keep these areas of expenditure going to fund the benefit, what areas of Government expenditure would he cut?
Alex Cunningham
Personally, I would raise taxes in order to ensure that we could maintain this provision, and the bankers are a good place for us to start.
Alex Cunningham
No, I will not.
Both the child trust fund and the saving gateway were Labour initiatives, put in place by a party that understands the importance of fostering a culture of saving. Asset-based welfare can make a huge difference to the opportunities of the least well off in this country who often do not have access to the resources that many others are lucky enough to have, whether through inheritance or the generosity of family or because they recognise the importance of saving a little of their salary each and every month for a rainy day. The saving gateway aimed to encourage those from low-income households who do not save, for whatever reason, by promising the incentive of a Government contribution of 50p for every pound saved over the two-year life of the account. It had been trialled, and was due to be rolled out across the country in July.
We will not see the difference that the saving gateway would have made to thousands of low-income families at the relatively tiny cost to the Government of £100 million a year. The response to the trials was largely positive—one pilot saw the number of people saving rise from 16% to nearly 80%. In total, more than 22,000 people took part in two successful pilots, achieving more than £15 million in savings. Those people demonstrated that the scheme could generate both new savers and new saving, because individuals continued to save beyond the end of their gateway accounts.
Encouraging people to save promotes self-reliance and stability, allows long-term planning and provides security from sudden financial shocks. Saving just a few pounds a month makes a person feel in greater control of their life, and it can be transformative and provide a psychological boost. The difference that that can make to families and their quality of life should not be underestimated.
Alex Cunningham
I have never had a problem with taxing the rich a little bit more. If that means a penny on income tax, I would be fine with it, although I do not know what encouragement I would get from my Front Benchers.
Alex Cunningham
No, I will not. We need to raise taxes and target the results at the poorest people.
I hoped that the saving gateway would squeeze some of the doorstep lenders out of low-income communities, which is an issue close to my heart. Those companies charge outrageous interest rates, and if people had some money saved for a rainy day, such monsters would see their customer base shrink.
I also want to speak out in defence of the child trust fund, which acts as an incentive to save by adding to a Government contribution of either £250 or £500 at birth depending on a family’s income. The child trust fund was well established, having been introduced for all children born since September 2002. At a cost of around £500 million a year, including additional contributions when a child reaches the age of seven, this universal yet progressive fund ensures that all children, regardless of their family income, have a pot of money that they can access at the age of 18.
According to the Save Child Savings alliance, some industry data suggest that the child trust fund has seen the number of people saving for their children’s futures almost treble. More than £2 billion is currently being held in child trust funds. That form of asset welfare opens doors to young adults, particularly those from low-income families. No young person has yet benefited from this fund—the first recipients are just eight years old today—but I would have hoped that when they can start accessing it in 10 years’ time, that money would go some way to improving social mobility, which is an issue that some hon. Members highlighted earlier.
A policy that spreads wealth to the asset poor should be backed by anyone who is dismayed by the lack of social mobility in the UK today. Yes, education plays a major role in tackling that problem, but so do assets, which is something that the Liberal Democrats have failed to address in recent years. The Deputy Prime Minister spent some of the summer discussing the Government’s programme for social mobility, but this measure goes against it. The child trust fund was one way in which the previous Labour Government hoped to tackle this issue, and scrapping it will be a step backwards.
At a time when the coalition proposes to increase university tuition fees, I would have thought it wise to defend child trust funds as one way in which young people could choose to shoulder at least a tiny bit of the burden of those costs. Even if they do not go to university, any funds available to 18-year-olds must give them a better start in life, which the better-off take entirely for granted. It may only help to fund their driving lessons, but that will give them the mobility and employability which would otherwise be denied.
Instead, having promised huge and unnecessary cuts over the next four years, the Government must cancel valuable programmes that are relatively inexpensive. Scrapping the child trust fund is a decision made with an eye on the short-term political goal of cutting the deficit, not the long-term responsible goal of encouraging families to save for their children’s future. The age group facing the most debt is 16 to 34-year-olds. Surely a responsible Government should be seriously considering measures to help the next generation of young people, particularly given that university fees are set to rise to eye-wateringly high levels.
The Government are intent on pressing ahead with these family cuts, but when will the Minister tell us how the plans to fund and retain the infrastructure of the fund, to enable contributions to be restarted when the economic position improves, will work? I am told by the Save Child Savings alliance that it would cost £2 million a year to do so—a very small fraction of the total overall cost. There is an alternative to these draconian cuts, despite what the coalition says. Labour would deal with the deficit by halving it over four years. Yes, there would still be cuts, but we could cut carefully and always with an eye on the human impact. I am not confident that I can say the same about the coalition.
Comprehensive Spending Review
Gavin Williamson Excerpts(14 years, 1 month ago)
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Mr Osborne
The hon. Gentleman, who is a member of the Treasury Committee, knows that the budget deficit was threatening the economic stability of the country. He also knows that his party proposed to eliminate the structural deficit over a slightly longer period than we propose. That, however, would not have reduced the scale of the cuts; it would merely have prolonged them. A structural deficit is a deficit that does not return when the economy grows. That is the definition of a structural deficit.
We are investing in road projects, and in housing projects: we are providing 150,000 new homes. The hon. Gentleman probably has not had time to study the document, but the capital cuts that have been set out today are less than the capital cuts in the March Budget presented by the Labour party.
Gavin Williamson (South Staffordshire) (Con)
Will my right hon. Friend assure the House that, unlike the Labour party, which abandoned Prudence after two years of government and pursued the policies of economic recklessness, he will continue to hold Prudence close to his heart to ensure that we have long-term stability and growth?
Mr Osborne
I can assure my hon. Friend that I am planning a long-term relationship with Prudence.
Equitable Life (Payments) Bill
Gavin Williamson Excerpts(14 years, 2 months ago)
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Nia Griffith
What is important now is to move on and get those payments made. The worry is that these smokescreens are putting people off, and the policyholders will not see any money at all. They want to see actual payments.
The policyholders are also worried about tax and benefit loss. I am pleased to see clause 1(3) in the Bill, but it is far too loosely worded. It gives the Treasury the power to disregard payments to Equitable Life victims when assessing their tax liability or their entitlement to means-tested benefits, but I would like to see a much more strongly worded provision, as well as a genuine awareness among Ministers that any payment will be disregarded.
Nia Griffith
I would like to continue for a moment, because I want to explain what I have understood from the speech made by the Financial Secretary to the Treasury today.
I was perturbed by what the Minister said. Far from giving any assurance that there would be a disregard for tax and benefit purposes, he said that the Department for Work and Pensions would sort these matters out in the usual way. That will set alarm bells ringing, as anyone who has lost benefit, pound for pound, as a result of receiving a payout will confirm. Equitable Life victims, having waited all these years, could end up receiving their payment only to lose the equivalent amount in benefits or additional tax. We need assurances from Treasury and DWP Ministers alike that insult will not be added to injury in that way.
Gavin Williamson
It is incredibly interesting listening to the hon. Lady’s speech, but surely she ought to hang her head in shame at the actions of the Labour Government, who continually betrayed Equitable Life policyholders. Will she apologise for the Labour Government’s failure to act?
Nia Griffith
If the hon. Gentleman had been here under the previous Government, and been a regular attender at business questions, he would have known that the timetable for the Equitable Life programme was raised again and again. I can assure him that I made many representations to our Ministers to ask them to speed up the process. It was a complex process and there were enormous difficulties; there was also an enormous amount to read. That is why it took the ombudsman so long to produce the report in the first place. I can assure the hon. Gentleman that an enormous amount of good work was done, and that we would not be where we are now if we had not put in that work before the general election.
We need assurances from the Treasury and the DWP that people will not lose out in the way that I have described. People are worried because the suggestion of a cap is being bandied about, and because the figures might be cut again in the comprehensive spending review. If they were then to lose money through a clawback of tax or benefits, it would be an absolute disgrace. It would also affect the most vulnerable people in particular.
Another worry about the Bill is that it contains no mention of a proper appeals mechanism. The Minister made a few encouraging remarks about appeals, but there are no details in the Bill. I call on him to consult policyholders about that mechanism, and to publish the relevant details as soon as possible. We want to see the settlements made as soon as possible, but we also want to see an appeals mechanism that can hear appeals quickly and fairly. The last thing we want is for Equitable Life victims, who have already waited far too long, to have to wait in a queue for their appeal to be heard.
Amendments have been proposed by those on our Front Bench, including my right hon. Friend the Member for East Ham (Stephen Timms). One relates to timing, which is crucial. We must have a specific start date so that we know when the victims are going to get their proper payments. We also need a scheme that will be totally independent of the Government. There is also an amendment that provides for hon. Members to vote on the scheme, to ensure that it is swift, simple, transparent and fair. That is vital if we are to have the trust of the public that this is a genuinely fair scheme, not one that has been cooked up in a back room and that will be cut and cut again in order to meet some overriding demand from the Chancellor. I look forward to debating the Bill more thoroughly in Committee. I very much hope that we will have the opportunity to table our amendments, and that they will be well supported by hon. Members on both sides.
Finance Bill
Gavin Williamson Excerpts(14 years, 4 months ago)
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Mr Umunna
I wish to make a bit of progress, but I might give way in a bit.
I wish to acknowledge that the Conservative side of the happy couple that is our coalition is at least consistent in its approach. The Conservatives fail to acknowledge the gravity of the financial crisis and its effect on our economy now and they failed to acknowledge the gravity of the crisis back in the autumn of 2008 when the Labour Government and others around the world took decisive action to save the financial services sector from itself and to protect the deposits of our constituents. The current Prime Minister and his Chancellor were then advocating the complete opposite—a do-nothing approach.
Let us be clear. Whatever those on the Government Benches say, no serious economist currently claims that the deficit can be disassociated from the global credit crunch I have just described. The credit crunch led the last Government to spend billions to prop up the financial services sector and to support our economy in the face of a global economic downturn that caused tax receipts to plummet and benefit payments to increase.
Mr Umunna
No I will not; I will make some progress first, and I will give way in a bit.
What we are witnessing now is a gross and distorted rewriting of history and repainting of the picture to justify the imposition of a Finance Bill and Budget that are less about economics and all about politics.
On 23 June, in an insightful piece in the Conservative house journal, The Spectator, its political editor described the Chancellor’s Budget thus:
“The mission, as Mr Osborne sees it, is to shrink the public sector and grow the private sector—the classic goal of the modern British centre-right.”
That is what the measures in the Bill and the emergency Budget are all about.
Let us address the Chief Secretary to the Treasury’s claims that the Bill is fair. He said:
“This is a Budget that protects the most vulnerable, especially children in poverty and pensioners, while ensuring that those with the broadest shoulders take the greatest share of the burden.”—[Official Report, 6 July 2010; Vol. 513, c. 203.]
Just a few weeks ago, a Liberal Democrat leaflet was pushed through thousands of letterboxes in my constituency under the headline, “Clegg delivers on promises”, proclaiming that the Government are reducing the deficit in as fair a way as possible. It made a series of claims in relation to the Bill and the emergency Budget. First, it claimed that there will be “more money for schools”. We have seen now how accurate that claim was: consider the Building Schools for the Future debacle that we have witnessed over the past few weeks.
Secondly, the leaflet claimed that
“tax credits for needy households”
will be
“saved”,
yet the emergency Budget, in fact, freezes child benefit, thus producing a real-terms cut for more than 14,000 in my constituency who receive the payment. Thirdly, it claimed that the emergency Budget included
“a tax cut for low and middle income families by raising tax allowances”.
That neglects to mention that the increased allowances are completely outweighed by the panoply of regressive measures in the Budget—most notably, the unfair VAT rise that will be introduced under clause 3.
During the general election campaign, my Liberal Democrat counterpart and I spoke at an international Save the Children event in my constituency and we both talked of the need to reduce child poverty. Save the Children is running an excellent campaign in opposition to the VAT hike—a hike that the Liberal Democrats now sanction. I note that there is but one Liberal Democrat Member, I think, in the Chamber at present.
Mr Umunna
Okay; three.
The charity said:
“A 20% VAT rate means that the poorest parents will see their VAT bill rise to at least £1,600 a year—affecting already overstretched budgets—and driving some into the arms of loan sharks”,
as my hon. Friend the Member for Wakefield (Mary Creagh) has just mentioned.
The fourth and final claim in the Liberal Democrat leaflet is that they stopped
“Tory plans for a huge Inheritance Tax give-away for the wealthy.”
Even if we accept that claim—I do not—the omission of that giveaway from the Bill pales in comparison with the appallingly regressive overall impact of the Budget, which the Institute for Fiscal Studies and others have looked into. It has calculated that the total effect of the tax rises and spending cuts will cost the average family in the top income decile £1,135 a year. It will cost the average family in the bottom income decile £1,344—£209 more in real terms. The poorest will be 20.5% worse off, and the richest will be 1.6% worse off. So when it comes to social justice, the Government have absolutely nothing to boast about.
The suggestion made in the leaflet that those who are on low incomes should rejoice at the fairness of a Budget that places a larger real-terms burden on the poorest than the richest is an utter disgrace. What is even more disgraceful is the fact that the measures in the Bill and the emergency Budget were a choice. Whatever rewriting of history the coalition indulges in, it cannot distract us from a simple fact: the coalition Government have actively chosen to do this to my community.
Gavin Williamson
Does the hon. Gentleman not feel that the last Labour Government had any responsibility for the economic situation that we find ourselves in and that the uncontrolled borrowing had an impact and led to the decisions that are encompassed by the Bill?
Mr Umunna
I will turn to those exact points in the rest of my speech if the hon. Gentleman will wait.
Let me address the claim that the Bill will, as the Chief Secretary said, help
“businesses that we rely on to rebuild our broken economy”.—[Official Report, 28 June 2010; Vol. 512, c. 674.]
The signs are that those businesses, along with leading economic experts, do not share his optimism. A recent survey of the service sector by the Chartered Institute of Purchasing and Supply showed that confidence in the sector has been dented by the austerity measures announced in the Budget, of which, of course, the Bill is a part. The survey registered a fall in confidence between May and June this year that was the most significant drop since records began 14 years ago. Since the First Reading of the Bill, the International Monetary Fund has updated its 2011 growth forecasts, downgrading that of the UK by 0.4% on its April figures—the largest drop in the forecast of any major economy over that period. The BDO business optimism index, which measures business confidence, saw its sharpest fall since 1995 between May and June this year, and who can blame those involved?
Finance Bill
Gavin Williamson Excerpts(14 years, 4 months ago)
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Gavin Williamson (South Staffordshire) (Con)
I shall try to be brief, as I was always told that brevity is a virtue. I am sure that many hon. Members will be brief in all their contributions this evening.
I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Lincoln (Karl MᶜCartney), who painted such a stirring picture of the city of Lincoln that most hon. Members will be hotfooting it there at the weekend if their constituency duties allow.
I listened with great interest to the hon. Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell), especially when he said that in his 13 years as a Member of Parliament taxation had never been simplified. I suggest that that is because of the 13 years of Labour Government during his time in Parliament; that is why the taxation system has got so complicated. To reduce tax avoidance we need to ensure that we have a simple and plain tax system. It might be a difficult concept to accept, but the less tax we have to raise, the less chance there is of having tax avoidance. It is beautifully simple, but beautifully true.
Stewart Hosie
The case for a simple tax regime is well made. Had the Government abandoned capital allowances and the annual investment allowance, that would have been simpler, but instead they just reduced and changed them. Can the hon. Gentleman explain how that simplifies the tax code in the way that he has described, rather than otherwise?
Gavin Williamson
I am obviously far below the pay grade of my hon. Friends on the Front Bench, but I am sure that they have great plans to make the tax system much fairer and more equal, right across the board.
One important thing that my hon. Friends have done is reduce corporation tax, which will help so many businesses. Most importantly, they have helped small businesses—it is often small businesses that have had the most difficult time over the past few years—which is something that I warmly welcome.
Gavin Williamson
The hon. Gentleman makes an interesting point, although more people becoming incorporated as limited companies will reduce the amount of tax avoidance from which people could perhaps benefit as sole traders.
Stephen Timms
I join others in congratulating the hon. Member for Lincoln (Karl MᶜCartney) on his maiden speech. He launched some important claims on behalf of his constituents. I was interested in the case that he made for reintroducing indexation and taper relief on capital gains tax. I suspect that these debates will gain a new currency, given the increase in the rate of capital gains tax that the Bill introduces. I also welcome the evidence of independent thinking that he showed the Committee today, and I appreciate, as many will, his generous remarks about Gillian Merron, who was certainly a very popular Member of the House, as well as a popular feature in the local press in the hon. Gentleman’s constituency.
I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell) for raising this issue. He has done us a service by raising some important points. I do not agree with his criticism of the previous Government in that respect, as I shall explain, but it is right that we should have this debate in this part of our consideration of the Bill.
I enjoyed listening to what the hon. Member for South Staffordshire (Gavin Williamson) said a moment ago. What he was saying, I think, was that he was expecting the new Government to simplify the tax system. Well, maybe, although I do not think that there is much simplification in the Bill. In fact, there is a major new complication, as we will see when we come to clause 2. For the first time ever, the rate of capital gains tax is being changed in the middle of a year. That is a significant new complexity that the Bill introduces. Although I am touched by his faith, I suspect that he might find himself somewhat disappointed as time goes on.
My hon. Friend the Member for Hayes and Harlington was right to pay tribute to the work of Richard Murphy and the tax justice campaign. I want to pay particular tribute to Richard Murphy for developing, and first arguing for, the idea of country-by-country reporting. We are debating the avoidance, and indeed evasion, of corporation tax, and of course, that is a matter not only for the UK but for developing countries on a large scale as well. Richard Murphy was the first person to argue that companies should report, on a country-by-country basis, the profits that they make in each country and the tax that they pay in each country, so that everyone can see if there is a mismatch between the two.
The previous Government supported that call, and I am pleased that the OECD is taking the matter up. I think that we are now going to see some progress on that front, thanks to Richard’s efforts. I note from his blog that he has been on the receiving end of some unwarranted online harassment recently on account of his work. I certainly wish him well in what he is doing. However, I am not entirely persuaded by his criticism, or that of my hon. Friend the Member for Hayes and Harlington, of the work of HMRC on the tax gap. As my hon. Friend rightly mentioned, however, it is inevitable that any estimates in this area will be uncertain because no one knows precisely what is being hidden from the tax authorities.
Narrowing the tax gap was an important priority for the previous Government, and I was grateful for the comments made by the hon. Member for Southport (Dr Pugh) and by the Minister in the debate on tax avoidance that was held in Westminster Hall on 14 June. In that debate, my hon. Friend the Member for Wallasey (Ms Eagle) set out the key elements of the progress that the previous Government had made on tackling the problem of avoidance. One of the initiatives that we took was to propose a voluntary code of practice for the banks, and I hope that the Minister will be able to tell us more about this when he winds up the debate. My hon. Friend the Member for Leeds East (Mr Mudie) mentioned one of the banks a few moments ago. The idea was that banks would sign up to the code of practice and, in doing so, would agree to stick not only to the law on the payment of taxes but to the spirit of the law as well.
Having listened to the arguments put forward by the right hon. Member for Wokingham (Mr Redwood), I imagine that he would be opposed to that initiative, because he would feel that it should simply be a matter of asking, “Are you or are you not complying with the letter of the law?” and that, if a problem arose, the Government should legislate to close the loophole. The problem with that approach is that we can get into an arms race, as we have certainly done on many occasions, in which the Government and Parliament agree on changes to the law and everyone knows perfectly well what they mean, but the banks then commission ingenious accountants to find ways round the spirit of the law, even though the letter of the law is being complied with. If we were to stick with the approach for which the right hon. Gentleman is arguing, Parliament would then have to close the loophole, perhaps a year later, and the circle would continue to go round. He made an interesting case, but we have to find a way of breaking that vicious circle, because huge amounts of money are being spent by taxpayers and by HMRC, and, in the end, nobody benefits.
Gavin Williamson
In 1997, we had the 11th lowest rate of corporation tax, whereas in 2010 we have only the 23rd lowest. Does the right hon. Gentleman believe that that might have some impact on corporation tax evasion?
Stephen Timms
I believe that it is important, as the previous Government made clear was their continuing intention, to have the lowest rate of corporation tax in the G7. That is why we reduced corporation tax when we were in government, and when we come to debate the rate, as we will in a few minutes’ time, I will press the Minister to reiterate on behalf of the present Government the commitment that was made and indeed fulfilled by the previous Government—to have a competitive corporation tax regime.
Gavin Williamson
When global companies are looking across the globe to where they should locate their headquarters, is the right hon. Gentleman not concerned that we slipped so far down the rankings under a Labour Government?
Stephen Timms
No, we were successful in maintaining a competitive business tax system in the UK. It is true, of course, that if a company goes to Ireland, it will pay a much lower rate of corporation than it would in the UK, but that rate of corporation tax in Ireland is lower than in any G7 country. Our commitment was to keep the UK’s corporation tax rate the lowest in the G7, and that is what we successfully did. It was important that we did so.
There is debate about whether the £40 billion figure is correct. I believe that HMRC did a serious and careful analysis. I also think there should be more discussion with people such as Richard Murphy. I believe his figure for the tax gap on corporation tax was about £12 billion—not vastly more than the £9 billion or so in the HMRC figure. Richard Murphy also makes the point that there is uncertainty—perhaps more uncertainty—about that figure than some of the others that he estimates. Continuing discussion between people such as the tax justice campaign and HMRC is important so that we make these figures as accurate as possible. I very much hope that the Minister will confirm that it is his intention regularly to update the analysis that has been published, to be frank and robust in publication and to discuss the issues with the tax justice campaign, which takes a different view, and the TUC, which has also taken a close interest. Ultimately, it is in everyone’s interest to have the best possible information available. I hope that the Minister will reassure us on that.
Economic Affairs and Work and Pensions
Gavin Williamson Excerpts(14 years, 5 months ago)
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Gavin Williamson (South Staffordshire) (Con)
It is a great honour to be called and to follow so many fantastic maiden speeches: when the bar is set so high, it is often easier to duck under it. It is a great honour to serve South Staffordshire. It is traditional for hon. Members to pay tribute to their predecessors, and that is easier for some than it is for others.
It is easy for me to pay tribute not only to my predecessors for previous constituencies, such as Cannock and Brierley Hill—for example, Sir Fergus Montgomery and Jennie Lee, who were great parliamentarians—but to my immediate predecessor, Sir Patrick Cormack, a great parliamentarian whom we all greatly admire. Sir Patrick believed in and fought passionately for his constituency and constituents, but he also believed passionately in this House—in its traditions and its importance in our national life. He also believed in the importance of a strong House of Commons in holding the Government to account and ensuring good government. Those principles were close to Sir Patrick’s heart and will be close to mine.
Over the weeks following my selection, Sir Patrick and I became good and close friends. We enjoyed spending a great amount of time campaigning together, and although our styles were sometimes a little different, that made it all the more enjoyable. I remember campaigning in the former mining village of Great Wyrley, where many constituents rushed up to Sir Patrick to wish him well in his retirement and thank him for the work he had done for them. They shook his hand and said, “Mr McCormack, Mr McCormack.” After about the 10th person had done so, I said to Sir Patrick, “Don’t you ever correct them?” He said, “Dear boy, after 40 years, it hardly seems worth bothering, don’t you think?” It is an honour to step into Sir Patrick’s very large shoes, but I hope that, over the years, I will gain some of his panache and style, which graced this Chamber, and that I will be an asset not only to the people of South Staffordshire but to this House.
South Staffordshire is one of those constituencies about which so many people say, “Where is it? Which town is in it?” People probably travel through it many times when they go up the M6 or up the west coast main line. It is a beautiful constituency that does not have a single major town, but is built up around many small, and some large, villages scattered across the South Staffordshire countryside. Many of those villages were born out of the industrial revolution and coal mining traditions, and have settled in some of the most beautiful, pretty and gentle English countryside that one can imagine.
The people are straight talkers, which, as a Yorkshireman, is comforting to know. As a straight talker myself, it is nice to have it blunt from others. South Staffordshire is a beautiful constituency that is criss-crossed by many canals and beautiful fields. However, it has its problems and issues. In South Staffordshire, compared with the national average, twice as many people work in manufacturing. That is important to me, because I have worked in manufacturing since I left university. I think it is fair to say that I am one of the few potters who sit in the House today. It is that experience of manufacturing that I hope to bring to the House, because far too often Governments of all colours have believed that we can build a strong, stable and vibrant economy on the twin pillars of financial services and coffee-shop economics. I have a great deal of respect for anyone who works in coffee shops and I even grudgingly admit that we might need bankers, but we cannot have a vibrant British economy without a strong and vibrant manufacturing sector.
Far too often, young people who go into manufacturing or engineering are seen as taking a second-class career, whereas we reward and sing the praises of people who go into accountancy, the law or public relations. We do not sing enough the praises of our designers, engineers and manufacturers. We need to change that ethos and have a similar one to that of Germany or Japan. We will have a truly vibrant economy only when we recreate the Victorian spirit of ingenuity and inventiveness that made Britain such a vibrant country, as I am sure it will be again.
I truly welcome the Prime Minister’s comments about the importance of manufacturing and I hope that the Treasury team listen well to his comments and do not spend all their time listening to bankers. They should also listen to manufacturers, because we often have a lot more common sense than bankers. I hope I can play my part in representing South Staffordshire and the people of a beautiful and lovely constituency, and that I can ensure their voices are heard loud and clear in this Chamber.