Gideon Amos
Main Page: Gideon Amos (Liberal Democrat - Taunton and Wellington)Department Debates - View all Gideon Amos's debates with the HM Treasury
(1 day, 8 hours ago)
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Rachel Reeves
It was a real pleasure after the Budget last year to join my hon. Friend at a community centre in Rugby, where I was able to talk to his constituents about the benefits of the £150 cut in energy bills. The conversation I remember most from my hon. Friend’s constituency was with a woman who had lost her husband just six months before. She had four children and will benefit from the changes we made by getting rid of the two-child limit. That is a conversation I will not forget, and it is the difference we are making in government.
Gideon Amos (Taunton and Wellington) (LD)
Monkton Elm garden centre, with its 400-cover restaurant employing 120 staff, has been hit by a £70,000 increase in its business rates this year as part of £178,000 in costs put on by the last Budget. If the Government will not accept the 5% cut in VAT that the Liberal Democrats propose—we would fund that by a tax on banks, by the way, not from cutting services—those at the garden centre would like to know whether the Chancellor will none the less extend the 15% discount to pubs on their business rates to restaurants? That would give our local businesses the support they need and give everyone the boost they want to see in our economy.
Rachel Reeves
As the hon. Gentleman knows, we are conducting a review of how the Valuation Office Agency calculates business rates, including for our hospitality sector. The last time that the Liberal Democrats were in office and they had a choice over VAT policy, they increased it from 17.5% to 20%. I am not sure why the public should believe that this time it would somehow be different.