The Economy and Work

Debate between George Osborne and Natascha Engel

Thursday 26th May 2016 Commons Chamber

[Geraint Davies]

On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. Surely this is meant to be a debate about the Queen’s Speech, not the Labour party?

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Natascha Engel)]

How the Chancellor chooses to use his speech is up to him. I would have thought that, since it is his Queen’s Speech, his focus would be on that, but it is up to him.

[Mr Osborne]

We cannot talk about the Queen’s Speech unless we know what the alternative might look like. This is what the Labour party says about itself: it says the Labour party is becoming increasingly

“irrelevant to the…working people in the country.”

If we think Labour has learned any lessons, this is what has happened today. The leader of the Labour party has today appointed someone called Andrew Fisher as the head of policy for the Labour party. This is a man who campaigned against Labour candidates at the general election in Croydon. This is a man who took part in the 2010 student riots and boasted about breaking through police lines, scaring the police and hurling abuse at them. This is what his economic policy consists of: public ownership of all land in the country; nationalising all banks; and returning to a three-day week. This is the man who has just become the Labour party’s head of policy.

Economic Policy

Debate between George Osborne and Natascha Engel

Monday 25th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. As I have said before, the Institute for Fiscal Studies says that the Labour plans would add £200 billion extra to borrowing. In the end, the clue is in how one answers the questions, and the shadow Chancellor was asked six times on the radio—many will have heard it—whether borrowing would go up under a Labour Government. He did not want to give a clear answer. Why is that? It is because Labour does not want to admit that borrowing would go up. Finally, on the seventh question, he was forced to admit it, but it is the policy that dare not speak its name.

[Natascha Engel (North East Derbyshire) (Lab)]

As well as the lack of growth in the economy, Moody’s also cited in its downgrading decision its concern about the implementation risks surrounding the current austerity plans. What is the Chancellor doing to address those?

[Mr Osborne]

That is the first sensible question we have heard from the Labour party all afternoon. I agree with the hon. Lady that we have to make sure that the decisions we take on reducing the size of Government are implemented. Collectively as a Parliament we have to reduce Government spending and we have to get the deficit down. I look forward to her support in the Division Lobby as we take further difficult decisions this year.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between George Osborne and Natascha Engel

Tuesday 26th June 2012 Commons Chamber

[Natascha Engel (North East Derbyshire) (Lab)]

2. What estimate he has made of the proportion of the money issued through quantitative easing which has been used by banks to pay off their debts.

[The Chancellor of the Exchequer (Mr George Osborne)]

Quantitative easing is a tool of the independent Monetary Policy Committee and has been designed to work through channels other than the impaired banking system by stimulating activity in capital markets. The Government and the Bank of England are working together on a new funding for lending scheme that will more broadly support sustained and increased bank lending to the economy. I can confirm for the first time that in the three months since the start of the national loan guarantee scheme, over 10,000 cheaper loans worth over £1.5 billion have been offered to businesses. I can also confirm that we have today secured EU state aid approval to extend the scheme to medium-sized businesses with a turnover of up to £250 million. That means 99.9% of UK businesses can now benefit.

[Natascha Engel]

Quantitative easing was certainly intended to stimulate the economy, but in reality it is being used to write off the debts of reckless banks with hundreds of billions of pounds’ worth of virtual money. Has anyone in Government thought through the consequences of this policy, and if so, what are they?

[Mr Osborne]

The Bank of England conducted a study of the first round of QE that it undertook under the last Government, and estimated that it had increased real GDP by between 1.5% and 2%. The Bank’s chief economist says that the asset programme regime

“was explicitly designed to go around the banking system”.

I therefore do not accept the hon. Lady’s characterisation.

Eurozone Crisis

Debate between George Osborne and Natascha Engel

Thursday 27th October 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

They were all written by him.

The Foreign Secretary described the euro as a

“burning building with no exits”.

That was his point. As I said, the break-up of the euro, disorderly or otherwise, this autumn or in the foreseeable future, would cause enormous instability to the entire global economy and do enormous damage to the British economy.

[Natascha Engel (North East Derbyshire) (Lab)]

Will the Chancellor provide some clarification? He said that no UK funding would go to the euro bail-out. When he talked about supporting the IMF, therefore, did he mean with advice and suggestions only or is he using UK taxpayers’ money to support it? If the latter, how will he force the IMF to ring-fence the money so that it does not pay for a euro bail-out?

[Mr Osborne]

Let me be clear to the hon. Lady. The IMF potentially has a role—but that is yet to be decided—in helping the eurozone to organise its special purpose vehicle, provide technical support and do all the things that it is very good at doing, which is stepping in and providing expertise. That is a perfectly legitimate role for the IMF. It has done it in other situations where trust funds and the like have been created around the world. However, we are saying that there should not be IMF resources going into this special purpose vehicle in terms of a lending programme. The IMF lends money to countries with conditions attached, and that is what it should do in the future. It is what its articles require it to do. We do not support, and I do not think that the IMF does either, changing those articles and allowing the IMF to lend money to the special purpose vehicle. We are against that and against Britain contributing to the special purpose vehicle, even if countries such as China or Chinese sovereign wealth funds do contribute.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between George Osborne and Natascha Engel

Tuesday 8th June 2010 Commons Chamber

[Natascha Engel (North East Derbyshire) (Lab)]

I welcome the right hon. Gentleman to his new position. Has he calculated what his announcement of a £125 million reduction in the police grant means, in terms of fewer police officers and fewer special constables in Derbyshire?

[Mr Osborne]

All public services have to find efficiencies, and that is true of the police service, as it is of every other service. I have to say to the hon. Lady, and all Opposition Members, that if they are going to play a serious part in the discussion about how to reduce Britain’s record budget deficit, they need to come up with their own proposals instead of attacking every proposal put forward by the Government.