Charter for Budget Responsibility

Debate between George Osborne and Lord Sharma

Tuesday 13th January 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

We retain our triple A credit rating with some credit rating agencies. I can tell the right hon. Gentleman one thing for sure: the only way we will get back our triple A credit rating is by dealing with our debts, cutting our spending and making sure this country can live within its means. If anyone thinks the answer to Britain’s debt problems is to borrow £170 billion more, which is what the Labour party is proposing, they will be leading Britain back into economic ruin.

We remember what the shadow Chancellor said was going to happen if we pursued this plan. He said we would choke off growth and that there would be a double-dip recession. Britain has grown faster than any other major European economy in the past four years. We have grown faster than any major economy in 2014 and the one recession we had was the one big recession, the great recession, on Labour’s watch.

[Alok Sharma (Reading West) (Con)]

It was of course a Labour Government, led by James Callaghan, who went cap in hand to the IMF, and the Blair-Brown Government left us with a record deficit. Does the Chancellor share my view that it does not matter what that lot say today? History repeats itself and, when it comes to Labour, we cannot trust them with the public finances.

[Mr Osborne]

You cannot trust the Labour party with people’s money. Every Labour Government leads this country into bankruptcy. Every Labour Government left office with unemployment higher than when it came to office. That is what Labour does when it gets into office. People remember that and they will not trust them with the public finances again. We remember what Labour said was going to happen to jobs: they said that 1 million jobs would be lost. Instead, we have 1.7 million more people in work. Unemployment is falling. Youth unemployment is down by more than half. Full employment is in sight. They said that public services would be decimated and crime would rise. Crime has fallen and satisfaction with local government services is up. They said that the north of England would suffer the most, just as it had suffered the most in their great recession. Now, the fastest growing part of our economy is the north of England and we are building that northern powerhouse.