Fuel Costs

Debate between George Freeman and Claire Perry

Monday 7th February 2011 Commons Chamber

[George Freeman]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point.

On the wider economy, fuel inflation in rural areas not only affects rural communities but hinders our national economic growth. This goes to the heart of two of the coalition’s laudable objectives: the rebalancing of the economy and promotion of economic growth outside the City of London and our main metropolitan centres; and the attempts to help those sectors of the economy that do more than operate in the service, retail and housing industries—namely, the sectors that make things, transport things and sell things. Those sectors are hit particularly hard and we need to do all that we can to help them.

The reality that those on the Opposition Benches—particularly the Labour Benches—do not want to face is the fact that we have inherited a chronic legacy in our public finances that is costing £120 million a day in interest, which represents £20,000 of debt for every man, woman and child in the country. If we had not tackled the debt crisis, the interest payments would have been heading towards £70 billion a year. I repeat these figures because they need repeating to those on the Labour Benches. It ill behoves a serious party of government to come to the House, as those on the Labour Front Bench did today, and show no recognition of its part in causing this fiscal crisis. Labour Members have made no serious analysis of the rural economy and rural communities—[Interruption.] I wish that they would listen to what I am saying, rather than talking over it. They had no positive suggestions for how we might tackle the problem.

Fuel inflation risks strangling the economic recovery in our most marginal rural communities, but we cannot afford to do what we would like to do to address that. I therefore urge the Government, in accepting the constraints under which they are operating, to look carefully at the options.

[Claire Perry (Devizes) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that we need a sustainable solution, one that will work in bad times as well as good, rather than a knee-jerk reaction to what is clearly a problem for many rural constituencies, including my own?

[George Freeman]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. It is vital that we should not go for some short-term gimmick, and that we make a sustainable, serious commitment to helping rural communities and the rural economy.

My constituents and many in other rural constituencies have been encouraged by the Prime Minister’s continued espousal of the benefits of a fair fuel stabiliser. I defer to Ministers and experts in the Treasury on determining the right mechanism for that. We have a duty to make some gesture towards ameliorating this problem, and my plea to the Ministers and Treasury experts is that, whatever mechanism we go for, we focus on two groups in most urgent need: the rural small businesses on which we rely for economic growth and for the jobs in the rural economy on which we all ultimately depend; and the very lowest-paid employees who are struggling to get on and make something of their lives by earning a living. In my constituency, the average income is £17,500, and such people are hit hardest by this serious problem. I urge Ministers to do all that they can in the forthcoming Budget.